Gastelum v. Pinnacle Hotel Circle LP
| Decision Date | 05 December 2022 |
| Docket Number | 21-CV-1458 JLS (DEB) |
| Parties | FERNANDO GASTELUM, Plaintiff, v. PINNACLE HOTEL CIRCLE LP, dba Comfort Inn and Suites San Diego Zoo SeaWorld Area, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Southern District of California |
ORDER (1) GRANTING IN PART AND DENYING IN PART DEFENDANT'S REQUEST FOR JUDICIAL NOTICE; AND (2) DENYING DEFENDANT'S MOTION TO DISMISS (ECF NOS. 15 & 15-2)
Presently before the Court are Defendant Pinnacle Hotel Circle LP's Motion to Dismiss for Lack of Standing (“Mot.,” ECF No. 15) and Request for Judicial Notice (“RJN,” ECF No. 15-2). Plaintiff Fernando Gastelum filed an Opposition to the Motion (“Opp'n,” ECF No. 16), and Defendant filed a Reply in support of the Motion (“Reply,” ECF No 17). The Court took the matter under submission without oral argument pursuant to Civil Local Rule 7.1(d)(1). See ECF No. 17. Having carefully reviewed Plaintiff's First Amended Complaint (“FAC,” ECF No. 14), the Parties' arguments, and the law, the Court GRANTS IN PART and DENIES IN PART Defendant's Request for Judicial Notice and DENIES the Motion.
Plaintiff a resident of Casa Grande, Arizona, has been using a wheelchair for mobility since 2015. FAC. ¶¶ 1, 12. When locations are not designed for the use of a wheelchair, Plaintiff must use his prosthetic leg to move short distances. Id. ¶ 4. Plaintiff, however, prefers to use a wheelchair, as the prosthetic leg is painful and uncomfortable, according to Plaintiff. Id.
Defendant owns and operates a hotel located at 2485 Hotel Circle Place, San Diego, California 92108 (the “Hotel”). Id. ¶ 6. Plaintiff claims he visited the Hotel on July 2, 2021, with the intention of lodging there. Id. ¶ 29. On the date of his visit, Plaintiff allegedly discovered the Hotel was not compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act's (“ADA”) regulations concerning wheelchair accessibility. Id. ¶ 34. Specifically, Plaintiff states the Hotel's access aisle slope is too steep and does not connect to an accessible route, and a curb ramp is located on the accessible parking access aisle. Id. ¶ 34(a)-(c). Plaintiff requests an injunction requiring Defendant to comply with state and federal law regarding wheelchair access and “[d]amages under California law for $4,000 per violation.” Id. at 10-11.[1]
Plaintiff filed the Complaint on August 17, 2021. See generally ECF No. 1. The Court dismissed the initial Complaint without prejudice for lack of standing. ECF No. 13. Plaintiff then filed the FAC on June 1, 2022. See generally FAC. The FAC asserts violations of the ADA, the California Unruh Civil Rights Act (the “Unruh Act”), and the California Disabled Persons Act (the “DPA”). See id. at 7-10. On June 23, 2022, Defendant filed the instant Motion, arguing that Plaintiff lacks standing and has failed to state a claim under the ADA or the Unruh Act. See generally Mot.
As a general rule, a district court cannot rely on evidence outside the pleadings in ruling on a Rule 12(b)(6) motion without converting the motion into a Rule 56 motion for summary judgment. See United States v. Ritchie, 342 F.3d 903, 907 (9th Cir. 2003) (citing Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b); Parrino v. FHP, Inc., 146 F.3d 699, 706 n.4 (9th Cir. 1998)). “A court may, however, consider certain materials-documents attached to the complaint, documents incorporated by reference in the complaint, or matters of judicial notice- without converting the motion to dismiss into a motion for summary judgment.” Id. at 908 (citing Van Buskirk v. CNN, 284 F.3d 977, 980 (9th Cir. 2002); Barron v. Reich, 13 F.3d 1370, 1377 (9th Cir. 1994); 2 James Wm. Moore et al., Moore's Federal Practice § 12.34[2] (3d ed. 1999)). Federal Rule of Evidence 201(b) provides that “[t]he court may judicially notice a fact that is not subject to reasonable dispute because it: (1) is generally known within the trial court's territorial jurisdiction; or (2) can be accurately and readily determined from sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned.”
In support of its Motion to Dismiss, Defendant requests that the Court take judicial notice of the following exhibits: (1) a spreadsheet downloaded from the federal judiciary's Public Access to Court Electronic Records (“PACER”) system showing Plaintiff's cases filed in the federal district courts in California through the present; (2) the Second Amended Complaint in Gastelum v. KPK Hospitality, Case No. 21-1510 JGB (Kkx) (C.D. Cal. May 16, 2011); (3) a search on TripAdvisor.com for San Diego hotels in the “budget” class that Plaintiff claims to prefer; (4) a page from Google Maps showing the numerous hotels that are either as close to SeaWorld and the “Pacific Coast” as Defendant's Hotel or closer; (5) Gastelum's In Forma Pauperis Application filed in Gastelum v. Hees II, Case 3:21-cv-01337-JLS-RBB (S.D. Cal. Jul. 27, 2021); and (6) complaints filed by Plaintiff against hotels in Bakersfield, Gilroy, and San Diego arising from his visit to California between June 29 and July 4, 2021. See generally RJN.
