Sentry Select Insurance v. Badiou (In re Badiou)

527 B.R. 692
CourtUnited States Bankruptcy Court, E.D. California
DecidedMarch 16, 2015
DocketCase No. 13-90888-E-7; Adv. Proc. No. 13-9027
StatusPublished

This text of 527 B.R. 692 (Sentry Select Insurance v. Badiou (In re Badiou)) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Bankruptcy Court, E.D. California primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Sentry Select Insurance v. Badiou (In re Badiou), 527 B.R. 692 (Cal. 2015).

Opinion

SUPPLEMENTAL FINDINGS OF FACT AND CONCLUSIONS OF LAW

RONALD H. SARGIS, Judge, United States Bankruptcy Court

On December 18, 2014, this court stated oral findings of fact and conclusions of law on the record in this Adversary Proceeding. Fed. R. Civ. P. 52(a)(1); Fed. R. Bank. P. 7052. At that hearing, the parties presented arguments on whether the punitive damages claim could be assigned or be subject to subrogation. The parties thereafter filed post-trial briefs on the issue. Upon consideration of the additional arguments and post-trial briefs, the court determined that supplemental findings of fact and conclusions of law are necessary to provide a complete record on the issue.1

SUPPLEMENTAL FINDINGS AND CONCLUSIONS

The court is presented with the issue of whether Sentry Select Insurance Company (“Sentry Select”) obtained by subrogation the rights of American Chevrolet-Geo, Inc. (“Insured”) to prosecute a claim for punitive damages arising from the conduct of Michael Badiou (“Defendant-Debtor”). Sentry Select is prosecuting this Adversary Proceeding asserting the claim it obtained by subrogation from Insured for $349,899.75 in damages arising from the misconduct of the Defendant-Debtor.

As shown in the competing post-trial briefs, analysis of whether a claim for punitive damages may be transferred by assignment or subrogation can quickly become mired in purported conclusive statements by the California Court of Appeal. In considering this issue, this court begins with the basics.

For questions of state law, a federal court is bound by the decisions of the highest court of that state. In the absence of such a decision, a federal court must predict how the highest state court would decide the issue using intermediate appellate court decisions, decisions from other jurisdictions, statutes, and treatises. Vestar Dev. II, LLC v. Gen. Dynamics Corp., 249 F.3d 958, 960 (9th Cir.2001).

Under settled canons of statutory construction, the California Supreme Court2 ascertains the meaning of a statute by applying the usual and ordinary meaning of the words. Kimmel v. Goland, 51 Cal.3d 202, 208, 271 Cal.Rptr. 191, 793 P.2d 524 (Cal.1990). The statute’s plain meaning controls the court’s interpretation unless the words are ambiguous. Green v. State of California, 42 Cal.4th 254, 260, 64 Cal.Rptr.3d 390, 165 P.3d 118. (Cal.2007). When more than one statutory construction is arguably possible, the Supreme Court selects the construction that comports most closely with the apparent legislative intent, seeking to promote, rather than defeat, the statute’s purpose. Imperial Merchant Services, Inc. v. Hunt, 47 Cal.4th 381, 388, 97 Cal.Rptr.3d 464, 212 P.3d 736 (Cal.2009).

ASSIGNABILITY OF CLAIMS

Before rushing headlong into the various state law insurance cases cited in [694]*694the competing briefs, this court first considers California law relating to the assign-ability and the enforcement of claims by an assignee or subrogee. For a claim to be subject to subrogation, it must be assignable. Fifield Manor v. Finston, 54 Cal.2d 632, 641, 7 Cal.Rptr. 377, 354 P.2d 1073 (1960). California Civil Code § 954 provides that a “thing in action” arising out of the violation of a property right or out of an obligation may be transferred by the owner.3 A “thing in action” is further defined to be “[a] right to recover money or other personal property by a judicial proceeding.” Cal. Civ. 953.

The Supreme Court has qualified the “every thing in action is assignable” rule with the limited exception that certain “personal rights” are not assignable.

It is a rule universally recognized that one who is injured personally may not assign a claim growing out of such tort but there is some authority to the effect that almost every other kind of property is assignable.

Perkins v. Sunset Tel. & Tel. Co., 155 Cal. 712, 720, 103 P. 190 (Cal.1909). Going back further in time, the Supreme Court enunciated this exception in Rued v. Cooper, 109 Cal. 682, 694, 34 P. 98 (Cal.1893), quoting the decision of the New York Court of Appeals in Meech v. Stoner, 19 N.Y. 26, 30 (N.Y. 1859), stating:

‘Assignability of things in action is now the rule; nonassignability, the exception; and this exception is confined to wrongs done to the person, the reputation, or the feelings of the injured party, and to contracts of a purely personal nature, like promises of marriage.’
The court in this case [Meech] sustained the views above quoted by further argument and the citation of the number of cases, both English and American, and in these views we concur.

In the 20th Century, the California Court of Appeal addressed the personal wrongs exception to the general rule in the context of a legal malpractice claim. In Fireman’s Fund Ins., Co. v. McDonald, Hecht & Solberg, 30 Cal.App.4th 1373, 1381-1382, 36 Cal.Rptr.2d 424 (1994), the Court of Appeal stated:

It is now well settled that under California law a former client may not voluntarily assign his claims for legal malpractice against his former attorneys. In Goodley v. Wank & Wank, Inc. (1976) 62 Cal.App.3d 389, 133 Cal.Rptr. 83, and more recently in Jackson v. Rogers & Wells, supra, 210 Cal.App.3d p. 336, 258 Cal.Rptr. 454 [ (1989) ], the courts determined that although choses in action for property or pecuniary losses are generally assignable, a claim for legal malpractice is more akin to those types of claims which are not assignable, i.e., claims for personal injury, wrongs of a purely personal nature (such as injuries to the reputation or feelings of the injured party) or breaches of contracts of a purely personal nature (such as promises of marriage). [Citations.] Goodley and Jackson concluded that the attorney-client relationship (although containing contractual elements) is unique and involves a highly personal and confidential relationship, making the relationship “... more analogous to a contract of a personal nature than to an ordinary commercial contract’ [citation], and rendering claims for negligent breach thereof nonassignable.” (Kracht v. Perrin, Gartland & Doyle, supra, 219 Cal. [695]*695App.3d [1019] at p. 1023, 268 Cal.Rptr. 637 [ (1990) ], italics in original.) FN.7.
FN.7. In Jackson v. Rogers & Wells, supra, 210 Cal.App.3d 336, 258 Cal.Rptr. 454, we noted “the hybrid contract-tort nature” of claims for legal malpractice. (Id. at p. 342, 258 Cal.Rptr. 454.)

The malpractice claim not being assignable, a third-party could not acquire it through subrogation. Id. at 1384, 36 Cal. Rptr.2d 424.

In 2006, the Supreme Court addressed the assignability of tort claims in Essex Ins. Co. v. Five Star Dye House, Inc., 38 Cal.4th 1252, 45 Cal.Rptr.3d 362, 137 P.3d 192 (Cal.2006). In Essex, the specific question presented to the Supreme Court was whether an insured’s tort claim for attorneys’ fees4 relating to a claim for the tortious breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing could be assigned.

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Bluebook (online)
527 B.R. 692, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/sentry-select-insurance-v-badiou-in-re-badiou-caeb-2015.