Q: I am a receiver in a partnership dispute case. I have been served with a subpoena issued from a case outside the receivership case, seeking partnership records and emails to and from a defendant in that case. Neither the partnership nor the partners are parties in that case. Do I have to comply with the subpoena? There are few liquid assets in the estate and it will be costly to locate and produce the documents.

A: Based on the reasoning in a recent bankruptcy case, from the Central District of California, if the subpoenaing party did not first obtain leave of the receivership court to ...

Since its enactment in 2020, employers have been forced to be mindful of the burdensome imposition of Code of Civil Procedure section 1281.97 et seq., which requires an employer to pay the full amount of arbitration fees within 30 days of an arbitrator’s invoice being due, unless the arbitration agreement specifies a different deadline. In a recent opinion titled Espinoza v. Superior Court, the Court of Appeals clarified that this deadline must be strictly followed and there is no leeway for “substantial compliance.” 

In Espinoza, a defendant employer failed to pay the ...

Effective January 1, 2023, under Assembly Bill 1949, which amends the California Family Rights Act (CFRA), California employers with at least five employees must provide up to five days of bereavement leave to an eligible employee upon the death of a family member.  To be eligible for the leave, the employee must have completed at least 30 days’ service prior to the leave.  “Family member” means a spouse or a child, parent, sibling, grandparent, grandchild, domestic partner, or parent-in-law. 

The leave is unpaid, but the employee may elect to use available vacation, personal ...

With the relaxation of some governmental COVID-19 measures, it may appear that employers need no longer be concerned with any of the requirements imposed in the last two years.  On the contrary, the California Legislature has created a number of new COVID-19-related laws that may California Employers: 

• Assembly Bill 152 extends COVID-19 Supplemental Paid Sick Leave (SPSL), which had been set to expire on September 30, 2022, to December 31, 2022. That means that California employers with at least 26 employees must continue to provide, under specified COVID-19-related ...