Estrada v. Royalty Carpet Mills, Inc. (2024) 15 Cal.5th 582

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IN THE SUPREME COURT OF 
CALIFORNIA 
 
JORGE LUIS ESTRADA et al., 
Plaintiffs and Appellants, 
v. 
ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC., 
Defendant and Appellant. 
 
S274340 
 
Fourth Appellate District, Division Three 
G058397, G058969 
 
Orange County Superior Court 
30-2013-00692890 
 
 
January 18, 2024 
 
Chief Justice Guerrero authored the opinion of the Court, in 
which Justices Corrigan, Liu, Kruger, Groban, Jenkins, and 
Evans concurred. 
 



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1 
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
S274340 
 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
The Courts of Appeal have reached contrary conclusions 
as to whether trial courts have the inherent authority to strike 1  
a Labor Code Private Attorneys General Act of 2004 (PAGA; 
Lab. Code, § 2698 et seq.) 2  claim on manageability grounds.  
(Compare Estrada v. Royalty Carpet Mills, Inc. (2022) 
76 Cal.App.5th 685, 697 (Estrada) [concluding that trial courts 
lack such inherent authority] with Wesson v. Staples the Office 
Superstore, LLC (2021) 68 Cal.App.5th 746, 766–767 (Wesson) 
[concluding that trial courts possess such inherent authority]; 
see also Woodworth v. Loma Linda University Medical Center 
(2023) 93 Cal.App.5th 1038, 1047, review granted Nov. 1, 2023, 
S281717 (Woodworth) [agreeing with Estrada that “trial courts 
may not strike or dismiss a PAGA claim for lack of 
manageability”].)  We granted review to consider the issue. 3 
 
1   
By “strike,” we mean to dismiss with prejudice. 
2   
Unless otherwise specified, all subsequent statutory 
references are to the Labor Code. 
3   
After we granted review, the United States Court of 
Appeals for the Ninth Circuit resolved a similar split among 
federal district courts applying California law and held, “In light 
of the structure and purpose of PAGA, we conclude that 
imposing 
a 
manageability 
requirement 
in 
PAGA 
cases . . . would not constitute a reasonable response to a 
specific problem and would contradict California law by running 
 



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
2 
We now conclude that trial courts lack inherent authority 
to strike PAGA claims on manageability grounds.  In reaching 
this conclusion, we emphasize that trial courts do not generally 
possess a broad inherent authority to dismiss claims.  Nor is it 
appropriate for trial courts to strike PAGA claims by employing 
class action manageability requirements.  
  And, while trial 
courts may use a vast variety of tools to efficiently manage 
PAGA claims, given the structure and purpose of PAGA, 
striking such claims due to manageability concerns — even if 
those claims are complex or time-intensive — is not among the 
tools trial courts possess. 4 
Accordingly, we affirm the Court of Appeal’s judgment as 
that court reached the same conclusion we reach here.  (See 
Estrada, supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at p. 697.) 5 
 
afoul of the key features of PAGA actions.”  (Hamilton v. Wal- 
Mart Stores, Inc. (9th Cir. 2022) 39 F.4th 575, 587 (Hamilton); 
id. at p. 590 [“The [manageability] requirement cannot be 
imposed in PAGA actions under the guise of a court’s inherent 
powers”].) 
4   
We disapprove the Wesson court’s conclusion that “trial 
courts . . . if necessary, may preclude the use of this procedural 
device [i.e., a PAGA claim].”  (
device [i.e., a PAGA claim].”  (Wesson v. Staples the Office 
Superstore, LLC, supra, 68 Cal.App.5th at p. 767.) 
5   
As we explain in part II.E., post, we also conclude that 
defendant Royalty Carpet Mills, Inc. (Royalty) has not 
demonstrated any potential violation of its right to due process 
occasioned by the Court of Appeal’s reversal of the trial court’s 
striking of plaintiffs’ representative PAGA claim.  However, we 
do not decide the hypothetical questions of whether a 
defendant’s right to due process can ever support striking a 
PAGA claim, and if so, the circumstances under which such 
striking would be appropriate. 



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
3 
I.  FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND 6 
Royalty operated two facilities relevant here:  one located 
on Derian Avenue (Derian) and the other on Dyer Road (Dyer) 
in Orange County.  (Estrada, supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at p. 698.)   
Plaintiff Jorge Luis Estrada worked at Derian.  (Estrada, 
supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at p. 698.)  Estrada filed a complaint 
against Royalty alleging various claims, including one asserting 
that Royalty violated Labor Code provisions requiring that it 
provide first and second meal periods, 7  and one seeking PAGA 
penalties for various alleged Labor Code violations.  (Estrada, 
at p. 698.) 
Estrada and plaintiff Paulina Medina, a former Royalty 
employee who worked at Dyer, filed a second amended 
complaint that realleged Estrada’s individual claims as class 
claims and retained the PAGA claim from the original 
complaint.  
complaint.  (Estrada, supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at p. 698.)  
Thereafter, Estrada, Medina, and 11 other plaintiffs filed the 
operative third amended complaint.  (Id. at p. 699.)  The third 
amended complaint alleged a total of seven class claims, one 
 
6   
Our factual and procedural background is drawn 
primarily from the Court of Appeal’s opinion.  (See Estrada, 
supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at pp. 698–703.) 
7   
A California employer must generally provide “a first meal 
period no later than the end of an employee’s fifth hour of work, 
and a second meal period no later than the end of an employee’s 
10th hour of work.”  (Brinker Restaurant Corp. v. Superior Court 
(2012) 53 Cal.4th 1004, 1041 (Brinker).)  In Brinker, we clarified 
that an “employer satisfies this obligation if it relieves its 
employees of all duty, relinquishes control over their activities 
and permits them a reasonable opportunity to take an 
uninterrupted 30-minute break, and does not impede or 
discourage them from doing so.”  (Id. at p. 1040.) 



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
4 
which was based on the failure to provide first and second meal 
periods, and one which sought PAGA penalties for various Labor 
Code violations, including those related to meal periods.  (Ibid.) 
Several named plaintiffs moved for class certification in 
June 2017.  
  (Estrada, supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at p. 700.)  
700.)  As 
relevant here, the trial court certified a Dyer/Derian class 
composed of former nonexempt hourly workers who worked at 
the two facilities between December 13, 2009, and June 14, 
2017.  
2017.  (Ibid.)  
  The court also certified three Dyer/Derian 
subclasses, including a meal period subclass to determine 
whether “class members were provided timely first meal periods 
and/or deprived of second meal periods.”  (Ibid.) 
The trial court held a bench trial on plaintiffs’ claims.  
Plaintiffs presented “live testimony from 12 of the 13 named 
plaintiffs, deposition testimony from four different managers 
and officers of Royalty, live testimony from two of Royalty’s 
human resources employees, and live testimony from an expert 
witness.”  (Estrada, supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at p. 701.)  
701.)  In 
defense, Royalty presented testimony from two former 
employees and an expert witness.  (Ibid.) 
Following the presentation of evidence, the trial court 
entered an order decertifying the two Dyer/Derian meal period 
subclasses alleging the first and second meal period violations, 8  
on the ground that there were too many individualized issues to 
 
8   
The Court of Appeal noted, “Though the court’s initial 
certification order created a single meal period subclass, the 
court’s decertification order appears to treat the first and second 
meal period issues as two separate subclasses.”  (Estrada, supra, 
76 Cal.App.5th at p. 719, fn. 10.)  
.)  Thus, we refer to these “as 
separate subclasses.”  (Ibid.) 



