Last week, the Supreme Court granted the defendant's petition for review in Dynamex Operations West v. Superior Court, No. S222732. In that case, the Court of Appeal (Second Appellate District, Division Seven) vacated, in part, the trial court's order denying the defendant's motion to decertify certain wage and hour claims. Dynamex Operations West, Inc. v. Superior Court, 230 Cal.App.4th 718 (2014), review granted.
The petition for review focused on substantive wage and hour issues, and this is the question for review, according to the docket:
In a wage and hour class action involving claims that the plaintiffs were misclassified as independent contractors, may a class be certified based on the Industrial Welfare Commission definition of employee as construed in Martinez v. Combs (2010) 49 Cal.4th 35, or should the common law test for distinguishing between employees and independent contractors discussed in S.G. Borello & Sons, Inc. v. Department of Industrial Relations (1989) 48 Cal.3d 341 control?
In answering this question, the Supreme Court may well have an opportunity to expand on its three most recent class certification opinions, namely, Brinker, Duran, and Ayala. It's hard to predict how far the Court might delve into class certification issues when it ultimately decides this case, which could be two or three years from now.
This litigation has already resulted in one published opinion on class certification issues. In Lee v. Dynamex, Inc., 166 Cal.App.4th 1325 (2008), the Court of Appeal reversed the trial court's order denying class certification. My post on that opinion is here.
Many thanks to the blog reader who wrote to advise me of the grant of review.
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