1

LOS ANGELES OFFICE
5850 Canoga Ave | Ste 600
Woodland Hills, CA 91367
.
Office: 818.587.9146
Fax: 818.587.9147
SAN FRANCISCO OFFICE
350 Sansome St | Ste 630
San Francisco, CA 94104
.
Office: 415.248.5315
Fax: 415.248.5314

Hauser v. Doe
Delivery Company:

The firm (Ninos Saroukhanioff and Dennis S. Newitt) represented a national delivery company in a negligence action involving claimed business losses.

 

FACTS: The plaintiff was the principal of a telemarketing company, selling ink and toner supplies to small businesses. The plaintiff arranged for regular pick up and delivery services from Doe Delivery company. One day, Doe Delivery Company’s driver, on his way out of the plaintiff’s business after picking up, passed by a computer terminal in a vacant office and allegedly pressed buttons on a keyboard which led to the crash of the business’ computer system and loss of substantial sales and customer data. The plaintiff sued the delivery company for the alleged negligence of its driver, and the claimed resulting data loss.

It was learned during the course of the case that plaintiff had failed to pay state business taxes resulting in the suspension of the corporation. At the time of the incident, the corporation was suspended and not authorized to conduct business. The plaintiff brought the suit as an assignee of his corporation to skirt the fact that the corporation did not have standing to sue. Later, the plaintiff brought current his tax obligations and reactivated his corporation. However, this was after the statute of limitations had expired as to the business loss claim.

DISPOSITION: The trial court granted defendant delivery company’s motion to dismiss on the basis that a suspended corporation does not have standing to assign a claim to its individual principal.  The plaintiff appealed and the firm handled the appeal.  The appellate court sided with defendant delivery company’s position that the corporation lacked standing to sue prior to the statute’s expiration, and that subsequent reactivation after the statute ran did not retroactively apply to revive the claim.





COPYRIGHT MARANGA MORGENSTERN 2008 I  SITEMAP