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
5 
support class treatment.    (Estrada, supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at 
p. 702.) 9   In the same order, the trial court dismissed the PAGA 
claim seeking penalties for the alleged Dyer/Derian meal break- 
related violations with respect to persons other than the named 
plaintiffs as being unmanageable.  (Estrada, at p. 702.) 10   The 
trial court subsequently entered judgment.  (Estrada, at p. 703.)  
Plaintiffs appealed from the decertification order and the 
judgment.  (Ibid.) 
In the Court of Appeal, plaintiffs claimed that the trial 
court abused its discretion by decertifying the Dyer/Derian meal 
period subclasses and erred in dismissing the subclasses’ PAGA 
meal period claims on manageability grounds.  (Estrada, supra, 
76 Cal.App.5th at pp. 709–714, 719–727.)  The Court of Appeal 
agreed with plaintiffs on both issues.  (Id. at pp. 714, 726.)  The 
Court of Appeal reversed the trial court’s order that had 
decertified the Dyer/Derian meal period subclasses and 
dismissed that portion of the Dyer/Derian PAGA claim based on 
meal period violations.  (Id. at p. 731.)  
731.)  The Court of Appeal 
directed the trial court to hold a new trial on both claims on 
remand, and added, “[a]s to both, we leave it in the court’s 
discretion to determine whether additional witnesses or other 
evidence will be allowed in light of the principles set forth in this 
opinion.”  (Ibid.)  
 
9   
In explaining the nature of these individualized issues, the 
trial court’s decertification order noted that “employee choice 
was a significant factor with respect to taking meal breaks.”   
10   
However, with one exception, the trial court “found the 
named Dyer/Derian plaintiffs had established individual PAGA 
violations” and therefore awarded them penalties.    (Estrada, 
supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at p. 703.) 



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
6 
We granted Royalty’s petition for review to resolve the 
issue dividing the appellate courts:  whether trial courts have 
inherent authority to strike a PAGA claim on manageability 
grounds. 
II.  DISCUSSION 
Royalty and amici curiae 11  claim that California trial 
courts have inherent authority to strike PAGA claims on 
manageability grounds.  In support of this assertion, Royalty 
and amici curiae raise two primary arguments that differ in 
their conception of the scope of a trial court’s inherent authority.  
Specifically, Royalty and amici curiae argue that a trial court 
may strike:  (1) any claim that is unmanageable for reasons of 
judicial economy; or, at a minimum, (2) any representative claim 
that is unmanageable, as with class claims and representative 
claims brought under a former version of the unfair competition 
law (UCL) (Bus. & Prof. Code, former § 17200 et seq.).  Royalty 
also suggests that retrial of the plaintiffs’ representative PAGA 
claim would violate Royalty’s right to due process and that trial 
courts must have discretion to strike PAGA claims in order to 
preserve the due process rights of defendants generally.  After 
providing an overview of the relevant law, we consider each 
argument in turn.   
 
11  
We have received amicus curiae briefs supporting Royalty 
from:  (1) the Board of Trustees of the California State 
University; 
(2) the 
Employers 
Group 
and 
California 
Employment Law Counsel; and (3) the Chamber of Commerce of 
the United States of America, California Chamber of Commerce, 
National Retail Federation, and Retail Litigation Center, Inc. 
(Chamber of Commerce).   



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
7 
A. Governing Law 
We begin with an overview of the three areas of law upon 
which Royalty’s and amici curiae’s arguments are primarily 
based:  California courts’ inherent authority, the PAGA statute, 
and the concept of manageability. 
1.  Courts’ Inherent Authority 
This court has identified two primary sources of California 
courts’ inherent authority:  “equitable power derived from the 
historic power of equity courts [citation], and supervisory or 
administrative powers which all courts possess to enable them 
to carry out their duties.”  (Bauguess v. Paine (1978) 22 Cal.3d 
626, 635 (Bauguess).) 
These two sources of power have translated into two 
principal ways in which California courts have exercised their 
inherent authority, namely:  (1) to address gaps in the law by 
applying procedures contained in related statutory provisions 
(see, e.g., People v. Arredondo (2019) 8 Cal.5th 694, 707 [courts 
may “ ‘ “create new forms of procedures” in the gaps left 
unaddressed by statutes and the rules of court’ ”]; In re Cook 
(2019) 7 Cal.5th 439, 446–447 [courts have inherent authority 
to apply Pen. Code, § 1203.01 to preserve evidence of youth- 
related factors for a hearing to be held pursuant to People v. 
Franklin (2016) 63 Cal.4th 261]); and (2) to adopt procedures 
necessary to perform essential judicial functions (see, e.g., 
Citizens Utilities Co. v. Superior Court (1963) 59 Cal.2d 805, 813 
(Citizens Utilities) [courts have inherent power to determine the 
appropriate 
amount 
of 
just 
compensation 
for 
inverse 
condemnation]; 
James 
H. 
v. 
Superior 
Court 
(1978) 
77 Cal.App.3d 169, 175 (James H.) [courts have the inherent 
power to determine a minor’s mental competence]). 



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
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On the other hand, “Courts . . . do not have the authority 
to adopt procedures or policies that conflict with statutory 
law . . . .”  (Weiss v. People ex rel. Dept. of Transportation (2020) 
9 Cal.5th 840, 857 (Weiss).)  “ ‘[I]nherent powers should never 
be exercised in such a manner as to nullify existing legislation 
or frustrate legitimate legislative policy.’ ”  (People v. Municipal 
Court (Runyan) (1978) 20 Cal.3d 523, 528 (Runyan), italics 
omitted.) 
More specifically, where the Legislature has provided for 
certain procedures in one context, courts generally lack inherent 
authority to apply the procedure in an inapposite context.  (See 
Weiss, supra, 9 Cal.5th at p. 865 [courts lack inherent authority 
to import certain eminent domain procedures into inverse 
condemnation actions]; Kraus v. Trinity Management Services, 
Inc. (2000) 23 Cal.4th 116, 137 (Kraus) [courts lack inherent 
authority to “fashion a fluid recovery remedy [in a 
representative UCL action] when the action has not been 
certified as a class action” in part because “the Legislature has 
not expressly authorized monetary relief other than restitution 
in UCL actions, but has authorized disgorgement into a fluid 
recovery fund in class actions”]; Bauguess, supra, 22 Cal.3d at 
p. 637 [“It would be both unnecessary and unwise to permit trial 
courts to use fee awards as sanctions apart from those situations 
authorized by statute”].) 
And, with respect to the form of authority at issue here, 
the power to strike a claim, while “[t]here may be cases in which 
the use of a nonstatutory motion procedure to dismiss a cause of 
action before trial is called for, . . . courts should be wary of such 
requests.”  (Weiss, supra, 9 Cal.5th at p. 865.) 



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
9 
2.  PAGA 
In 2003, the Legislature enacted PAGA to remedy 
“systemic underenforcement” of the Labor Code.  (Williams v. 
Superior Court (2017) 3 Cal.5th 531, 545 (Williams).)    PAGA 
provides for civil penalties for various Labor Code violations and 
authorizes “aggrieved employees, acting as private attorneys 
general, to recover [those] penalties.”  
general, to recover [those] penalties.”  (Iskanian v. CLS 
Transportation Los Angeles, LLC (2014) 59 Cal.4th 348, 379 
(Iskanian) abrogated in part on other grounds in Viking River 
Cruises, Inc. v. Moriana (2022) 596 U.S. ___ [142 S.Ct. 1906, 213 
L.Ed.2d 179] (Viking River).)  Under the statute, an “ ‘aggrieved 
employee’ ” is “any person who was employed by the alleged 
violator and against whom one or more of the alleged violations 
was committed.”  (§ 2699, subd. (c).)   
The term “ ‘[a]ggrieved employee’ . . . . governs not just 
who has standing to bring a PAGA claim, but also who may 
recover a share of penalties.”  (
recover a share of penalties.”  (Kim v. Reins International 
California, Inc. (2020) 9 Cal.5th 73, 87 (Kim).)    And a PAGA 
plaintiff may seek penalties for violations involving aggrieved 
employees other than the PAGA plaintiff.  (ZB, N.A. v. Superior 
Court (2019) 8 Cal.5th 175, 185 (ZB).)    We have sometimes 
referred to this as a “ ‘representative’ ” (Adolph v. Uber 
Technologies, Inc. (2023) 14 Cal.5th 1104, 1118, italics omitted, 
quoting Iskanian, supra, 59 Cal.4th at p. 384) or “non- 
individual” PAGA claim (Adolph, at p. 1114). 
Civil penalties recovered on a PAGA claim are split 
between the state and aggrieved employees.  (Iskanian, supra, 
59 Cal.4th at p. 382; see § 2699, subd. (i) [75 percent of civil 
penalties go to state labor law enforcement agency, 25 percent 
go to aggrieved employees].)  “[C]ivil penalties recovered on the 



