Filed 9/10/26 Marquez v. Equinox Holdings CA2/7 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS
California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.
IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT
DIVISION SEVEN
JUANITA MARQUEZ, B333140
Plaintiff and Appellant, (Los Angeles County Super. Ct. No.
v. 22STCV20090)
EQUINOX HOLDINGS, INC.,
Defendant and Respondent.
APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County, Serena Murillo, Judge. Reversed with directions.
Law Office of Alfredo Nava Jr. and Alfredo Nava for Plaintiff and Appellant.
Jackson Lewis, Adam Y. Siegel, Kishaniah Dhamodaran, and Dylan B. Carp for Defendant and Respondent.
_____________________________
INTRODUCTION
Juanita Marquez appeals from a judgment dismissing her action against her former employer Equinox Holdings Inc. under the Private Attorneys General Act of 2004, Labor Code section 2698 et seq. (PAGA).1 Marquez asserted one cause of action under PAGA, alleging among other things that Equinox violated section 216, subdivision (a), which prohibits employers from willfully refusing to pay wages due and payable after demand, and section 1199, subdivision (c), which prohibits employers from violating or failing to comply with certain provisions of the Labor Code or an order of the Industrial Welfare Commission. One such order requires employers to maintain wage-and-time records and make them available for employee inspection.
Equinox demurred to Marquez’s PAGA cause of action, arguing the applicable one-year statute of limitations barred her complaint. The trial court sustained Equinox’s demurrer without leave to amend, ruling her complaint was untimely because she did not make her wage or inspection demand within one year after Equinox terminated her employment. Marquez argues the statute of limitations did not bar her complaint because, though she did not make her demand until nearly two years after her employment ended, Equinox violated sections 216 and 1199 when it denied those requests, and Marquez filed this action within one year of that denial.
The trial court erred. The statute of limitations begins to run when the claim accrues, and no sooner. Marquez alleged a
1 Undesignated statutory references are to the Labor Code.
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violation—Equinox wrongly denied her demand for unpaid wages, in violation of section 216, subdivision (a)—that did not accrue until at least after she made her request. Marquez filed her action within a year of her request. Therefore, we reverse.
FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
A. Marquez Claims Equinox Committed Labor Code Violations
Marquez alleged she began working for Equinox “a few years” before she filed her operative, first amended complaint in December 2022. She alleged that throughout her employment she “would work more than five hours in a shift without being provided or relieved of duty for purposes of taking a meal break” and that Equinox failed to include “non-discretionary bonuses and commissions” in calculating pay for meal-break premiums and sick days, which resulted in “an illegal underpayment.” According to a complaint Marquez filed in a different action, Equinox terminated her employment on December 9, 2019.
Marquez alleged that, “on or about October 4, 2021”—
almost two years after her employment with Equinox ended—she demanded Equinox pay her “uncompensated meal break premiums” and produce her “time and payment records.” She alleged that the “unpaid wages were not provided by October 14, 2021” and that her time records were not “reasonably provided,” even after “multiple demands in writing.” On April 12, 2022, approximately 28 months after Equinox terminated her employment, and six months after she made her demand for payment and records, Marquez notified Equinox and the Labor
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and Workforce Development Agency of the alleged Labor Code violations.
B. The Trial Court Sustains Equinox’s Initial Demurrer with Leave To Amend
On June 20, 2022 Marquez filed this action, seeking PAGA penalties on behalf of herself and “all other aggrieved employees.” Equinox demurred, arguing Marquez’s PAGA action was time-barred.
The trial court sustained Equinox’s initial demurrer to all the Labor Code causes of action, except those based on sections 216 and 1199, with leave to amend. Section 216, subdivision (a), authorizes misdemeanor charges, as well as “any other penalty imposed by this article,” against any person who, “[h]aving the ability to pay, willfully refuses to pay wages due and payable after demand has been made.” Section 1199, subdivision (c), makes it a misdemeanor to violate, or to refuse or neglect to comply with, “any provision of this chapter or any order or ruling of” the Industrial Welfare Commission. Commission Order Number 10-2001, which applies to the amusement and recreation industry and governs “gymnasiums.”2 That order requires employers to keep required records on file “for at least three years” and to make them “available for inspection by the employee upon reasonable request.” (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 8, § 11100, subd. 7(C).)
