Baillargeon v. Department of Water & Power

• Decision Date: 11 May 1977
• Citation: 69 Cal.App.3d 670,138 Cal.Rptr. 338
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: Doris BAILLARGEON, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. The DEPARTMENT OF WATER AND POWER OF the CITY OF LOS ANGELES et al., Defendants and Respondents. Civ. 49429.

Page 338

138 Cal.Rptr. 338

69 Cal.App.3d 670

Doris BAILLARGEON, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. The DEPARTMENT OF WATER AND POWER OF the CITY OF LOS ANGELES et al., Defendants and Respondents.

Civ. 49429.

Court of Appeal, Second District, Division 4, California.

May 11, 1977.

David S. Sperber, Los Angeles, for plaintiff and appellant.

Burt Pines, City Atty., Edward C. Farrell, Chief Asst. City Atty., Charles Zinger and David J. Oliphant, Deputy City Attys., Los Angeles, for defendants and respondents.

JEFFERSON, Associate Justice.

Plaintiff Doris Baillargeon filed against defendants Department of Water and Power of the City of Los Angeles (hereinafter, Department), Water and Power Employees Retirement Plan (hereinafter, The Plan), and Board of Administration of the Water and Power Employees Retirement Plan (hereinafter, Board), a complaint entitled '1. Breach of Contract (Promissory Note) ¹ 2. Infliction of Mental Distress 3. Declaratory Relief.'

Defendants Department and Board answered the complaint, setting forth various affirmative defenses, including the statute of limitations. Discovery ensued. Defendants then moved for judgment on the pleadings. After oral argument, the trial court granted the defense motion. A judgment was accordingly signed and entered. Plaintiff appeals; we reverse.

We consider first the standard of appellate review applicable when judgment has been granted on the pleadings. In the case at bench, defendants Board and Department utilized in the motion for judgment on the pleadings, which resembles a general demurrer, a varied attack on plaintiff's complaint, combining the assertion that she had failed to state a cause of action with defenses based upon limitation of actions. The defense of the statute of limitations may be raised by demurrer. (See 3 Witkin, California Procedure (2d ed. 1971) Pleading, § 812, p. 2421.)

Since judgment on the pleadings is similar to a judgment following the sustaining of a demurrer, the standard of appellate review is the same. 'Like the demurrer, the motion for judgment on the pleadings in confined to the Face of the pleading under attack. (Citations.) This means two things: ( ) First, if the pleading, though uncertain or otherwise defective in form, sufficiently states a cause of action or defense, the motion cannot be granted on the basis of a showing of extrinsic matters by inference from attached exhibits, by affidavits, or otherwise. (Citations.) ( ) Second, a sufficient complaint cannot be thus attacked by reference to matters set forth in the answer. (Citations.) ( ) But the unqualified statement of the foregoing rule may be misleading . . . (as) various outside matters may be looked to under the doctrine of judicial notice . . ..' (4 Witkin, California Procedure (2d ed. 1971), Proceedings Without Trial, § 162, pp. 2817--2818.) (Emphasis in original.)

The motion for judgment on the pleadings performs the function of a general demurrer. Therefore, it "admits all material and issuable facts pleaded." (Colberg, Inc. v. State of California ex rel. Dept. Pub. Wks. (1967) 67 Cal.2d 408, 412, 62 Cal.Rptr. 401, 403, 432 P.2d 3, 5.) '(T)he facts alleged in the pleading attacked must be accepted as true, and the court may also consider matters subject to judicial notice.' (Kachig v. Boothe (1971) 22 Cal.App.3d 626, 630, 99 Cal.Rptr. 393, 395.) With these principles in mind, we approach the complaint.

The complaint, filed January 24, 1973, alleged that plaintiff became an employee of defendant Department on July 13, 1959, and a member of The Plan on February 1, 1960. In June, 1966, defendant Board issued a 41-page Booklet purporting to give general information concerning the benefits available through The Plan to employee members. The Booklet contained the following language concerning the benefits available to a Plan participant who sustained an on-the-job injury and received workmen's compensation benefits: '. . . if you are on monthly salary, you would be paid supplemental benefits from the disability fund (of The Plan). This assures that the amount you receive from compensation payments plus supplemental payments for an on-the-job injury at least equals the amount you would receive for disability resulting from an off-the-job sickness or injury.'

Plaintiff alleged, and we must accept it as true, that this statement concerning supplemental benefits available through The Plan to employee members receiving workmen's compensation was a representation by defendants upon which she relied 'in continuing her employment and in not accepting other employment.'