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
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state’s behalf are intended to ‘remediate present violations and 
deter future ones,’ not to redress employees’ injuries.”  
to redress employees’ injuries.”  (Kim, 
supra, 9 Cal.5th at p. 86.)   
“PAGA suits exhibit virtually none of the procedural 
characteristics of class actions.”  (Viking River, supra, ___ U.S. 
___ [142 S.Ct. at p. 1920]; see also Hamilton, supra, 39 F.4th at 
pp. 583, 588 [summarizing distinctions].)  
  “A class-action 
plaintiff can raise a multitude of claims because he or she 
represents a multitude of absent individuals; a PAGA plaintiff, 
by contrast, represents a single principal, the [Labor and 
Workforce Development Agency] LWDA, that has a multitude of 
claims.”  (Viking River, 142 S.Ct. at p. 1920.)    Thus, because 
PAGA actions do not adjudicate individually held claims, the 
due process rights of third parties are not paramount.  (Viking 
River, at p. 1921.)  While “nonparty employees as well as the 
government are bound by the judgment” in a PAGA action as to 
a claim for civil penalties, nonparty employees are not bound 
with respect to “remedies other than civil penalties.”  (Arias v. 
Superior Court (2009) 46 Cal.4th 969, 986–987 (Arias).)  
Moreover, “PAGA does not make other potentially aggrieved 
employees parties or clients of plaintiff’s counsel, does not 
impose on a plaintiff or counsel any express fiduciary 
obligations, and does not subject a plaintiff or counsel to 
scrutiny with respect to the ability to represent a large class.”  
(Williams, supra, 3 Cal.5th at pp. 546–547.) 
3.  Manageability 
The term “manageability” and variants thereof encompass 
two related but distinct concepts.  First, the term refers 
generally to the degree to which techniques may be used (both 
before and during trial) to fairly and efficiently adjudicate an 



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
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action.  (See, e.g., Kesner v. Superior Court (2016) 1 Cal.5th 
1132, 1154 [“defendants raise legitimate concerns regarding the 
unmanageability of claims”], italics added; Platypus Wear, Inc. 
v. Goldberg (2008) 166 Cal.App.4th 772, 778 [stating that an 
anti-SLAPP motion might provide a way of making the case 
more “ ‘manageable’ ”], italics added; City of King City v. 
Community Bank of Central California (2005) 131 Cal.App.4th 
913, 
938 
[stating 
that 
discovery 
renders 
“more 
manageable . . . the points of legal controversy” in an action], 
italics omitted and added.)   
Second, the term “manageability” and its variants may be 
used more specifically to refer to a factor utilized in determining 
whether a class may be certified.  This factor looks to whether 
issues pertaining to individual putative class members may be 
fairly and efficiently adjudicated.  Under federal law, 
manageability refers to the rule that a court consider “the likely 
difficulties in managing a class action” in determining whether 
the class action certification requirements of predominance and 
superiority are met.  
  (Fed. Rules Civ.Proc., rule 23(b)(3)(D), 
28 U.S.C.; see Hamilton, supra, 39 F.4th at p. 586.) 12   
Similarly, in discussing California law, we have instructed 
courts to consider the manageability of a class action in 
determining certification.  For example, in Duran v. U.S. Bank 
National Assn. (2014) 59 Cal.4th 1 (Duran), we stated:  “In 
certifying a class action, the court must also conclude that 
litigation of individual issues, including those arising from 
affirmative defenses, can be managed fairly and efficiently.  
[Citation.]  ‘[W]hether in a given case affirmative defenses 
 
12  
All subsequent references to “Rule 23” and its subparts are 
to Rule 23 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (28 U.S.C.).   



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should lead a court to approve or reject certification will hinge 
on the manageability of any individual issues.  [Citation.]’  
[Citation.]  In wage and hour cases where a party seeks class 
certification based on allegations that the employer consistently 
imposed a uniform policy or de facto practice on class members, 
the party must still demonstrate that the illegal effects of this 
conduct can be proven efficiently and manageably within a class 
setting.”  (Id. at pp. 28–29.) 
B. Trial Courts Lack Inherent Authority to Strike a 
PAGA Claim on Manageability Grounds Based 
on Judicial Economy 
Royalty and some amici curiae claim that trial courts have 
broad inherent authority to strike any type of claim, irrespective 
of its nature, to foster judicial economy.  Specifically, Royalty 
broadly asserts, the power to strike a claim “is . . . an inherent 
power of the court in every case.”  (Italics added.)  According to 
Royalty, trial courts may exercise such power to strike claims to 
“preserve judicial resources [and to] prevent trials from 
becoming excessively complex and time-consuming.” 
Contrary to Royalty’s contention that trial courts possess 
a broad and general power to dismiss claims in the name of 
judicial economy, our case law has recognized that the inherent 
authority of trial courts to dismiss claims is limited and operates 
in circumstances that are not present here.  We explained the 
limits of a court’s “inherent discretionary power to dismiss 
claims with prejudice” in Lyons v. Wickhorst (1986) 42 Cal.3d 
911, 915 (Lyons).  There we explained that the inherent power 
of a trial court to dismiss claims “has in the past been confined 
to two types of situations:  (1) the plaintiff has failed to prosecute 
diligently [citation]; or (2) the complaint has been shown to be 
‘fictitious or sham’ such that the plaintiff has no valid cause of 



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
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action.”  (Ibid.)  In concluding that a trial court lacked inherent 
authority to dismiss a plaintiff’s action for failing to participate 
in a judicial arbitration proceeding, we emphasized in Lyons 
that “although the discretionary power to dismiss with prejudice 
has been upheld in this state, its use has been tightly 
circumscribed.”  (Id. at p. 916, italics added; see also 6 Witkin, 
Cal. Procedure (6th ed. 2023) Proceedings Without Trial, § 329 
[citing Lyons and stating “[t]he trial court’s inherent power to 
dismiss is circumscribed”].) 13 
Our holding in Lyons that trial courts possess only a 
“tightly circumscribed” inherent power to dismiss with prejudice 
(Lyons, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 916) is consistent with this court’s 
refusal to recognize even lesser forms of inherent power.  For 
example, in Bauguess, we concluded that trial courts lack 
inherent authority to award attorney fees as a sanction for 
misconduct, reasoning that it was “unnecessary and unwise to 
permit trial courts to use fee awards as sanctions apart from 
those situations authorized by statute.”  (
those situations authorized by statute.”  (Bauguess, supra, 
22 Cal.3d at p. 637.)  We observed, “If this court were to hold 
that trial courts have the inherent power to impose sanctions in 
 
13   
Royalty relies on Stephen Slesinger, Inc. v. Walt Disney 
Co. (2007) 155 Cal.App.4th 736, where the court held “that 
when the plaintiff has engaged in misconduct during the course 
of the litigation that is deliberate, that is egregious, and that 
renders any remedy short of dismissal inadequate to preserve 
the fairness of the trial, the trial court has the inherent power 
to dismiss the action.”  (Id. at p. 764.)  But nothing in Stephen 
Slesinger supports a broad inherent judicial power to dismiss a 
claim to “preserve judicial resources [and to] prevent trials from 
becoming excessively complex and time-consuming,” as Royalty 
contends.  
  On the contrary, the Stephen Slesinger court 
“emphasize[d] that dismissal is always a drastic remedy to be 
employed only in the rarest of circumstances.”  (Id. at p. 764.) 