2 According to the complaint, Equinox is “a business engaged in the ownership, management and operation of . . . fitness and gym-related facilities.”
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C. Marquez Files an Amended Complaint, and the Trial Court Sustains Equinox’s Demurrer Without Leave To Amend
Marquez filed an amended complaint, and Equinox demurred again, renewing its argument the statute of limitations in Code of Civil Procedure section 340, subdivision (a), barred Marquez’s complaint because she filed it more than one year after Equinox terminated her employment. The trial court sustained the demurrer without leave to amend. The court ruled the action was untimely, concluding that “it would be absurd to construe Section 216” to delay the accrual of a cause of action until the employee made a demand, even if the employee waited more than a year after her employment ended to do so and even if the employee should have known “upon discharge, or soon thereafter, that wages were due.” Regarding Equinox’s failure to comply with the inspection wage order, the court ruled Marquez’s inspection demand was not “reasonable” because she made it more than one year after her employment ended. Thus, the court ruled, the one-year statute of limitations requires an employee to make “a demand for payment of all outstanding wages owed and time records kept” within one year of the employee’s discharge to support a PAGA action. The court entered a judgment dismissing Marquez’s complaint with prejudice, and she timely appealed.
DISCUSSION
A. Marquez’s Appeal Is Not Moot Equinox argues we should dismiss Marquez’s appeal as moot because a judgment based on a settlement agreement in a
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different PAGA case, Porter v. Equinox Holdings, Inc., (Super. Ct. Alameda County, 2019, No. RG19009052) (Porter), bars Marquez’s PAGA claim under the doctrine of claim preclusion. Dismissing the appeal is not appropriate.
Claim preclusion is an affirmative defense the defendant ordinarily must first raise in the trial court. (See, e.g., Rodgers v. Sargent Controls & Aerospace (2006) 136 Cal.App.4th 82, 88; David v. Hermann (2005) 129 Cal.App.4th 672, 630.) Equinox did not argue in its demurrer claim preclusion barred Marquez’s complaint. And for good reason: The trial court dismissed Marquez’s action in August 2023; the judgment in the Porter action apparently did not become final until November 2025. Nevertheless, though “normally the res judicata [now claim preclusion] effect of a prior judgment must be pleaded or evidence thereof presented to the trial court, where a judgment becomes final while an appeal from a judgment in another action presenting the same issue between the same parties is pending, the first final judgment may be brought to the attention of the appellate court in which the appeal is pending and may be there relied upon as res judicata.” (Palm Springs Paint Co. v. Arenas (1966) 242 Cal.App.2d 682, 688; see, e.g., Aronow v. LaCroix (1990) 219 Cal.App.3d 1039, 1046-1047; First N.B.S. Corp. v. Gabrielsen (1986) 179 Cal.App.3d 1189, 1195.)
We decline to consider Equinox’s claim preclusion defense for the first time on appeal. (See Palm Springs Paint Co. v. Arenas, supra, 242 Cal.App.2d at p. 688 [court of appeal “may” rely on a judgment that became final while an appeal is pending to determine whether claim preclusion applies].) Though whether claim preclusion applies is a question of law (Mills v. Facility Solutions Group, Inc. (2022) 84 Cal.App.5th 1035, 1048),
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the court must carefully examine and compare the allegations and factual circumstances in the two proceedings to determine whether they satisfy the elements of claim preclusion: a final judgment, identity of claims under a primary-rights theory, and identity or privity of the parties. (Boeken v. Philip Morris USA, Inc. (2010) 48 Cal.4th 788, 797-798.) And even if the defendant establishes the elements of claim preclusion, “public policy considerations may warrant an exception to the claim preclusion aspect of res judicata.” (People v. Barragan (2004) 32 Cal.4th 236, 256.)
