Opinion
C098074
04-22-2024
GOLD STRIKE HEIGHTS HOMEOWNERS ASSOCIATION et al., Plaintiffs and Respondents, v. DON H. LEE, Movant and Appellant.
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
Super. Ct. No. CV34353
BOULWARE EURIE, J.
Don H. Lee, representing himself in pro. per., appeals the trial court's determination in a postjudgment order that he is not a judgment creditor entitled to renew a money judgment against the Gold Strike Homeowners Association (the Association). No respondent's brief was filed. But former officers and directors of the Association did appear in the trial court, where they asked to be excused from a judgment debtor examination. In taking that position, the former officers and directors explicitly recognized Lee's right to execute judgment against the Association. Because the trial court's determination that Lee is not a judgment creditor entitled to renew a money judgment exceeded the relief requested by the Association's former officers and directors, we agree with Lee that it was inconsistent with due process principles. We therefore vacate the trial court's February 24, 2023 order and remand for further proceedings.
BACKGROUND
When a clubhouse in a new real estate subdivision was not built, the Association sued the developer for breach of contract. (Gold Strike Heights Homeowners Assn. v. Financial Pacific Insurance Company et al. (July 13, 2012, C066240) [nonpub. opn.].)In 2012, a different panel of this court affirmed judgment in favor of the developer (ibid.) and the trial court later ordered the Association to pay over $100,000 in attorney fees to the developer. In October 2015, and because the developer owed money to Lee, the trial court ordered the clerk of the superior court to levy in favor of Lee upon the developer's attorney-fee money judgment, and in May 2022, Lee filed an application to renew the money judgment.
On our own motion, we take judicial notice of our prior opinion in this case. (Evid. Code, § 452, subd. (d).)
Apparently, Lee obtained a default judgment against the developer in an action as an assignee to recover monthly homeowners association dues paid to the developer.
" 'Code of Civil Procedure section 683.020, which defines the period for enforceability of judgments, provides after the expiration of 10 years after the date of entry of a money judgment . . . the judgment may not be enforced. One way to preserve such a judgment is to file an application for renewal under the terms of Code of Civil Procedure sections 683.120 and 683.130 before the expiration of the 10-year enforceability period. Such application automatically renews the judgment for a period of 10 years.'" (Rubin v. Ross (2021) 65 Cal.App.5th 153, 161.)
In a November 2022 filing, Lee identified himself as the Association's judgment creditor from the action related to the unbuilt clubhouse and the trial court signed his application for a judgment debtor examination order requiring at least one officer, director, "or other persons familiar with" the Association's property and debts to appear in a courtroom on the afternoon of January 27, 2023, and to furnish information to aid in enforcement of the money judgment. Using a Judicial Council form (FW-020), Lee represented he had received a waiver of court fees and costs in the action and requested a court reporter for the January 27 hearing.
Counsel for former officers and directors of the Association filed a pleading asking that they be excused from the judgment debtor examination, contending that (1) while Lee was "entitled to execute a judgment against the Association" (boldface omitted), (2) the Association dissolved and filed a bankruptcy petition in 2015, and (3) the former officers and directors were mere "volunteers" and asking them questions "about a long-ago dissolved and bankrupt corporation" was "harassment" that "serve[d] no proper purpose."
In response, Lee filed a pleading captioned "judgment creditor's objection to any further proceedings without a court reporter present." (Boldface &capitalization omitted.) In that pleading, Lee objected to further proceedings "regard[ing] the scheduling of a [d]ebtors [e]xamination, without a court reporter present, under the principles established" by Jameson v. Desta (2018) 5 Cal.5th 594.
In that case, our Supreme Court held that "as applied to in forma pauperis litigants who are entitled to a waiver of official court reporter fees," a trial court's "general policy of not providing official court reporters in most civil trials while permitting privately retained court reporters for parties who can afford to pay for such reporters [was] inconsistent with the general teaching of prior California in forma pauperis judicial decisions and the public policy of facilitating equal access to the courts embodied in [Government Code] section 68630, subdivision (a)." (Jameson v. Desta, supra, 5 Cal.5th at p. 599.)
