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Davila v. Nickell10/26/2005
elated argument, the Louies contend the court erred in granting Barraza's motion to amend his third amended complaint to add the Louies and Sun Villa Inc. to the breach of contract cause of action.
Two years before trial, the court sustained a demurrer with leave to amend on Barraza's cause of action against all defendants for breach of the October 1997 settlement agreement. However, when Barraza amended the complaint, he named only the Joadd defendants to the contract claim and did not include the Louies or Sun Villa Inc. as defendants. At trial, Barraza's counsel moved to amend the contract claim at the conclusion of his case to "conform to proof" by adding the Louies and Sun Villa Inc. as defendants in his breach of contract action. Although the trial court initially denied the motion, it later permitted the amendment.
The Louies argue the court erred in permitting this amendment because "'it is well settled that [at trial] a plaintiff may not amend so as to change the cause of action or set up a new and distinct cause of action not contained in the original complaint.'" We do not reach the merits of this argument because the amendment had no possible effect on the final judgment. The jury resolved only plaintiffs' negligence claim, and awarded damages solely on plaintiffs' negligence cause of action and not on the breach of contract claim. Additionally, as explained above, Barraza was not required to affirmatively pursue a breach of contract claim against the defendants as a prerequisite to avoiding the res judicata and statute of limitations defenses.
A judgment may be reversed only if an error was prejudicial. "Error is prejudicial when it is probable that the party against whom it was made would have achieved a better result but for the error." (Sargent Fletcher, Inc. v. Able Corp. (2003) 110 Cal.App.4th 1658, 1674; see Cal. Const., art. VI, § 13; Code Civ. Proc., § 475.) Even assuming the court erred in permitting the amendment, the amendment had no possible effect on the judgment. Thus, the asserted error was harmless.
D. Verdict Form Error
In another related argument, the Louies contend the judgment must be reversed because the jury did not make factual findings critical to their res judicata and statute of limitations defenses.
In a special verdict, the jury must resolve all the facts presented by the plaintiffs' claims and defendants' affirmative defenses. (See Code Civ. Proc., § 624.) The special verdict questions should be sufficiently comprehensive so that "'nothing shall remain to the court but to draw from them conclusions of law. [Citation.]'" (Myers Building Industries, Ltd. v. Interface Technology, Inc. (1993) 13 Cal.App.4th 949, 959-960 (Myers); accord City of San Diego v. D.R. Horton San Diego Holding Co., Inc. (2005) 126 Cal.App.4th 668, 678 (City of San Diego).)
In this case, the special verdict form contained a series of questions related to plaintiffs' negligence case. In its responses to these questions, the jury found plaintiffs proved their entitlement to relief under their statutory employer negligence theory (see § 3708) and on agency and joint venture theories. However, the special verdict form did not ask the jury to make the underlying factual findings necessary to determine the viability of defendants' statute of limitations and res judicata affirmative defenses. To avoid these defenses as to the Louies, Barraza was required to prove two elements: (1) the Louies were bound by the October 1997 settlement agreement; and (2) the agreement was breached in a manner triggering Barraza's right to reopen the case. The special verdict form did not include any questions pertaining to these elements.
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