The preclusive effect of the Porter judgment is not obvious.3 For example, as Equinox acknowledges, Marquez’s PAGA claim involves Labor Code violations that were not involved in the Porter action. And as Marquez argues, the disparities between her PAGA notice and the Porter PAGA notice complicate the privity analysis. (See LaCour v. Marshalls of California, LLC (2023) 94 Cal.App.5th 1172, 1194-1196 [“PAGA plaintiff’s settlement of PAGA claims beyond the scope of her [PAGA] notice letter will rob a judgment founded on that settlement of res judicata effect” because a “statutory proxy acting without authority cannot be said to be in privity with her principal”].) In addition, as Marquez points out, there may be public interest or other reasons not to give the Porter judgment
3 The parties submitted over 800 pages of material in support of and in opposition to Equinox’s motion to dismiss Marquez’s appeal, including pleadings, ex parte applications, and other documents filed in the Porter action; PAGA notices in both actions; multiple motions to dismiss filed by Equinox in the Porter action; and excerpts of the depositions of the plaintiffs in the Porter action.
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preclusive effect here, including that Equinox successfully objected to Marquez’s intervention in that action. (Cf. Villacres v. ABM Industries Inc. (2010) 189 Cal.App.4th 562, 583, 585, 590 [prior class action judgment had preclusive effect in a subsequent PAGA action, where the PAGA plaintiff had not objected to, intervened in, or opted out of the class-action settlement].) The trial court should address these issues in the first instance. (See Jogani v. Jogani (2026) 118 Cal.App.5th 823, 840; City of Scotts Valley v. County of Santa Cruz (2011) 201 Cal.App.4th 1, 28.)
Finally, even if Equinox’s claim preclusion argument has some merit, this appeal would not be moot. An appeal is moot if we cannot provide any effective relief. (In re S.R. (2025) 18 Cal.5th 1042; In re Landon M. (2026) 121 Cal.App.5th 686, 693; Ghost Golf, Inc. v. Newsom (2024) 102 Cal.App.5th 88, 99.) If we agree with Marquez that the trial court erred in ruling the statute of limitations barred her complaint, we can provide her effective relief: reversal of the judgment dismissing her complaint and reinstatement of her action. A meritorious claim preclusion defense may eventually carry the day on demurrer, but it does not moot an appeal.
B. Standard of Review “We review a judgment of dismissal after an order sustaining a demurrer de novo, exercising our independent judgment about whether the complaint states a cause of action as a matter of law. [Citation] We ‘assume the truth of all facts properly pleaded by the plaintiffs, as well as those that are judicially noticeable.’” (Hanouchian v. Steele (2020) 51 Cal.App.5th 99, 106.) A court may sustain a demurrer based on a statute of limitations only if the action is
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“‘“‘necessarily[ ] barred,’”’” that is, if the defect “‘“‘clearly and affirmatively appear[s] on the face of the complaint.’”’” (Lee v. Hanley (2015) 61 Cal.4th 1225, 1232.) If any possible legal theory supports the complaint, the court must overrule the demurrer. (Metabyte, Inc. v. Technicolor S.A. (2023) 94 Cal.App.5th 265, 274; International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Local 848 v. City of Monterey Park (2019) 30 Cal.App.5th 1105, 1109.)
C. Marquez’s PAGA Cause of Action Was Timely PAGA “authorizes ‘an aggrieved employee,’ acting as a proxy or agent of the Labor and Workforce Development Agency . . . , to bring a civil action against an employer ‘on behalf of himself or herself and other current or former employees’ to recover civil penalties for Labor Code violations they have sustained.” (Adolph v. Uber Technologies, Inc. (2023) 14 Cal.5th 1104, 1113.) The plaintiff must file an action “upon a statute for a penalty” within one year, unless “the statute imposing” the penalty “prescribes a different limitation.” (Code Civ. Proc., § 340, subd. (a).)4 Because PAGA does not prescribe a different limitations period, the “statute of limitations for PAGA claims is one year.” (Brown v. Ralphs Grocery Co. (2018) 28 Cal.App.5th 824, 839 (Brown); see Adolph, at p. 1117; Williams v. Alacrity Solutions Group, LLC (2025) 110 Cal.App.5th 932, 941
4 Section 340, subdivision (a), provides an “action upon a statute for a penalty or forfeiture, if the action is given to an individual, or to an individual and the state, except if the statute imposing it prescribes a different limitation,” must be filed within one year.
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(Williams), review granted July 9, 2025, S291199; LaCour v. Marshalls of California, LLC, supra, 94 Cal.App.5th at p. 1184.)