Several weeks later, on February 24, 2023, the trial court held a hearing at which Lee and counsel for the Association's former officers and directors were present, but not a court reporter. According to a minute order, the trial court informed Lee that "the reporter is taking down criminal cases" and observed that Lee "did not make a request that a court reporter be provided for this hearing." The minute order continues: "At the court's inquiry, Mr. Lee does not wish to make an oral argument on the court's tentative ruling." In a written ruling filed the same day as the hearing, the trial court (1) denied Lee's application for a judgment debtor examination order, (2) found that Lee "is not 'a judgment creditor' entitled to renew" the developer's money judgment against the Association, and (3) "vacated sua sponte" Lee's May 2022 renewal of the money judgment. Lee appealed.
DISCUSSION
Lee contends the trial court erred in multiple ways, including that it (1) violated his due process rights by ruling on an issue that was "never subjected to any briefing by the parties" and "strip[ped]" him of his judgment creditor status, (2) failed to honor his request for a court reporter and denied his request to continue the hearing so he could try to obtain a reporter, and (3) misunderstood the applicable law when it ruled he was not the Association's judgment creditor. We agree the trial court's ruling regarding Lee's judgment creditor status must be reversed as inconsistent with principles of due process.That conclusion makes it unnecessary to consider Lee's other contentions.
Lee's brief lacks pertinent citations to the record and legal authorities. But, in part because the record reflects Lee tried make sure there would be a court reporter at the hearing on February 24, 2023, we will reach the merits of this appeal in the interests of justice.
I
Due Process
We review de novo whether a litigant has been afforded the necessary due process before issuance of a court order. (In re Marriage of Siegel (2015) 239 Cal.App.4th 944, 953 (Siegel).) Fundamental to the concept of due process is the notion that judgment against a litigant cannot be entered absent proper notice and an opportunity to state a position on the matter. Relatedly, a court cannot grant unrequested relief against a party absent notice and an opportunity to respond. (Id. at pp. 953-954.)
In Siegel, the appellate court reversed a postjudgment court order on those grounds. A divorce judgment required an ex-husband to establish a life insurance trust for his ex-wife, subject to certain terms. Years later, the ex-wife requested a court order requiring her ex-husband to prove the insurance policy existed. The ex-husband filed responsive papers and did not appear at the hearing. At the hearing, the family court judge construed the ex-wife's request "as a motion to enforce the marital termination agreement, and issued an order after the hearing which . . . required [the ex-husband] to establish a $126,916 trust with [the ex-wife] as the beneficiary." (Siegel, supra, 239 Cal.App.4th at pp. 946-947.) The appellate court ruled "the trial court erred by issuing an order that far exceeded the relief requested by" the ex-wife. (Ibid., italics added.) This was so because the ex-wife's "request for an order to disclose insurance information as 'proof' that a life insurance policy existed could not be treated, consistent with due process, as notice that the family court would take the matter under submission and issue an order requiring [the ex-husband] to establish and fund a $126,916 trust." (Id. at p. 958, italics added.)
Here, the Association's former officers and directors asked the trial court to excuse them from the judgment debtor examination that "serve[d] no proper purpose" because they had no helpful information to provide about "a long-ago dissolved and bankrupt corporation." In making that request, they expressly recognized (in bolded and underlined text) Lee's right "to execute judgment against the Association." The trial court's determination that Lee is not a judgment creditor of the Association "far exceeded the relief requested" and therefore was inconsistent with due process. (Siegel, supra, 239 Cal.App.4th at pp. 947, 958.) Accordingly, that determination and the resulting vacatur of Lee's May 2022 renewal of the money judgment against the Association must be reversed.
II
Lee's Other Claims
Because Lee challenges only the trial court's determination that he is not a judgment creditor of the Association, we need not address his other claims of error.
DISPOSITION
The trial court's February 24, 2023 order is vacated and the matter is remanded to the trial court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. Because respondents did not appear in this appeal, appellant shall bear his own costs on appeal. (Cal. Rules of Court, rule 8.278(a)(5); see S.C. v. G.S. (2019) 38 Cal.App.5th 591, 602.)
We concur: EARL, P. J., KRAUSE, J.