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The Ralph Act is a civil rights law, enforced by the DFEH, which has aim to protect individuals with special characteristics and their property from violence or intimidation by the threat of violence. The Ralph Act is codified in California’s Civil Code Section 51.7 according to which all individuals have the right to be free from any kind of violence, or intimidation by threat of violence, committed against them or their property, based on race, religion, color, political affiliation, ancestry, sexual orientation, sex, age, citizenship, immigration status, age, or position in labor dispute.
According to CACI 3063, in case the plaintiff claims that the defendant committed an act of violence against him or his property he must be able to prove all of the following elements to establish the claim:
According to CACI 3064, in case the plaintiff claims that the defendant intimidated by threat of violence he must be able to prove all of the following elements to establish the claim:
In successful claims, the victims are entitled to the following remedies:
In a successful Ralph Act lawsuit, the court can order additional damages for the victims. The plaintiff can be entitled to punitive damages even if he already got a full compensation for caused harm or injuries. Civil Fine: The Ralph Act also allows plaintiff to recover a fine of $25,000. Restraining Order: The victims can get a restraining order and the defendant can be fined or jailed. Contact KAASS LAW for any further legal assistance!
California's court system is the nation's biggest and serves over thirty-nine million people — about 12 percent of the total American population.
There are fifty-eight trial courts in California, one in each county. A judge and sometimes a jury hears the testimony of witnesses and other proof in trial courts or superior courts and chooses cases by applying the appropriate law to the appropriate facts. The judiciary in California serve almost thirty-four million individuals. Until June 1998, the trial courts of California were made up of superior and municipal courts, each with their own jurisdiction and the number of judges set by the Legislature. Proposition 220 file type icon was endorsed by California voters in June 1998, a constitutional amendment that allowed the judges in each county to merge their superior and municipal courts into a «unified», or single, superior court. All 58 counties in California had also voted to unify their trial courts as of February 2001.
According to California Government Code Section 830(a) a dangerous condition of property is a condition which creates a substantial risk of injury when such property is used with due care in a way in which it is foreseeable that it will be used. In California, property managers and owners are obliged to establish engineering standards when designing buildings and roadways and buildings. They should also conduct regular inspections for assuring that the property is not dangerous and maintain the property in a safe and secure manner. When the manager or owner fails to fulfill his legal obligations and someone is injured, he is responsible for the caused injuries and financial damages.
According to CACI Instructions 1100 and California Government Code Section 835 the plaintiff must be able to prove the following elements to establish the claim.
Unreasonable force refers to situations when government officials legally entitled to use force exceed the necessary minimum amount to diffuse an incident or to defend others or themselves from harm.
According to CACI 440 the plaintiff must be able to prove the following elements to establish this claim:
Under the legal doctrine of governmental immunity, a police officer's actions are protected from liability while being on the job. This is a rule that the police officer generally can’t be sued for reasonable actions taken while performing his official duties. So, the right to make an investigatory stop or arrest necessarily carries with it the right to use some degree of physical force, but the degree of the force must be proportional to the threat and be applicable only in response to the threat.
According to California Penal Code Section 350 it is prohibited to willfully manufacture, intentionally sell, or knowingly possess for sale any counterfeit mark registered with the Secretary of State or registered on the Principal Register of the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
The prosecutor must be able to establish the following element to convict the defendant of manufacturing, sale, or possession for sale of counterfeit goods under PC Section 350:
Conversion is an intentional interference with the property of another person with the intention to deprive the owner of the property. This includes situations when someone uses the property of another and damages or destroys it. During an act of conversion, taking the property may be lawful, while keeping the property and/or returning the property in a damaged state is unlawful.
According to CACI 2100 the plaintiff must be able to prove the following elements to establish the claim.
The plaintiff generally must establish an actual interference with his ownership or right to possess property to prove the conversion. In addition to actual interference the plaintiff must also show that the interference was substantial, which can prove by showing an intention or purpose to keep the owner from taking possession of the property or to convert the goods and to exercise ownership over them.
