Tentative Ruling

Judge Thomas Anderle
Department 3 SB-Anacapa
1100 Anacapa Street P.O. Box 21107 Santa Barbara, CA 93121-1107

CIVIL LAW & MOTION
Leonard Blatt v. Rena Felicia Smith, et al.
Case No: 19CV05839
Hearing Date: Tue Feb 25, 2020 9:30

Nature of Proceedings: Demurrer

Demurrer

Attorneys:

Plaintiff: represents self

For Defendant: James M. Sweeney (Allen & Kimbell)

Ruling: The court sustains the demurrer of defendant Rena Felicia Smith, individually and as trustee of the Thomas Blatt Living Trust dated August 19, 2015, to plaintiff Leonard Blatt’s complaint without leave to amend.

Complaint:

Plaintiff Leonard Blatt filed his complaint for violations of the Elder and Dependent Adult Civil Protection Act (W&I Code §§ 15600, et seq.) and breach of fiduciary duty against defendant Rena Felicia Smith, individually and as trustee of the Thomas Blatt Living Trust dated August 19, 2015 (the “Trust”). Plaintiff alleges:

Plaintiff is the son of decedent Thomas “Toivi” Blatt and is a residual beneficiary of the Trust. [Complaint ¶5] Defendant is decedent’s daughter. [¶8] Plaintiff and decedent were close and plaintiff worked on decedent’s books about the Sobibor death camp where decedent was imprisoned. [¶¶15, 16] Decedent informed plaintiff that he intended to leave his wife a house and divide the rest of the estate between plaintiff and defendant. [¶18] Plaintiff saw decedent’s will that carried out this intent. [¶19] The Trust, written during a time decedent spent with defendant, excludes plaintiff from decedent’s $1.6 million dollar real property and the $10,000 monthly income it produces and only provides for $1,000 per month to plaintiff. [¶20]

Defendant is responsible for taking, secreting, appropriating, and/or retaining decedent’s property for wrongful use with intent to defraud, by undue influence during a time of decedent’s failing mental health, [¶¶28-31, 33] Defendant breached fiduciary duties to decedent by exerting undue influence to obtain the Trust and appropriate decedent’s Trust estate and by depriving decedent of his right to dispose of his property according to his long held and carefully crafted plan to provide an equal division of his property after giving his former wife a house. [¶¶38-40]

Plaintiff seeks damages, including treble and punitive damages, and restitution and disgorgement of profits.

Demurrer:

Defendant demurs to the complaint on the grounds that it is an untimely trust contest barred by the 120 day limitation period in Prob. Code § 16061.8 and is barred by res judicata or collateral estoppel because the validity of the Trust was previously determined in Case No. 17PR00212. Plaintiff has not filed an opposition to the demurrer.

1. Demurrer Standards: The court’s only task in ruling on a demurrer is to determine whether the complaint states a cause of action. Moore v. Regents of University of California, 51 Cal.3d 120, 125 (1990). The court treats “the demurrer as admitting all material facts properly pleaded, but not contentions, deductions or conclusions of fact or law”; considers “matters which may be judicially noticed”; and gives “the complaint a reasonable interpretation, reading it as a whole and its parts in their context.” Evans v. City of Berkeley, 38 Cal.4th 1, 6 (2006) [internal quotation marks and citations omitted]. The court also considers the reasonable inferences that may be drawn from the properly pleaded material facts. Reynolds v. Bement, 36 Cal.4th 1075, 1083 (2005).

2. Request for Judicial Notice: Defendant asks the Court to take judicial notice of six exhibits constituting the pleadings and order in Case No. 17PR00212.

“Evidence Code sections 452 and 453 permit the trial court to ‘take judicial notice of the existence of judicial opinions and court documents, along with the truth of the results reached – in the documents such as orders, statements of decision, and judgments – but [the court] cannot take judicial notice of the truth of hearsay statements in decisions or court files, including pleadings, affidavits, testimony, or statements of fact.’” People v. Woodell, 17 Cal.4th 448, 455 (1998). “Both trial and appellate courts may properly take judicial notice of a party’s earlier pleadings and positions as well as established facts from both the same case and other cases.” Cantu v. Resolution Trust Corp., 4 Cal.App.4th 857, 877 (1992).