“[U]nder Fed R. Evid. 201, a court may take judicial notice of ‘matters of public record.'” Lee v. City of Los Angeles, 250 F.3d 668, 689 (9th Cir. 2001). PACER is a “court-generated database that provides public access to court electronic records.” Moore v. Saniefar, No. 114CV01067DADSKO, 2016 WL 2764768, at *2 n.2 (E.D. Cal. May 12, 2016). Thus, PACER's accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned, and judicial notice may be taken of “court records available to the public through the PACER system via the internet.” Delano Farms Co. v. Cal. Table Grape, 546 F.Supp.2d 859, 927 n.5 (E.D. Cal. 2008). Accordingly, the Court may take judicial notice of Exhibit (1), as the information was generated by PACER. See, e.g., Delano Farms Co., 546 F.Supp.2d at 927 n.5; Reyn's Pasta Bella, LLC v. Visa USA, Inc., 442 F.3d 741, 746 n.6 (9th Cir. 2006) ().
As to the Second Amended Complaint in Gastelum v. KPK Hospitality, Gastelum's In Forma Pauperis Application filed in Gastelum v. Hees II, and the complaints filed by Plaintiff against hotels in Bakersfield, Gilroy, and San Diego, these exhibits are all court filings and thus matters of public records. See Lee, 250 F.3d at 689. Therefore, the Court finds that taking judicial notice of Exhibits (2), (5), and (6) is appropriate. However, the Court notes the limited scope of the judicial notice doctrine in this regard; specifically, the Court takes notice of the existence and content of these public records, but not the truth of the facts recited therein. See Coal. for a Sustainable Delta v. F.E.M.A., 711 F.Supp.2d 1152, 1172 n.6 (E.D. Cal. 2010) (citations omitted).
Courts have taken judicial notice of a geographic location or distance measurement as compiled by Google or a similar website. See, e.g., Pahls v. Thomas, 718 F.3d 1210, 1216 n.1 (10th Cir. 2013) (); Citizens for Peace in Space v. City of Colorado Springs, 477 F.3d 1212, 1218 n.2 (10th Cir. 2007) (); Access 4 All, Inc. v. Boardwalk Regency Corp., No. Civ. A. 08-3817 RMB, 2010 WL 4860565, at *6 n.13 (D.N.J. Nov. 23, 2010) (); see also Tesoro Ref. & Mktg. Co. v. City of Long Beach, 334 F.Supp.3d 1031, 1042 (C.D. Cal. 2017) () (citations omitted). Exhibit (4) is a printout directly from Google Maps. Accordingly, the Court takes judicial notice of Exhibit (4).
As to Exhibit (3), a search on TripAdvisor.com for San Diego hotels in the “budget” class that Plaintiff claims to prefer, the Court declines to take judicial notice of TripAdvisor's website because it may have looked different when Plaintiff was searching for lodging options. See e.g., Putt v. TripAdvisor Inc., No. CV 20-3836, 2021 WL 242470 at *7 (E.D. Pa. Jan. 25, 2021). Moreover, such information is not generally known in this Court's jurisdiction, and the information's source is not beyond question. Fed.R.Evid. 201(b); see, e.g., Tijerina v. Alaska Airlines, Inc., No. 22-CV-203 JLS (BGS), 2022 WL 3135913, at *3 (S.D. Cal. Aug. 5, 2022) ( that “[information on websites . . . is often not considered an appropriate subject of judicial notice,” and that “[c]ases that do judicially notice information from websites often rely on the doctrine of incorporation by reference when the complaint necessarily relies on information appearing on a[] website”) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). Thus, prudence cautions the Court to hesitate before determining that the search results from TripAdvisor are beyond controversy.
In sum, the Court GRANTS IN PART and DENIES IN PART Defendant's Request for Judicial Notice. See ECF No. 15-2. Specifically, the Court judicially notices Defendant's Exhibits (1), (2), and (4)-(6), but declines to judicially notice Exhibit (3). See id.
Defendant moves to dismiss the FAC on the basis of both (1) Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1), asserting Plaintiff's lack of standing; and (2) Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), asserting Plaintiff's failure to state a claim. See generally Memorandum of Points and Authorities in Support of Motion to Dismiss (“Mem.,” ECF No 15-1). The Court addresses each basis in turn.
A. Legal Standard
“A party invoking federal jurisdiction has the burden of establishing that [he] has satisfied the requirement of Article III of the Constitution; standing is a ‘core component'...
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