The statute of limitations “‘“begins to run when a cause of action has accrued, that is, when the cause is complete with all of its elements.”’” (Pineda v. Bank of America, N.A. (2010) 50 Cal.4th 1389, 1397; see Williams, supra, 110 Cal.App.5th at p. 942, review granted.) Most PAGA cases involve claims for penalties based on conditions existing during employment; in those cases, courts have used “the end of employment as shorthand for the most recent time at which a cause of action may have accrued.” (Esparza v. Safeway, Inc. (2019) 36 Cal.App.5th 42, 63, fn. 11; see Williams, at pp. 938, 942 [PAGA action based on alleged failure to pay overtime and issue accurate wage statements accrued on the plaintiff’s last day of employment]; Brown, supra, 28 Cal.App.5th at p. 839 [PAGA plaintiff had one year from termination of her employment to file claims “for alleged violations occurring during her employment or upon her discharge”].) “However, we are aware of no authority . . . holding that a PAGA cause of action accrues because of the end of employment.” (Esparza, at p. 63, fn. 11.)
Marquez’s PAGA action was different from most such actions. “As to herself,” Marquez sought only “civil penalties under Labor Code Sections 1199 and 216,” claims that are based
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on her post-employment wage-and-record demands.5 When were those Labor Code violations “complete”?
As stated, an employer6 violates section 216, subdivision (a), by willfully refusing to pay wages “after demand has been made” by an employee (or former employee). The statute does not require the employee to make the demand within one year, and Equinox has not identified any other statute that requires employees to make wage demands within one year of the termination of their employment (to support a PAGA action or otherwise). The language of section 216, subdivision (a), is plain: Because the demand is an essential element of the violation, the cause of action is not “complete” (Pineda v. Bank of America, N.A., supra, 50 Cal.4th at p. 1397) at least until the employee makes a demand. That’s the earliest time Marquez’s individual PAGA claim accrued. (See Aryeh v. Canon Business Solutions, Inc. (2013) 55 Cal.4th 1185, 1191 [“statute of limitations runs from ‘the occurrence of the last element essential to the cause of action’”]; Hamilton & High, LLC v. City of Palo Alto (2023)
5 Marquez wisely disavows any individual PAGA claim for the alleged meal-break, meal-premium, and sick-pay violations; those violations occurred during her employment and accrued, at the latest, on the last day of her employment. (See Brown, supra, 28 Cal.App.5th at p. 839.) “[I]ndividual claims” refer to “alleged Labor Code violations personally sustained by a PAGA plaintiff.” (Adolph v. Uber Technologies, Inc., supra, 14 Cal.5th at p. 1114.)
6 “[A]ny person, or an agent, manager, superintendent, or officer thereof,” who violates the statute is liable under it. (§ 216.) We use “employer” in this opinion to describe the “person” who would owe an employee wages as well as anybody acting on the employer’s behalf.
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89 Cal.App.5th 528, 556 [same]; see also Church v. Jamison (2006) 143 Cal.App.4th 1568, 1582 [“statute of limitations begins to run only when the cause of action has accrued and not before”].)
The trial court ruled that under Code of Civil Procedure section 340, subdivision (a), Marquez “had one year from her termination date” to make her payment demand. But section 340, subdivision (a), addresses the time for commencing a civil action after a cause of action has accrued; it says nothing about when a cause of action accrues.7 (See Code Civ. Proc., § 312 [“Civil Actions, without exception, can only be commenced within the periods prescribed in this title, after the cause of action shall have accrued, unless where, in special cases, a different limitation is prescribed by statute.”]; Neel v. Magana, Olney, Levy, Cathcart & Gelfand (1971) 6 Cal.3d 176, 191, fn. 30 [section 312 “does not define that point at which the cause of action accrues”]; City of Pasadena v. Superior Court (2017) 12 Cal.App.5th 1340, 1347 [“accrual is a prerequisite to the running of the limitations period”].) Nor does Code of Civil Procedure section 340, subdivision (a), limit the time an employee has to make demands covered by section 216 (or any other statute authorizing an employee to make a demand).