Defendant does not offer the pleadings for the truth of what is asserted therein. Rather, defendant offers the pleadings to demonstrate the positions the parties took in the probate litigation and the Court’s order. The Court grants the request for judicial notice of Exhibits A-E.

3. Prior Proceeding: On May 11, 2017, in Case No. 17PR00212, defendant filed a petition to determine ownership of trust property and for an order confirming transfer of trust property. [Exhibit A] On August 9, 2017, plaintiff filed his answer to the petition and a declaration in which he argued that the Trust was invalid because decedent lacked testamentary capacity because of dementia and cognitive decline. [Exhibits B and C] On August 23, defendant filed a response explaining that the answer amounted to a contest of the Trust and was barred by the 120 day period after notice of irrevocability of the Trust in Prop. Code § 1601.8. That period had expired on March 31, 2017. [Exhibit D] Plaintiff’s verified reply dated August 31, 2017, acknowledged that he was time-barred from challenging the validity of the trust. [Exhibit E]

On September 21, 2017, the Court entered an order granting the May 2017 petition, confirming that defendant, as trustee of the Trust, had title to the property in question. [Exhibit F]

4. Collateral Attack on Trust: The complaint in this case is another collateral attack on the trust. Plaintiff alleges that decedent was deprived of his property rights by means of the August 15 (sic), 2015 Trust and/or other purported Trusts and wills, contrary to decedent’s original intent, and to the detriment of decedent’s true Trust beneficiaries. [Complaint ¶31] Plaintiff also alleges that defendant breached fiduciary duties to decedent by exerting undue influence to obtain the Trust and appropriate decedent’s Trust estate and by depriving decedent of his right to dispose of his property according to his long held and carefully crafted plan to provide an equal division of his property after giving his former wife a house. [Complaint ¶¶38-40]

Plaintiff has previously acknowledged that any attack on the Trust is barred by Prob. Code § 16061.8. That same position would apply equally to his collateral attack on the Trust here.

The probate litigation necessarily litigated the validity of the Trust, which plaintiff raised in his answer and declaration filed in response to defendant’s petition in that proceeding. “Collateral estoppel is one of two aspects of the doctrine of res judicata.” Vandenberg v. Superior Court, 21 Cal.4th 815, 828 (1999). “Where applicable, it prevents a party or that party’s privy from relitigating in a second proceeding an issue that was already litigated and determined in a prior proceeding.” Taylor v. Lockheed Martin Corp., 113 Cal.App.4th 380, 385 (2003). “If the matter was within the scope of the action, related to the subject-matter and relevant to the issues, so that it could have been raised, the judgment is conclusive on it despite the fact that it was not in fact expressly pleaded or otherwise urged.” Sutphin v. Speik, 15 Cal.2d 195, 202 (1940); Burdette v. Carrier Corp., 158 Cal.App.4th 1668, 1675 (2008). To the extent that undue influence was not raised in the probate litigation, it was related to the subject matter and relevant to the issues such that it could have been raised and the judgment in conclusive as to that issue.

For the foregoing reasons, the Court sustains the demurrer to the complaint. “If the plaintiff has not had an opportunity to amend the complaint in response to the demurrer, leave to amend is liberally allowed as a matter of fairness, unless the complaint shows on its face that it is incapable of amendment.” City of Stockton v. Superior Court, 42 Cal.4th 730, 747 (2007). That court noted that denial of leave to amend is appropriate where “a cause of action is plainly and irremediably defective.” Id. Here the time-barred attack on the Trust and the previously litigated issues preclude the possibility that plaintiff could amend the complaint to state a cause of action. Therefore, the Court will sustain the demurrer without leave to amend.

5. Order: The Court sustains the demurrer of defendant Rena Felicia Smith, individually and as trustee of the Thomas Blatt Living Trust dated August 19, 2015, to plaintiff Leonard Blatt’s complaint without leave to amend.