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Lockheed v. Superior Court of San Bernardino County3/3/2003
ate directing the trial court to vacate its order certifying the classes. We granted plaintiffs' petition for review.
Discussion
I. Suitability of Medical Monitoring Claims for Class Treatment
We first addressed the availability of medical monitoring as a form of damages in Potter v. Firestone Tire & Rubber Co. (1993) 6 Cal.4th 965 (Potter). There, residents of homes located near a landfill at which the dumping of toxic substances was prohibited brought, as individual claimants, an action against a tire manufacturing company that had dumped toxic waste materials, alleging that their water supply had thereby been contaminated. The plaintiffs sought damages for, inter alia, fear of cancer and the costs of medical monitoring. (See id. at pp. 975-979.) Recognizing that "expenditures for prospective medical testing and evaluation, which would be unnecessary if the particular plaintiff had not been wrongfully exposed," are " `detriment proximately caused' " by negligent disposal of toxic substances (id. at p. 1005 & fn. 24, quoting Civ. Code, ยง 3333), we held that "the cost of medical monitoring is a compensable item of damages where the proofs demonstrate, through reliable medical expert testimony, that the need for future monitoring is a reasonably certain consequence of a plaintiff's toxic exposure and that the recommended monitoring is reasonable" (Potter, supra, at p. 1009).
"In determining the reasonableness and necessity of monitoring," we stated, "the following factors [(hereafter the Potter factors)] are relevant: (1) the significance and extent of the plaintiff's exposure to chemicals; (2) the toxicity of the chemicals; (3) the relative increase in the chance of onset of disease in the exposed plaintiff as a result of the exposure, when compared to (a) the plaintiff's chances of developing the disease had he or she not been exposed, and (b) the chances of the members of the public at large of developing the disease; (4) the seriousness of the disease for which the plaintiff is at risk; and (5) the clinical value of early detection and diagnosis." (Potter, supra, 6 Cal.4th at p. 1009.)
We have not previously addressed the prerequisites for class treatment of medical monitoring claims. "Section 382 of the Code of Civil Procedure authorizes class suits in California when `the question is one of a common or general interest, of many persons, or when the parties are numerous, and it is impracticable to bring them all before the court.' The burden is on the party seeking certification to establish the existence of both an ascertainable class and a well- defined community of interest among the class members." (Washington Mutual Bank v. Superior Court (2001) 24 Cal.4th 906, 913 (Washington Mutual).)
Plaintiffs assert that separate litigation of each class member's medical monitoring claim would unnecessarily consume vast judicial resources and time. They also urge us to repudiate the Court of Appeal's suggestion that the presence of individual issues generally precludes class certification in mass toxic exposure cases, arguing any such categorical foreclosure would render our decision in Potter meaningless. Defendants, on the other hand, emphasize that Potter's proximate cause rationale for recognizing medical monitoring costs as damages logically extends only to such "increased or different monitoring" (Potter, supra, 6 Cal.4th at p. 1009, fn. 27) as a defendant's conduct actually necessitates. In light of their due process right to litigate each individual plaintiff's actual toxic dosage and relevant personal characteristics, defendants argue, individual issues in the case predominate over common ones, such that the community of inter
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