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
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the form of attorney’s fees for alleged misconduct, trial courts 
would be given a power without procedural limits and 
potentially subject to abuse.”  (Id. at p. 638.)   
In sum, there is no inherent authority that sweeps as 
broadly as Royalty would have us hold.  Contrary to Royalty’s 
claim that all courts have broad inherent powers to dismiss 
claims on judicial economy grounds, we held in Lyons that trial 
courts possess only a narrow inherent authority to dismiss 
claims based on limited circumstances undisputedly not present 
in this case (e.g., cases involving a failure to prosecute, frivolous 
claims, or egregious misconduct). 
None of the cases cited by Royalty or by amici curiae 
supports the contention that courts have broad inherent 
authority to strike claims to serve judicial economy.  Notably, 
aside from Stephen Slesinger, discussed in footnote 13 ante, 
none of these cases addressed whether a court had the inherent 
power to strike a claim.  (See, e.g., Cohn v. Corinthian Colleges, 
Inc. (2008) 169 Cal.App.4th 523, 531 [considering a court’s 
inherent authority to accept an oral application to expedite 
discovery prior to a motion for summary judgment]; Asbestos 
Claims Facility v. Berry & Berry (1990) 219 Cal.App.3d 9, 23 
[considering a court’s inherent power to appoint defense 
counsel]; Peat, Marwick, Mitchell & Co. v. Superior Court (1988) 
200 Cal.App.3d 272, 289 [discussing a court’s inherent power to 
preclude the presentation of evidence as a sanction for litigation 
abuse]; Adamson v. Superior Court (1980) 113 Cal.App.3d 505, 
509 [considering a court’s inherent power to grant rehearing]; 
James H., supra, 77 Cal.App.3d at p. 172 [considering a court’s 
inherent power to order a competency hearing for a juvenile]; 
Venice Canals Resident Home Owners Assn. v. Superior Court 
(1977) 72 Cal.App.3d 675, 680 [discussing a court’s inherent 



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power to require the posting of a bond].)  And, in some of the 
cited cases, this court declined to conclude that the trial court 
possessed the inherent authority to take the action at issue in 
the case.  (Bauguess, supra, 22 Cal.3d at p. 638; Rutherford v. 
Owens-Illinois, Inc. (1997) 16 Cal.4th 953, 967 [stating “ ‘trial 
judges have no authority to issue courtroom local rules which 
conflict with any statute’ or are ‘inconsistent with law’ ”].) 
Our cases holding that courts possess some limited 
amount of inherent authority in other respects do not support 
Royalty’s contention that trial courts possess broad inherent 
authority to strike a claim for judicial economy reasons.  In 
Addison v. State of California (1978) 21 Cal.3d 313, we 
“appl[ied] the well established doctrine of ‘equitable tolling’ ” (id. 
at p. 316), which we explained had grown from our power to 
“formulate rules of procedure where justice demands it,” to 
ensure that “technical forfeitures . . . [do not] unjustifiably 
prevent a trial on the merits” (id. at p. 319).  And, in Citizens 
Utilities, we upheld a limited inherent power of courts to devise 
a procedure to assess the value of condemned property as of the 
date of trial and not merely as of the date of the summons (as 
provided by statute) after noting that constitutional provisions 
for the payment of the taking of public property were “self- 
executing,” and that it had “been held, in inverse condemnation 
cases, that inherent power is reposed in the trial court to provide 
for the assessment of just compensation in situations not within 
the purview of existing statutory provisions.”  (Citizens Utilities, 
supra, 59 Cal.2d at p. 812.)  This court’s formulation of rules of 
procedure to facilitate the trial of causes on the merits 
(Addison), and to devise a procedure to adjudicate certain claims 
(Citizens Utilities) bear no resemblance to the broad power to 



[PDF page 17]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
16 
strike a claim for judicial convenience that Royalty and amici 
curiae argue for here.   
Similarly, none of the statutes cited by Royalty and amici 
curiae reveals the broad inherent authority that Royalty and 
amici curiae claim trial courts possess.  For example, while 
Royalty cites Code of Civil Procedure sections 128 and 187, 14  
neither statute refers to a court’s inherent power to strike a 
claim due to manageability concerns, and Royalty does not offer 
any argument demonstrating that this sort of power is implied 
by such statutes. 15 
 
14   
Code of Civil Procedure section 128, subdivision (a) 
specifies a series of powers that every court possesses, including 
“[t]o preserve and enforce order in its immediate presence,” “[t]o 
enforce order in the proceedings before it,” “[t]o provide for the 
orderly conduct of proceedings before it,” “[t]o compel obedience 
to its judgments,” “[t]o control in furtherance of justice, the 
conduct of its ministerial officers,” “[t]o compel the attendance 
of persons to testify,” “[t]o administer oaths,” and “[t]o amend 
and control its process and orders so as to make them conform 
to law and justice.”  
 
Code of Civil Procedure section 187 provides, “When 
jurisdiction is, by the Constitution or this Code, or by any other 
statute, conferred on a Court or judicial officer, all the means 
necessary to carry it into effect are also given; and in the exercise 
of this jurisdiction, if the course of proceeding be not specifically 
pointed out by this Code or the statute, any suitable process or 
mode of proceeding may be adopted which may appear most 
conformable to the spirit of this Code.” 
15   
Royalty also cites California Standards of Judicial 
Administration, standard 3.10(a), which provides, “In complex 
litigation, judicial management should begin early and be 
applied continuously and actively, based on knowledge of the 
circumstances of each case.”  However, this standard neither 
identifies any inherent authority nor establishes that courts 
have the power to strike claims to foster judicial management. 



[PDF page 18]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
17 
The statutes cited by amici curiae are also inapposite.  
(See Code Civ. Proc., §§ 583.150, 581, subd. (m).)  While Code of 
Civil Procedure section 583.150 states that it “does not limit or 
affect the authority of a court to dismiss an action or impose 
other sanctions . . . under inherent authority of the court,” that 
provision does not purport to describe the extent of such 
inherent authority in any manner.  Code of Civil Procedure 
section 583.150 also pertains to the dismissal of a case for delay 
in prosecution, which, as discussed ante, is one of the narrow 
grounds upon which courts do have inherent dismissal 
authority.   
The other statute cited by amici curiae, Code of Civil 
Procedure section 581, enumerates specific bases for which a 
trial court may dismiss an action, complaint, or cause of action.  
(See, e.g., id., subd. (b)(3) [specifying that action may be 
dismissed “[b]y the court, without prejudice, when no party 
appears for trial following 30 days’ notice of time and place of 
trial”].)    Code of Civil Procedure section 581, subdivision (m), 
which amici curiae specifically reference, includes a caveat 
providing that the provisions of Code of Civil Procedure section 
581 are not the exclusive grounds for dismissal. 16   However, 
neither the statute generally, nor subdivision (m) in particular, 
confers a broad discretionary power to dismiss upon trial courts.  
Thus, we are not persuaded that Code of Civil Procedure 
section 581, subdivision (m) demonstrates that courts possess 
the inherent authority to strike claims advanced here. 
 
16  
Code of Civil Procedure section 581, subdivision (m) 
provides, “ The provisions of this section shall not be deemed to 
be an exclusive enumeration of the court’s power to dismiss an 
action or dismiss a complaint as to a defendant.” 