Over the years, drivers under Uber, Lyft, and many others have not been successful with these apps. California legislature approved Assembly Bill 5, back in the year 2019, requiring app-based companies like Uber, Lyft, and Doordash treat workers as employees. It's aim is to make it harder for companies to classify workers as independent contractors rather than employees. This bill on a 2018 California Supreme Court decision, Dynamex Operations West, Inc. v. Superior Court of Los Angeles, establishes the "ABC test" for determining whether a worker is an independent contractor or an employee. Workers must be an employees instead of contractors if a company retains control over how they perform their tasks or if their work is part of a company’s regular business. California will become the first state to require app-based companies/gig-economy to treat workers as employees. Overall, AB 5 marked a pivotal shift in California's approach to worker rights, particularly within the gig economy, and its influence continues to shape debates about labor classification in the state and beyond
Trespassing is the legal term for when one person enters onto another person’s land without legal right or permission to be there. The trespassing can be considered a crime, a civil wrong, or both depending on a particular case. When a person trespasses onto another person’s land and steals some personal property from the owner he can be charged with criminal trespass. When the trespasser breaks something on the homeowner’s property he can be sued under civil tort law.
Under personal injury law, assault is defined as a purposeful act by one person which causes a reasonable apprehension of immediate harm or offensive contact to another person. Assault is known as an intentional tort when it is made the subject of a civil case.
According to CACI 1301 to establish the claim of assault, a plaintiff must prove all the following elements:
Assault does not always involve physical contact, at least not when it comes to civil liability. Even fear of offensive or harmful touching is usually enough for an assault to have occurred. In case the touching actually occurs, the physical contact is usually classified as a battery in civil law, though both claims are often made together.
Battery is an intentional harmful or offensive touching of another person without his consent. Frequently used in a single phrase and often thought of as one offense, the terms "assault" and "battery" are two separate torts. These two offenses are usually almost alongside, that is, an assault is immediately by a battery. Though, an assault doesn’t include a battery since it is just the apprehension of a contact that if made would establish a battery.
According to CACI 1300 the plaintiff must be able to prove all the following elements to establish the claim:
A battery is a violation of a person’s interest in freedom from intentional illegal, offensive and harmful unconsented contacts with his person. To successfully establish a claim for battery a plaintiff must show that the defendant intentionally subjected him to an offensive or harmful touching which actually lead to injuries.
The competition of two judges of the Superior Court's appeal division shall be essential for the rendering of the judgment in each situation and for the transaction of any other company except that which the presiding judge of the division may do in the chambers. In an appeal, an appeal division's decision shall contain a short declaration of the grounds for the judgement. There is inadequate a judgement saying only «affirmed» or «reversed».
Court proceedings may be recorded or electronically taped by a court reporter. Transcripts applications in civil and probate matters for privately owned court reporters must be created directly with the private court reporter. A paper transcript or a copy of an electronic recording may be accessible upon request, depending on the recording of a particular event.
In some cases, it is easy to determine who is the owner of the property. For example, if a person is injured in a dangerous curve in a roadway it is easy to know that it involves a public entity. The victim must determine whether the roadway is the responsibility of the Country, the State or the City. Other cases can involve a piece of business or a land that seems to be private, but is actually operated by a government entity. Sometimes there are no signs letting us know who is the owner of the property. In response to a letter to the entity requesting ownership information a public entity typically confirms the ownership or directs to the potential owner.
It is important to know that government entities have a multitude of defenses and immunities for fighting the claims.
Courts can also grant police officers qualified immunity along with deferring to a law enforcement reasonableness standard. This aims to protect public officials from civil liability for violations of rights as long as they were reasonably performing their duties and the rights weren’t clearly established. In unreasonable force cases, qualified immunity can protect police officers in more unclear situations where there's a border between necessary and unreasonable force. Though, to benefit from this immunity, a public official must be able to show that a reasonable person in his position wouldn't have known that his conduct violated clearly established law.
Here are some examples of excessive force and police abuse.
A victim might be able to take his case to the court if he was victimized by law enforcement. Generally, there can be three main causes of action:
Under Section 1983 of the United States Code, an unreasonable force is a constitutional violation that can be remedied by filing a civil rights complaint for injunctive or monetary relief. A plaintiff can also file a complaint with the U.S. Department of Justice, which can decide to investigate his case. When deciding the issue of whether the government official engaged in excessive force or not, courts consider particular circumstances to determine if the actions were objectively reasonable.
Have you been involved in an arrest where you've experienced unreasonable force by a law enforcement officer? Experienced attorneys at KAASS Law are here to help protect your rights. Get in touch with us to go over the details of your case at any time!
