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Styne v. Stevens2/8/2000
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Section 1700.44, subdivision (c), provides: "No action or proceeding shall be brought pursuant to this chapter with respect to any violation which is alleged to have occurred more than one year prior to commencement of the action or proceeding." In Park v. Deftones (1999) 71 Cal.App.4th 1465 (Deftones), we held that a defense based upon illegality under the Act is not barred by the statute of limitations where the defendants petitioned before the Labor Commissioner within one year of the filing of the action to collect commissions under the challenged agreement. Here, however, Stevens failed to refer the matter to the Labor Commissioner within one year of even answering the complaint. Referral at this late date is barred by the Act's limitations period.
It was not necessary for us in Deftones to consider the outer limit of the one-year limitations period. We do so here. For the defensive application of the Act, the one-year period commences upon the artist's formal notice of the agent's claim. Therefore, the earliest starting point of the one-year period will ordinarily be when the artist is served with process. We select that date because of its certainty compared to determining the date upon which a defendant becomes aware of the action. We reject the filing date as a triggering event, because filing does not necessarily give the defendant notice of the action.
In order to avoid the harsh application of a "bright-line" rule, we recognize there may be unique factual situations where, at the time of service of process, the artist may not reasonably be aware that the plaintiff has engaged in activities within the Act. In such instance, the courts will have to sort out on a case-by-case basis when the artist was (or reasonably should have been) aware that the Act should be asserted as a defense. The artist would have one year from that point in time to defensively raise the Act and obtain a hearing under the Labor Code.
In the present case, Stevens was at all times aware of the role Styne played in her relationship with HSN and she was not misled by the complaint. Accordingly, any question as to the application of the Act arose when she was served with process, and she simply waited too long to assert it.
Stevens's proper course was to seek a stay of the judicial proceeding and submit the matter to the Labor Commissioner. Stevens's failure to do so in a timely manner bars a judicial determination that the agreement is void under the Act. The trial court's decision to order a new trial because the jury was not instructed on the requirements of the Act was error.
Stevens urges that a statute of limitations may not defeat a position raised defensively. We agree that where an action to collect commissions is filed, and the defendant contends the agreement violates the Act, the limitations period does not bar a referral to the Labor Commissioner within one year after the defendant is served in the action. The defendant may not, however, wait until after a verdict in the superior court, as Stevens has done in this case, before referring the matter to the Labor Commissioner. As we stated in Deftones, we agree with the interpretation given section 1700.44, subdivision (c) by the Labor Commissioner in that case. (Moreno v. Park (Jan. 20, 1998, Lab. Comr.) No. 9-97, p. 4.) It interpreted the filing of the superior court action to collect commissions as a violation of the Act for purposes of the limitations period.
4. Additional grounds for new trial
A new trial order may be upheld on any valid ground stated in the new trial motion whether or not specified in the court's order granting new trial or statement of reasons. (Code Civ.
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