[PDF page 19]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
18 
Royalty also offers two hypothetical actions to support its 
claim that trial courts have inherent authority to strike claims 
on manageability grounds.  Neither hypothetical advances 
Royalty’s argument.  
First, Royalty posits a hypothetical case involving a 
plaintiff who, in a single action, seeks to join multiple claims 
arising out of different facts, premised on different legal 
theories, against several different defendants.  Royalty asserts 
that while “[f]acially, there is no bar” against joining such claims 
in an action, a “court would likely, sua sponte, dismiss certain 
claims and defendants without prejudice” pursuant to its 
inherent power to manage the action.    Contrary to Royalty’s 
assertion, there is a bar against the joinder proposed in its 
hypothetical.  Code of Civil Procedure section 379 requires that 
“at least one of the causes of action joined must affect all of the 
defendants.”  (
defendants.”  (Weil & Brown, Cal. Practice Guide:  Civil 
Procedure Before Trial (The Rutter Group 2021) ¶ 6:269 (Civil 
Procedure Before Trial).) 17   Thus, a trial court would be 
authorized to dismiss such unrelated claims against different 
defendants pursuant to a statute, rather than pursuant to an 
inherent authority to manage the action.   
 
17  
Code of Civil Procedure section 379 provides in relevant 
part:  “(a) All persons may be joined in one action as defendants 
if there is asserted against them:  [¶]    (1) Any right to relief 
jointly, severally, or in the alternative, in respect of or arising 
out of the same transaction, occurrence, or series of transactions 
or occurrences and if any question of law or fact common to all 
these persons will arise in the action; or  [¶]  (2) A claim, right, 
or interest adverse to them in the property or controversy which 
is the subject of the action.”  (Italics added.) 



[PDF page 20]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
19 
Royalty offers a second hypothetical of a plaintiff bringing 
unrelated claims against the same defendant.  Again, Royalty 
contends that a court could exercise its inherent authority to 
require that such claims be brought as “separate actions” and 
that a court could dismiss such claims without prejudice if the 
plaintiff refused to do so.  However, a statute would govern a 
trial court’s joinder determination in this instance as well.  Code 
of Civil Procedure section 1048, subdivision (b) specifically 
authorizes a trial court to order “a separate trial of any cause of 
action . . . or of any number of causes of action” in the 
“furtherance of convenience or to avoid prejudice, or when 
separate trials will be conducive to expedition and economy.” 18   
Royalty contends that its hypotheticals “demolish[] the 
idea” that courts lack a broad inherent power to dismiss any 
claim on manageability grounds.  
  However, rather than 
demonstrating that trial courts possess a freewheeling inherent 
authority to develop joinder rules for each action they face, 
Royalty’s hypotheticals reveal only that California statutory law 
provides the applicable procedural rules governing the joinder 
issues that Royalty presents. 
Finally, at oral argument, while Royalty’s counsel argued 
that PAGA cases should “not be treated differently,” and that 
 
18   
Code of Civil Procedure section 1048, subdivision (b) 
provides, “The court, in furtherance of convenience or to avoid 
prejudice, or when separate trials will be conducive to 
expedition and economy, may order a separate trial of any cause 
of action, including a cause of action asserted in a cross- 
complaint, or of any separate issue or of any number of causes 
of action or issues, preserving the right of trial by jury required 
by the Constitution or a statute of this state or of the United 
States.” 



[PDF page 21]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
20 
this court should “leave trial courts . . . with their full toolbox,” 
counsel did not refer to any cases in which courts have 
recognized a broad inherent power to strike a claim to foster 
judicial economy.  
judicial economy.  And, as noted ante, neither Royalty nor 
supporting amici curiae have cited in their briefs, nor has our 
research uncovered, any other circumstance in which we have 
concluded that trial courts possess such an inherent power to 
strike a claim.  Thus, contrary to Royalty’s contention that this 
case is about “tak[ing] away” a power that trial courts generally 
possess, Royalty would have this court sanction a broad new 
power that we have never before recognized.  For the reasons 
discussed above, we decline to do so. 
C. Class Action Manageability Requirements 
Cannot Be Grafted onto PAGA Claims   
We also reject Royalty’s narrower argument that trial 
courts possess the power to dismiss PAGA claims, in particular, 
on manageability grounds — just as they do with class claims. 19 
1.  Structural Differences 
We conclude that class claims differ significantly from 
PAGA claims in ways that make it inappropriate to impose a 
class action-based manageability requirement on PAGA actions. 
First, manageability bears upon questions of superiority 
and the predominance of common issues, requirements unique 
 
19   
As Royalty puts it, “Just because PAGA suits ‘are not class 
actions’ [(Estrada, supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at p. 697)] — a 
statement with which no-one can disagree — does not mean that 
they are exempt from all requirements that class actions are 
subject to . . . .  There are good reasons why both class actions 
and PAGA suits can and should be subject to overlapping 
requirements — such as . . . manageability.” 



[PDF page 22]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
21 
to the class action context.  Under federal law, manageability 
had its primary origin as a factor in determining whether the 
Rule 23(b)(3) class action requirements of predominance and 
superiority have been met. 20   (See Hamilton, supra, 39 F.4th at 
p. 588 
[“The 
manageability 
requirement, 
a 
subsidiary 
component of the predominance and superiority inquiries, was 
thus specifically devised to address concerns arising from the 
aggregation of individual claims for money damages”]; accord, 
7AA Wright et al., Federal Practice and Procedure (3d ed. 2023) 
Civil, § 1780 [discussing the manageability criterion and its 
ability to help the court “in determining whether questions of 
law or fact common to the members of the class predominate”]; 
2 Rubenstein, Newberg and Rubenstein on Class Actions (6th 
ed. 2022) § 4:72 [“The manageability factor ‘encompasses the 
whole range of practical problems that may render the class 
action format inappropriate for a particular suit,’ ” and is “by the 
far, the most critical concern in determining whether a class 
action is a superior means of adjudication”].) 21   
 
20   
Rule 23(b) provides in relevant part:  “A class action may 
be maintained if Rule 23(a) is satisfied and if:  [¶] . . . [¶]  (3) the 
court finds that the questions of law or fact common to class 
members predominate over any questions affecting only 
individual members, and that a class action is superior to other 
available methods for fairly and efficiently adjudicating the 
controversy.  The matters pertinent to these findings include:  
[¶] . . . [¶]  (D) the likely difficulties in managing a class action.”  
(Italics added.) 
21   
Class actions may be brought for purposes other than 
those enumerated in Rule 23(b)(3), including where prosecuting 
separate actions would either risk inconsistent adjudications 
among class members or would substantially impede individual 
class members’ ability to protect their interests (Rule 23(b)(1)) 
 



[PDF page 23]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
22 
Similarly, under California law, in determining whether a 
class action may be maintained, courts consider whether 
common issues predominate and whether a class action is a 
superior method of adjudication.  (See Washington Mutual Bank 
v. Superior Court (2001) 24 Cal.4th 906, 913–914 (Washington 
Mutual).)  Manageability is considered in connection with such 
inquiries.  (See Duran, supra, 59 Cal.4th at p. 29 [“In 
considering whether a class action is a superior device for 
resolving a controversy, the manageability of individual issues 
is just as important as the existence of common questions 
uniting the proposed class”]; Civil Procedure Before Trial, supra, 
¶ 14:11.10 [“The proponent of class certification must 
demonstrate that the proposed class action is manageable,” 
which “requires the trial court ‘to carefully weigh the respective 
benefits and burdens of a class action, and to permit its 
maintenance only where substantial benefits will be accrued by 
both litigants and the courts alike’ ”].) 
In contrast, “an employee’s representative action against 
an employer . . . seeking civil penalties under [PAGA]” need not 
“satisfy class action requirements.”  (Arias, supra, 46 Cal.4th at 
p. 975.)  Specifically, there is no requirement that a plaintiff 
establish predominance of common issues to state a PAGA 
claim.  (See Wesson, supra, 68 Cal.App.5th at p. 766.)  Likewise, 
there is no authority suggesting that superiority is a 
requirement for a representative PAGA action.  On the contrary, 
PAGA is based on the Legislature’s intent to maximize the 
 
and where a party is requesting indivisible injunctive or 
declaratory relief (Rule 23(b)(2)).  
23(b)(2)).  In the Ninth Circuit, class 
actions brought under Rule 23(b)(1) or (b)(2) are not subject to a 
manageability requirement.  (
manageability requirement.  (Hamilton, supra, 39 F.4th at 
p. 588.) 