The trial court expressed concern that not allowing a cause of action under section 216 to accrue until after a demand for unpaid wages would be absurd because such an interpretation could delay accrual until long after the employment ended, and
7 For that, we look at the “substantive law” on which the claim is based (Norgart v. Upjohn Co. (1999) 21 Cal.4th 383, 397), which here is section 216, subdivision (a), and PAGA.
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an employee should know upon termination if wages are due. Equinox makes the same argument on appeal.
The potential delay between when an employer violates an employee’s rights under the Labor Code and when an employee asserts those rights may be concerning. One of the purposes of PAGA is to address workplace violations expeditiously, a goal that would be thwarted if a plaintiff could wait “10, 20, or 30 years after leaving the defendant-employer’s employ” to allege workplace violations.8 (Williams, supra, 110 Cal.App.5th at p. 943, review granted.) Had she acted sooner, Marquez could have pursued individual PAGA claims based on the alleged underpayments, claims that would have accrued, at the latest, at the end of her employment. (See Brown, supra, 28 Cal.App.5th at p. 839; Williams, at p. 943.) But section 216, subdivision (a), applies to more than “the mere failure to pay wages” by creating
8 The Legislature amended PAGA after Marquez filed her complaint. The amendments generally require that the aggrieved employee pursuing penalties “personally suffer[ ] each of the violations alleged during the period prescribed under Section 340 of the Code of Civil Procedure.” (§ 2699, subd. (c)(1); see Assem. Bill No. 2288 (2023-2024 Reg. Sess.) [amending § 2699 for purposes of civil actions brought on or after June 19, 2024].) This amendment may address the broader concern animating Equinox’s argument—the possibility a timely individual demand-based claim might revive otherwise time- barred non-individual PAGA claims relating to workplace conditions. (See Osuna v. Spectrum Security Services, Inc. (2025) 111 Cal.App.5th 516, 525-527 [Legislature enacted the amendments “in part” to supersede a case that allowed an employee whose individual PAGA claims were time-barred to pursue non-individual PAGA penalties], review granted July 30, 2025, S291614.)
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an additional violation that is not complete until an employer who could and should have paid wages willfully refuses to pay them after receiving a demand. (In re Trombley (1948) 31 Cal.2d 801, 808, 810; Naranjo v. Spectrum Security Services, Inc. (2024) 15 Cal.5th 1056, 1077-1078.)
It may be good policy to require discharged employees to make all wage demands within one year of the termination of their employment. But that is not the statute the Legislature enacted. (See Switzer v. Wood (2019) 35 Cal.App.5th 116, 129 [“the absurdity exception requires much more than showing that troubling consequences may potentially result if the statute’s plain meaning were followed or that a different approach would have been wiser or better”].) If the Legislature wants to place a one-year limit on wage demands, it “is free to do so.” (Weber v. Superior Court (2024) 101 Cal.App.5th 342, 364.) Until then, we must take section 216 “as we find it and enforce it as written.” (Weber, at p. 364; see City of Montclair v. Cohen (2018) 20 Cal.App.5th 238, 250 [“Legislatures, not courts, consider competing policies and make laws. As a coequal branch of government, the judiciary’s role is limited to interpreting the laws the Legislature enacts.”]; Fort Bragg Unified School Dist. v. Colonial American Casualty & Surety Co. (2011) 194 Cal.App.4th 891, 909-910 [“‘Crafting statutes to conform with policy considerations is a job for the Legislature, not the courts; our role is to interpret statutes, not to write them.’”]; Californians for Fair Representation-No on 77 v. Superior Court (2006) 138 Cal.App.4th 15, 26 [“the role of courts is to interpret and
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apply statutes as written, not to rewrite them or question their wisdom, expediency or policy”].)
Marquez alleged she demanded outstanding wages “on or about October 4, 2021.” Because section 216, subdivision (a), requires a demand to complete the cause of action, the date of the demand is the earliest possible date the claim accrued. Marquez filed this action in June 2022, within a year of her demand. Therefore, her PAGA action was timely.
DISPOSITION
Equinox’s motion to dismiss is denied. The judgment is reversed. The trial court is directed to vacate its order sustaining Equinox’s demurrer without leave to amend and to enter a new order overruling the demurrer. Equinox’s requests for judicial notice are denied. Marquez is to recover her costs on appeal.
SEGAL, Acting P. J.
We concur:
FEUER, J.
STONE, J.