Opinion
1:22-cv-00746-HBK (PC)
05-24-2023
DONNY STEWARD, Plaintiff, v. C. PFEIFFER, ET AL., Defendants.
ORDER GRANTING DEFENDANTS' MOTION FOR JUDICIAL NOTICE
(Doc. No. 12-1)
HELENA M. BARCH-KUCHTA, UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE
Pending before the Court is Defendants' Motion for Judicial Notice, contained within Defendants' Opposition to Plaintiff's construed motion to remand. (Doc. No. 12-1). Defendant requests the Court to take judicial notice of the following pleadings and orders from Steward v. Pfeiffer, Kern County Superior Court Case No. BCV-20-102663, and Steward v. Pfeiffer, et al., No. 1:19-cv-001022-DAD-EPG (E.D. Cal.).
1. Complaint filed in Kern County Superior Court No. BCV-20-102663;
2. Order sustaining demurrer with leave to amend in Kern County Superior Court Case No. BCV-20-102663;
3. Order denying Defendants' motion to dismiss in Kern County Superior Court Case No. BCV-20-102663;
4. Notice of motion and amended complaint filed in Kern County Superior Court Case No. BCV-20-102663;
5. Electronic docket for Kern County Superior Court Case No. BCV-20-102663;
6. Notice to adverse party of removal to federal court filed in Kern County Superior Court Case No. BCV-20-102663;
7. Minutes concerning June 22, 2022 case management conference in Kern County Superior Court Case No. BCV-20-102663;
8. Complaint filed in Steward v. Pfeiffer, et al., No. 1:19-cv-001022-DAD-EPG (E.D. Cal.);
9. Electronic docket in Steward v. Pfeiffer, et al., No. 1:19-cv-001022-DAD-EPG (E.D. Cal.).
(Doc. No. 12-1 at 1-2)
Under Federal Rule of Evidence 201(b)(2), “[t]he court may judicially notice a fact that is not subject to reasonable dispute because it . . . can be accurately and readily determined from sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned.” Courts judicially notice other court proceedings “if those proceedings have a direct relation to the matters at issue.” United States ex. Rel. Robinson Rancheria Citizens Counsel v. Borneo, Inc., 971 F.2d 244, 248 (9th Cir. 1992) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted); Trigueros v. Adams, 658 F.3d 983, 987 (9th Cir. 2011). However, a court may not take judicial notice of findings of facts from another case. Walker v. Woodford, 454 F.Supp.2d 1007, 1022 (S.D. Cal. 2006).
Here, Defendants request that the Court take judicial notice of Plaintiff's filings from his state court case and his other federal case, all which have a direct relation to the current action in the Eastern District of California because they involved the same facts, claims, and parties. The pleadings and orders in the two matters are readily available to the court through the PACER database and the Kern County Superior Court Portal, both sources of information whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned. Accordingly, the court will grant Defendant's request to take judicial notice of the pleadings and orders in Steward v. Pfeiffer, Kern County Superior Court Case No. BCV-20-102663, and Steward v. Pfeiffer, et al., No. 1:19-cv-001022-DAD-EPG (E.D. Cal.). However, the Court's judicial notice of the filings in these cases does not constitute an endorsement or application of the findings in either case to the instant matter.
ACCORDINGLY, it is ORDERED:
Defendants' Motion for Judicial Notice (Doc. No. 12-1) is GRANTED.