[PDF page 24]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
23 
enforcement of labor laws.  (
enforcement of labor laws.  (ZB, supra, 8 Cal.5th at p. 184.)  
PAGA’s legislative history also reveals that the Legislature 
wanted to seek to “achieve maximum compliance with state 
labor laws.”  (
labor laws.”  (Arias, supra, 46 Cal.4th at p. 980; see Wood v. 
Kaiser Foundation Hospitals (2023) 88 Cal.App.5th 742, 758 
(Wood) [explaining that the Legislature was concerned with 
massive underenforcement of labor laws causing state revenue 
losses].)  A legislative intent to maximize the enforcement of 
labor laws is in tension with the class action superiority 
requirement, which requires a court to “ ‘ “carefully weigh 
respective benefits and burdens and to allow maintenance of the 
class action only where substantial benefits accrue both to 
litigants and the courts.” ’ ”  (
”  (Linder v. Thrifty Oil Co. (2000) 
23 Cal.4th 429, 435 (Linder).) 
Thus, we are not persuaded by amici curiae’s argument 
that “if class action plaintiffs cannot manageably prove their 
claims on a classwide basis, there is no rational basis for 
allowing PAGA plaintiffs to demand that trial courts try 
unmanageable 
PAGA 
claims.” 
 
 
 
As 
outlined 
above, 
manageability in the class action context is a factor in 
demonstrating that class-wide issues predominate and that a 
class action is superior to individual actions.  Given that a PAGA 
plaintiff need not demonstrate that common issues predominate 
or that a representative or non-individual PAGA claim is 
superior to other forms of adjudication, the requirement that a 
plaintiff demonstrate the manageability of a class claim does not 
establish a similar manageability requirement for any related 
PAGA claim. 
Further, manageability, when considered as a factor in 
determining the propriety of class certification, is considered in 
connection with other factors.  (See 2 Rubenstein, Newberg and 



[PDF page 25]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
24 
Rubenstein on Class Actions, supra, at § 4:72 [“the question that 
courts consider when they analyze manageability is not whether 
a class action is manageable in the abstract but how the 
problems that might occur in managing a class suit compare to 
the problems that would occur in managing litigation without a 
class suit”].)  However, while a trial court may deny certification 
or decertify a class if it would not be feasible to manage the 
individual issues in a class action trial, denial of certification or 
decertification is not an option for a trial court when 
adjudicating a PAGA claim.  Further, imposing “a freestanding 
manageability requirement” as to PAGA claims “ ‘would invite 
courts to consider the administrative burdens’ of the action ‘in a 
vacuum.’ ”  (
”  (Hamilton, supra, 39 F.4th at p. 589.)  In other 
words, while a manageability determination in the class action 
context is part of the consideration of the costs and benefits of 
class adjudication as opposed to other methods for resolving the 
controversy (Briseno v. ConAgra Foods, Inc. (9th Cir. 2017) 
844 F.3d 1121, 1128), to apply a separate manageability 
requirement in the PAGA context apart from a consideration of 
any other factors that might favor representative litigation 
would be to apply the manageability criterion in a way it does 
not apply in the class action context.  And, applying a 
manageability requirement in such a unidirectional fashion in 
the PAGA context could predictably lead to “the dismissal of 
many PAGA cases” (Hamilton, at p. 589) in contravention of the 
Legislature’s intent to have the statute maximize the 
enforcement of labor laws (see ZB, supra, 8 Cal.5th at p. 184). 
In this case, the trial court ruled that the Dyer and Derian 
meal break subclasses had to be decertified because “Plaintiffs 
fail to satisfy their burden to establish commonality or 
predominance.”  Then, notwithstanding that commonality and 



[PDF page 26]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
25 
predominance are not PAGA requirements, the trial court 
summarily concluded, “The meal break-related claims that 
Plaintiffs bring for the Dyer and Derian locations under [PAGA], 
are also dismissed because, for the various reasons noted above, 
there are numerous individualized issues that render Plaintiffs’ 
PAGA meal break claims unmanageable.”  We reject a rule that 
would likely result in courts relying on class action 
manageability determinations in striking PAGA claims, even 
where the primary factors driving the class manageability 
determination (e.g., predominance and superiority) have no 
applicability in the PAGA context.   
Our decision in Williams did not impose a manageability 
requirement on PAGA actions.  While in Williams we stated that 
a PAGA plaintiff’s ability to offer evidence of uniform policies “is 
one way a plaintiff might seek to render trial of the action 
manageable” (Williams, supra, 3 Cal.5th at p. 559, italics 
added), we did not hold that a court could strike a PAGA claim 
for manageability reasons.  Rather, Williams stands for the 
unremarkable proposition that trial participants should 
endeavor in all cases (including PAGA cases) to ensure that a 
case is efficiently adjudicated.  We unequivocally endorse that 
proposition.  However, stating that all trial participants must 
endeavor to fairly and efficiently adjudicate an action is distinct 
from concluding that trial courts may strike a PAGA claim for 
manageability reasons.  (See ante, at p. 10 [noting that the “term 
‘manageability’ and variants thereof encompass two related but 
distinct concepts”].)  While trial courts shall endeavor to 
efficiently manage PAGA cases, just as they must manage any 
complex case, it makes little sense to impose a class action 
manageability requirement on PAGA claims when such a 



[PDF page 27]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
26 
requirement is relevant to the class certification procedure but 
has no applicability to a PAGA claim. 
Second, unlike class claims, PAGA claims are effectively 
administrative 
enforcement 
actions, 
and 
imposing 
a 
manageability requirement would impede the effectiveness of 
such actions.  “Hurdles that impede the effective prosecution of 
representative PAGA actions undermine the Legislature’s 
objectives.”  (Williams, supra, 3 Cal.5th at p. 548; see also Kim, 
supra, 9 Cal.5th at p. 89 [“the very reason the Legislature 
enacted PAGA was to enhance enforcement of provisions 
punishable only through government-initiated proceedings”].)   
Royalty contends that such reasoning “overlooks the very 
different incentives that exist in privately-brought PAGA 
actions 
as 
compared 
to 
LWDA 
enforcement 
actions.”  
Specifically, Royalty maintains that PAGA’s one-way attorney 
fees provision incentivizes plaintiffs’ lawyers to bring PAGA 
claims in ways that differ from “a state agency with ‘scarce 
resources [for] an investigation.’ ”  We are not persuaded by this 
reasoning, which focuses on the wisdom of PAGA’s attorney fees 
provision — a concern better addressed to the Legislature. 22 
 
22   
Differences of opinion regarding PAGA’s attorney fees 
provision are not new.  (See Simmons et al., California Private 
Attorneys General Act (PAGA) Litigation and Compliance 
Manual (Cont.Ed.Bar. 3d ed. 2023) § 1.2 [discussing PAGA’s 
attorney fees provision and stating, “The perception of PAGA 
thus varies based on the prism through which it is examined”]; 
compare Deutsch et al., California’s Hero Labor Law:  The 
Private Attorneys General Act Fights Wage Theft and Recovers 
Millions from Lawbreaking Corporations (Feb. 1, 2020) UCLA 
Labor Center Rep., p. 7  [“PAGA expands enforcement capacity 
 



