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Ratcliff v. Whitacre11/15/2004
Plaintiffs appeal from an order denying their petition to compel arbitration against two parties in an action for medical malpractice who were not signatories to the arbitration agreement between plaintiff wife and her obstetrician.
We affirm the order.
FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
Plaintiffs' daughter died shortly after birth. Plaintiffs sued the obstetrician, his medical group, the hospital where the birth took place, the anesthesiologist, and a pediatrician and a respiratory therapist who treated the infant, alleging medical malpractice.
Plaintiff Debbie Ratcliff, formerly Debbie Reddish, signed an agreement with Temecula Valley OB/GYN Medical Association (hereafter Temecula Valley), which provided that any medical malpractice claim arising from medical services rendered by the association would be submitted to binding arbitration. Joseph Glaser, the obstetrician who delivered plaintiffs' daughter, is an owner and partner of Temecula Valley. The agreement allowed any person or entity which would otherwise be a proper party in a court action for malpractice but who was not a party to the agreement to join in the arbitration. Dr. Glaser and Temecula Valley brought a successful petition to compel arbitration on behalf of themselves and Latiffah McGinness. Dr. McGinness is a pediatrician who treated plaintiffs' infant. She was not affiliated with Temecula Valley and was not a party to the arbitration agreement but sought to join in the arbitration. Plaintiffs opposed the petition to compel arbitration and opposed allowing Dr. McGinness to join. However, after the trial court granted the petition, plaintiffs filed a petition to compel Inland Valley Medical Center and Pearl Whitacre to arbitrate the malpractice action as well. Inland Valley is the hospital where the birth took place, and Ms. Whitacre is a respiratory therapist who treated the infant at the hospital. She is an employee of Inland Valley. Neither Inland Valley nor Ms. Whitacre was a party to the arbitration agreement between Debbie Ratcliff and Dr. Glaser and Temecula Valley.
The trial court denied the petition, and plaintiffs appealed.
DISCUSSION
Standard of Review
An order denying a motion to compel arbitration is an appealable order. (Code Civ. Proc., ยง 1294, subd. (a).)
The parties agree that the standard of review is abuse of discretion. We disagree. When, as in this case, the facts pertaining to the validity or applicability of an arbitration agreement are undisputed, we are not bound by the trial court's interpretation of the agreement, but construe the instrument independently. (County of Contra Costa v. Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Inc. (1996) 47 Cal.App.4th 237, 241; Vianna v. Doctors' Management Co. (1994) 27 Cal.App.4th 1186, 1189.)
The "Inconsistent" Orders Do Not Establish Error
Plaintiffs first argue that the court abused its discretion because it issued inconsistent orders, on the one hand granting Dr. Glaser's petition to compel arbitration and to allow Dr. McGinness to join, while on the other hand refusing to compel Inland Valley and Ms. Whitacre to submit to arbitration. In plaintiffs' view, because neither Dr. McGinness nor Inland Valley and Ms. Whitacre were signatories to the arbitration agreement, it was arbitrary and capricious to rule differently on the two petitions.
The obvious difference is that Dr. McGinness volunteered to join in the arbitration, while Inland Valley and Ms. Whitacre chose not to. The agreement expressly allows for joinder of willing nonsignatories who are proper parties in the court action, and plaintiffs had no basis for res
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