Penalties for manufacturing or selling counterfeit marks under PC Section 350 depend on the value and the number of the counterfeit goods. Manufacturing or selling counterfeit marks is a misdemeanor in case:
Manufacturing or selling counterfeit marks is a wobbler in case:
Wobbler is a crime that can be charged as either a misdemeanor or felony, depending on the number of factors. Penalties for a felony conviction are the following:
In case the defendant has a prior conviction for manufacturing or selling counterfeit marks, then the second offense is always a wobbler even if the number of counterfeit goods is less than 1,000 and the value of counterfeit items is less than $950. The penalties are the same as for a wobbler conviction with the exception in the amount of the fine:
The defendant will face harsher penalties if the manufacture or sale of the counterfeit items caused great bodily injury or death or to another person, who used the items, thinking that it was genuine. In that case, defendant always faces felony conviction with up to two, three or four years in a county jail.
The difference between a cause of action for conversion and for trespass against personal property turns on the degree of the defendant's interference with the plaintiff's rights in the property. In the case of conversion, it is essential to prove that the defendant actually and substantially has exercised control over the plaintiff's personal property, interfered with the plaintiff's rights in the property. In contrast, any illegal interference or exercise of control over the personal property of another person can give rise to a cause of action for trespass. After a property has been converted, the injured party can choose to either sue the defendant for the tort, or waive the tort and sue in "assumpsit" either for money had and received or the value of the property converted.
Conversion does not necessarily simply mean theft of the property, it is more related to actual interference with the victim’s possession or ownership rights rather than just theft. Examples of conduct which includes in the claim:
Evidence of the cost of the property, along with other circumstances such as the condition of the property ant the extent of its use can be considered essential in determining the value of the property at the time of the conversion.
For any further legal assistance, KAASS LAW is here to help!
Accordingly, some experts say that nothing in Assembly Bill 5 will require employees to work set shifts, meaning that Uber and Lyft legally have to allow drivers to make their own scheduling decisions. This California Bill is to better help employees for Uber and Lyft, and other third party companies that offer delivery services for food, groceries, and or client transportation. Also see Uber Insurance Explained
Trespass can be committed intentionally, recklessly or negligently. If a trespasser doesn’t know that the is deeded land, but with inquiry can find out, the trespass is negligent. Trespass requires some form of physical entry or contact with the plaintiff’s land. That entry could be the defendant going onto the plaintiff’s land, throwing or putting an object on it, causing a third person to enter onto the plaintiff’s land or discharging some substance onto the land. Trespass also takes place when a person fails to leave the owner’s property after permission to enter has been first given but then ended or revoked.
In case property was damaged by someone who committed a trespass the owner can take civil action. The owner can sue the trespasser even though the property was not damaged. In this case, the amount of compensation will be equal to the price that a reasonable person would pay for the right to pass over the land. The defendant can also ask for an injunction to stop the trespass from happening again.
Here are some examples of trespass in California:
A property owner or tenant has a legal right to get compensation for trespass to his land, and recover the following damages:
Assault can be filed under civil and criminal laws and in both cases the elements to prove are similar. Both require that the defendant’s conduct create a reasonable apprehension of harm to the plaintiff. Though, the difference between criminal assault and civil assault lies mainly in the legal remedies that result from the action. In civil law, it is required that the defendant either meant to cause apprehension or that the defendant should have known that his conduct would cause apprehension to the plaintiff. In contrast, criminal law requires that the defendant had the intention to commit physical injury or battery to the plaintiff. In a civil assault claim, it is a private lawsuit between two persons, where a plaintiff can normally collect monetary damages, but a jail sentence is not usually imposed in civil assault claims. In contrast, with a criminal trial, the involved parties are the state (the prosecution) and the victim. Any damages awards can be limited by state statutes that cover how much a victim can recover in a criminal trial. On the other hand, criminal laws generally impose a jail sentence for the defendant, which can range from a few months to several years depending on the severity of the assault.
In case the defendant was acting in self-defense or defense of another person he can’t be found liable.
In some cases, the defendant could have a limited right to commit assault. For instance, when a police officer attempts to place a suspect under arrest.
In a successful claim, the plaintiff must prove all the elements of assault: the apprehension of harm, cause of action and the defendant’s purpose or knowledge of harm to the plaintiff. Damages that can be recovered
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Civil liability means that the attacker can be liable for payment of the damages to the victim in a lawsuit, as opposed to criminal liability when the attacker faces punishment for a crime. In a civil lawsuit, the victim will have the burden of proving that the attacker caused him harm and injuries. The victim has a right to file a lawsuit against the attacker whether or not he has a conviction of a crime of battery and against other parties who may have contributed to the circumstance leading to the battery.
As mentioned above when harm and injuries were a cause by an intentional act of battery, the victim has a right to sue the attacker for the following measures of damages:
Are you in need of more individualized information about civil liability for battery in California? Our experienced criminal defense attorneys at KAASS Law are here to take your call.