[PDF page 28]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
27 
Third, unlike with class actions, a court’s authority to 
provide relief under PAGA is subject to specific statutory 
provisions that make it inappropriate to impose a manageability 
requirement on PAGA claims.   
Specifically, section 2699, subdivision (e)(1) links a court’s 
authority to “assess a civil penalty” to the LWDA’s authority to 
“assess a civil penalty” by specifying that a court’s authority is 
“subject to the same limitations and conditions” as those placed 
upon the LWDA. 23   We are aware of no authority that imposes 
a manageability limitation on the LWDA’s authority to assess a 
civil penalty.  Thus, the text of section 2699, subdivision (e)(1) 
further supports our conclusion that a PAGA plaintiff should not 
 
by tapping the expertise of private attorneys and increasing 
California Labor Code compliance”] <https:// 
www.labor.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/UCLA-Labor- 
Center-Report_WEB.pdf> [as of January 18, 2024] with 
Simmons et al., California Private Attorneys General Act 
(PAGA) Litigation and Compliance Manual, supra, Preface 
[“plaintiffs are able to leverage PAGA’s one-way attorney’s fee 
provision and penalty structure to their advantage because they 
have no concern regarding an adverse fee award,” and “[a]s a 
result, many employers encounter pressure to settle PAGA 
cases, even when they believe they have done nothing wrong, 
because they wish to avoid the substantial costs of defending 
litigation that presents a risk of paying both sides’ attorney’s 
fees”].)  
  This internet citation is archived by year, docket 
number, and case name at <http://www.courts.ca.gov/ 
38324.htm>. 
23    
Section 2699, subdivision (e) provides in relevant part:  
“(1) For purposes of this part, whenever the Labor and 
Workforce Development Agency, or any of its departments, 
divisions, commissions, boards, agencies, or employees, has 
discretion to assess a civil penalty, a court is authorized to 
exercise the same discretion, subject to the same limitations and 
conditions, to assess a civil penalty.” 



[PDF page 29]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
28 
be subject to such a requirement when it seeks a penalty on the 
LWDA’s behalf. 
We are not persuaded by amici curiae’s argument that 
section 2699, subdivision (e)(1) should be interpreted to “mean 
that if the LWDA has discretion to not take enforcement action 
after investigation, then trial courts have discretion to do so as 
well.”  (Citing Painting & Drywall Work Preservation Fund, Inc. 
v. Aubry (1988) 206 Cal.App.3d 682, 687 [“the Labor 
Commissioner has discretion to determine which investigations 
to conduct”].)  The judicial and administrative authority that is 
linked in section 2699, subdivision (e)(1) is discretion in 
“assess[ing] a civil penalty.”  While courts and the LWDA share 
discretion in assessing a civil penalty, amici curiae point to 
nothing in PAGA’s text or legislative history suggesting courts 
have the power to shape which cases can be investigated and 
enforced.  These types of enforcement decisions are matters 
within the LWDA’s discretion, not that of the courts.  The fact 
that LWDA can exercise a form of prosecutorial discretion in 
determining whether to take enforcement action does not mean 
that courts can exercise judicial power to strike a PAGA claim 
on manageability grounds.  We decline to interpret section 2699, 
subdivision (e)(1) in such a counterintuitive fashion.   
In sum, these three structural differences between class 
actions and PAGA claims support the conclusion that importing 
the class action manageability requirement into the PAGA 
context would be improper because it would “ ‘frustrate 
legitimate legislative policy.’ ”  
”  (Runyan, supra, 20 Cal.3d at 
p. 528, italics omitted.)   



[PDF page 30]
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29 
2.  Differing Jurisprudential Histories 
The differing jurisprudential histories of class actions and 
PAGA claims also support application of a manageability 
requirement as to the former but not the latter.  (See Kraus, 
supra, 23 Cal.4th at p. 138 [recognizing that the jurisprudential 
basis of an action is an important characteristic in determining 
the scope of a court’s inherent powers in stating that “because a 
UCL action is one in equity,” the court could “decline to 
entertain the action as a representative suit”].) 24   
We have previously described Code of Civil Procedure 
section 382 as “authorizing” class actions.  (
382 as “authorizing” class actions.  (Arias, supra, 
46 Cal.4th at p. 978.)  However, the history of class actions in 
California is considerably more complicated.  Code of Civil 
Procedure section 382 “is based upon the equitable doctrine of 
virtual representation which ‘ “rests upon considerations of 
necessity and paramount convenience, and was adopted to 
prevent a failure of justice.” ’ ”  (Daar v. Yellow Cab Co. (1967) 
67 Cal.2d 695, 703–704 (Daar); see Hernandez v. Restoration 
Hardware, Inc. (2018) 4 Cal.5th 260, 266 (Hernandez) [stating 
that “[t]he class action is codified in [Code of Civil Procedure] 
section 382,” and “is a product of the court’s equitable 
jurisdiction 
that 
rests 
on 
considerations 
of 
necessity, 
convenience, and the belief that in large cases, the class action 
will prevent a failure of justice”].)   
 
24   
Thus, we are not persuaded by Wesson’s suggestion that 
the adoption of a manageability requirement in the class action 
context — notwithstanding the fact that “Code of Civil 
Procedure section 382 . . . contains no such requirement” — 
supports imposing a manageability requirement as to PAGA 
claims.  (Wesson, supra, 68 Cal.App.5th at p. 764.) 



[PDF page 31]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
30 
As the Court of Appeal in Farrar v. Franchise Tax Bd. 
(1993) 15 Cal.App.4th 10 observed, “Its general but limited 
codification 
in 
Code 
of 
Civil 
Procedure 
section 382 
notwithstanding, the class action retains the essence of its 
origins as an invention of equity.    [Citations.]  
[Citations.]  Our Supreme 
Court has reinforced this heritage by urging trial courts to adopt 
flexible and innovative procedures from common law sources 
and analogous statutes.”  (Id. at p. 17, fn. omitted; cf. Fireside 
Bank v. Superior Court (2007) 40 Cal.4th 1069, 1084 (Fireside 
Bank) [“As class actions are originally creatures of equity 
[citation], so the rules for administering them must be 
equitable”].)   
The common law equitable basis of class actions in 
California explains why this state’s class action jurisprudence 
has not been limited by the literal terms of Code of Civil 
Procedure section 382.  As Justice Werdegar observed in her 
concurrence 
in 
Arias, 
“[Code 
of 
Civil 
Procedure] 
section 382 . . . says 
nothing 
about 
[several] 
important 
requirements such as the existence of common questions of law, 
the typicality of claims, the ability of the named plaintiff to 
provide fair and adequate representation, the superiority of a 
class action over other methods of adjudication, the likely 
difficulties of managing a class action, and the requirement of 
notice.” 25   (Arias, supra, 46 Cal.4th at p. 989, fn. 3 (conc. opn. of 
Werdegar, J.), italics added.) 
 
25    
Code of Civil Procedure section 382 provides in full, “If the 
consent of any one who should have been joined as plaintiff 
cannot be obtained, he may be made a defendant, the reason 
thereof being stated in the complaint; and when the question is 
 



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ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
31 
In addition, Code of Civil Procedure section 382 contains 
but a single sentence that provides scant legislative guidance 
regarding the multitude of procedural questions that arise in 
such complex actions. 26   The statute’s brevity, when considered 
in light of the inherent complexities of class suits, supports the 
need for courts to exercise inherent authority in this context.  
(See, e.g., Weiss, supra, 9 Cal.5th at p. 863 [stating that trial 
courts’ inherent authority “ ‘ “arises from necessity where, in the 
absence of any previously established procedural rule, rights 
would be lost or the court would be unable to function” ’ ”].)   
Unlike class actions, PAGA actions are not “originally 
creatures of equity” (Fireside Bank, supra, 40 Cal.4th at 
p. 1084), and PAGA does not “codif[y]” a preexisting common 
law equitable doctrine (Hernandez, supra, 4 Cal.5th at p. 266; 
cf. LaFace, supra, 75 Cal.App.5th at p. 400 [concluding that 
 
one of a common or general interest, of many persons, or when 
the parties are numerous, and it is impracticable to bring them 
all before the court, one or more may sue or defend for the 
benefit of all.”   
Even when this single sentence does provide apparently 
clear answers, we have concluded that such text does not 
necessarily govern class action procedure.  For example, 
notwithstanding Code of Civil Procedure section 382’s use of the 
disjunctive term “or,” this court explained that “[a]lthough the 
statute [Code of Civil Procedure section 382] appears to speak 
in the alternative, it uniformly has been held that two 
requirements must be met in order to sustain any class action:  
(1) there must be an ascertainable class [citations]; and (2) there 
must be a well defined community of interest in the questions of 
law and fact involved affecting the parties to be represented.”  
(Daar, supra, 67 Cal.2d at p. 704, italics added.)   
26   
The Judicial Council has adopted rules governing some 
aspects of class action procedure.  (See Cal. Rules of Court, rule 
3.760 et seq.) 