The complaint then sets forth that in August, 1966, plaintiff became ill with hypoglycemia, and believed her condition unrelated to her job. Plaintiff alleged that she was sporadically absent from her employment until January, 1967, when she could no longer work. She applied to The Plan for the benefits available to her for a non-job-related injury (called Disability Benefits) and received such benefits from The Plan, a total sum of $7,788.26, until January 31, 1969, when the benefits were terminated by defendant Board.

Plaintiff alleged that in April, 1968, her condition was diagnosed as hypoglycemia, and that she was informed that her condition was work-related. Plaintiff filed a workmen's compensation claim on February 28, 1969. On December 29, 1969, defendant Board filed a 'Notice and Request for Allowance of Lien' in that action, seeking reimbursement of $7,350.00.

Plaintiff alleged that on January 14, 1972, the Workmen's Compensation Appeals Board made findings and an award in her favor. It found that plaintiff had sustained an injury 'arising out of and occurring in the course of her employment'; it awarded temporary disability payments for the period from 1967 to 1971; it awarded permanent disability payments (on a 35 percent basis) for 140 weeks. It also allowed the lien of defendant Board.

Plaintiff alleged that she thereafter made demand upon defendants to provide the supplemental benefits through The Plan, described in the Booklet, to equalize the difference between the workmen's compensation payments she was receiving and the amount she would have been entitled to had her condition been non-job-related 'in accordance with the representations made by Defendants . . ..' Defendants, plaintiff alleged, refused to recognize plaintiff's entitlement to supplemental benefits in excess of $487.76.

In her complaint, plaintiff claimed that as a result of defendants' action in denying her demand, she sustained damages in excess of $10,000, although she did not know the exact amount of supplemental disability benefits to which she was entitled.

In a second cause of action of the complaint, plaintiff alleged that her hypoglycemic condition was seriously aggravated by defendants' termination of benefits payable to her by The Plan, and that this conduct caused her severe mental shock and additional physical and mental pain and suffering in the sum of $20,000.

A third cause of action is set forth in the complaint. In this cause of action plaintiff sought declaratory relief establishing that she was entitled, from the inception of her disability, to supplemental benefits payable by The Plan to 'equalize' the amount plaintiff would receive as the result of her job-related injury with that to which she would have been entitled had the injury not been job-related. ² Plaintiff alleged that defendants had taken the position that she was entitled to supplemental benefits for 11 weeks only, as opposed to her claim that she was entitled to such benefits for the duration of her disability.

The record indicates that the parties to this lawsuit entered into a stipulation allowing an amendment to the complaint to add the allegation that on or about January 16, 1973, plaintiff had filed with defendants a claim 'in excess of $30,000.00 for the damages sought herein.' Defendants failed to act upon the claim within 45 days and the claim was thus deemed rejected. (Gov. Code, § 912.4.)

Plaintiff's Cause of Action

Although inexpertly fashioned, plaintiff's complaint is reasonably susceptible to an interpretation that plaintiff was seeking to establish a cause of action based upon principles of estoppel. This attempt was undertaken in both the first and the third causes of action; the third cause of action, for declaratory relief, was merely reflective of the underlying equitable basis for plaintiff's complaint.

Estoppel, conceptually speaking, results from a representation of fact which the party making such representation is not legally permitted to deny. In contract law, the detrimental reliance on the promise made is regarded as a substitute for the requisite element of consideration. (See 1 Witkin, Summary of California Law (8th ed. 1973) Contracts, § 189, p. 174.)

'The venerable doctrine of equitable estoppel or estoppel in pais, . . . rests firmly upon a foundation of conscience and fair dealing, . . .' (City of Long Beach v. Mansell (1970) 3 Cal.3d 462, 488, 91 Cal.Rptr. 23, 42, 476 P.2d 423, 442.) 'Generally speaking, four elements must be present in order to apply the doctrine of equitable estoppel: (1) the party to be estopped must be apprised of the facts; (2) he must intend that his conduct shall be acted upon, or must so act that the party asserting the estoppel had a right to believe it was so intended; (3) the other party must be ignorant of the true state of facts; and (4) he must rely upon the conduct to his injury.' (Driscoll v. City of Los Angeles (1967) 67 Cal.2d 297, 305, 61 Cal.Rptr. 661, 666, 431 P.2d 245, 250.)

Applying these criteria to the case at bench, defendants knew, or were chargeable with, the fact that The Plan's actual provisions were opposed to those described in the Booklet, so that the first element is established. The purpose of the defendants in issuing the Booklet was to disseminate general information to their employees with the intention of persuading them...