[PDF page 33]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
32 
PAGA is “unlike any pre-1850 common law action”]).  
  The 
statute and the rights it creates have been described as 
unique. 27   And, in contrast to the inexhaustive nature of Code of 
Civil 
Procedure 
section 382, 
the 
Legislature 
provided 
comparatively detailed statutory requirements for maintaining 
a 
PAGA 
claim. 
 
(See 
Lab. 
Code, 
§§ 2699, 
2699.3.)  
Manageability, however, is not one of the requirements and we 
see little reason to presume that the Legislature would intend 
for courts to have broad extra-statutory inherent authority to 
strike PAGA claims that the Legislature has itself authorized.  
“[A]s a general practice, we leave to the Legislature the adoption 
and amendment of statewide rules governing trial court 
proceedings.”  (Weiss, supra, 9 Cal.5th at p. 857.) 
Further, under PAGA, “[e]mployees who were subjected to 
at least one unlawful practice have standing to serve as PAGA 
representatives even if they did not personally experience each 
and every alleged violation” (Kim, supra, 9 Cal.5th at p. 85) and 
a PAGA plaintiff may seek to recover civil penalties from an 
employer based on violations committed against the plaintiff 
and other employees without demonstrating that the violations 
stem from a uniform policy (Williams, supra, 3 Cal.5th at 
p. 559).  Thus, our precedent makes clear that PAGA permits a 
plaintiff to have representational standing to seek penalties on 
behalf of individuals who have allegedly suffered violations that 
vary widely in nature.  To permit the striking of such claims 
merely because they require individual determination would 
 
27  
For example, one Court of Appeal observed that there are 
“some unique aspects to the PAGA agency relationship.”  (Wood, 
supra, 88 Cal.App.5th at p. 753, fn. 8.)  PAGA penalties have 
also been described as “unique.”  (Provost v. YourMechanic, Inc. 
(2020) 55 Cal.App.5th 982, 991.) 



[PDF page 34]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
33 
deprive the State of the very remedy the Legislature has 
authorized and would thereby defeat the purpose of the statute.  
This too supports the conclusion that courts lack the inherent 
power to strike PAGA claims on manageability grounds.  (See 
Weiss, supra, 9 Cal.5th at p. 857 [courts lack inherent authority 
to act in ways that conflict with statutes].)    In addition, the 
Legislature’s choice to authorize civil penalties rather than 
damages for a PAGA violation may help to lessen the 
manageability concerns inherent with these actions.  For 
although some individualized assessment is required to 
determine whether a violation occurred and the number of 
aggrieved employees, a PAGA penalty is not keyed to the degree 
or quality of an individual’s injury, as is often the case with a 
damages remedy.  (See § 2699, subd. (f).) 
Class actions and PAGA actions also differ with respect to 
the relevance of federal law.  California class action 
jurisprudence has long looked to federal law.  (See, e.g., Brinker, 
supra, 53 Cal.4th at p. 1021 [“Drawing on . . . federal precedent, 
we have articulated clear requirements for the certification of a 
class”]; In re Tobacco II Cases (2009) 46 Cal.4th 298, 318 [“This 
is demonstrated by federal law, to which we look when seeking 
guidance on issues of class action procedure”]; Washington 
Mutual, supra, 24 Cal.4th at p. 922 [“we may look to the 
procedures governing federal class actions under [Rule 23] for 
guidance”]; Vasquez v. Superior Court (1971) 4 Cal.3d 800, 821 
[“In the event of a hiatus, [Rule 23] prescribes procedural 
devices which a trial court may find useful”].)  And federal class 
action law contains an express manageability requirement for 
Rule 23(b)(3) actions that instructs courts to consider “the likely 
difficulties in managing a class action.”  (Rule 23(b)(3)(d).)   



[PDF page 35]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
34 
In contrast, there is no federal PAGA analogue.  Rather, 
PAGA case law is exclusively rooted in the application of our 
Legislature’s enactment, which, as noted above, lacks a 
manageability requirement.   
In 
sum, 
class 
action 
requirements, 
including 
manageability, developed in large measure from California 
courts’ assertion of their inherent equitable powers as informed 
by federal law.  In contrast, a PAGA claim is a pure statutory 
claim arising under California law.  This differing doctrinal 
basis for class and PAGA actions serves as an additional reason 
to conclude that trial courts lack inherent authority to impose a 
manageability requirement in PAGA actions.   
For all these reasons, we conclude the Court of Appeal 
properly determined that a trial court’s authority to limit class 
claims on manageability grounds does not support the 
conclusion that trial courts also possess inherent authority to 
strike PAGA claims on manageability grounds. 
D. Representative UCL Claims Are Inapposite 
Royalty and amicus curiae Chamber of Commerce claim 
that appellate courts have recognized that trial courts have the 
broad inherent authority to strike pre-2004 UCL representative 



[PDF page 36]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
35 
claims, 28  and that courts have similar inherent authority to 
strike PAGA claims. 29   We are not persuaded by this argument. 
Like class actions, but unlike PAGA claims, the right to 
bring a pre-2004 UCL representative claim arose out of courts’ 
exercise of their inherent equitable powers.  
.  Specifically, in 
People v. Superior Court (Jayhill Corp.) (1973) 9 Cal.3d 283, this 
court concluded that courts had inherent equitable powers to 
award restitution as ancillary relief in an action seeking an 
injunction under the UCL as it then existed.  (See Jayhill Corp., 
at p. 286 [“In particular, in an action by the Attorney General 
under [Business and Professions Code] section 17535 a trial 
court has the inherent power to order, as a form of ancillary 
relief, that the defendants make or offer to make restitution to 
the customers found to have been defrauded”].)   
In Fletcher v. Security Pacific National Bank (1979) 
23 Cal.3d 442, we recognized that a trial court also had the 
concomitant power to decline to exercise such inherent powers 
to permit a non-class representative UCL action and could 
 
28   
By “pre-2004 UCL representative claims,” we refer to 
representative claims brought under a former version of the 
UCL that were not class actions.  In 2004, the voters enacted 
Proposition 64 and amended the UCL to require that “private 
plaintiffs bringing representative actions comply with class 
actions procedures and requirements developed under Code of 
Civil Procedure section 382.”  (California Medical Assn. v. Aetna 
Health of California Inc. (2023) 14 Cal.5th 1075, 1092, citing 
Arias, supra, 46 Cal.4th at pp. 977–980.) 
29   
While Royalty alludes to this argument by citing one case 
involving a pre-2004 UCL representative claim, South Bay 
Chevrolet v. Gen. Motors Acceptance Corp. (1999) 72 Cal.App.4th 
861 (South Bay), the Chamber of Commerce’s amicus curiae 
brief fully develops the argument. 



[PDF page 37]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
36 
instead require the case to “proceed[] as a class action.”  
(Fletcher, at p. 454.)  We explained, “Before exercising its 
discretion, the trial court must carefully weigh both the 
advantages and disadvantages of an individual action against 
the burdens and benefits of a class proceeding for the underlying 
suit.” 30   (Ibid.; see also Kraus, supra, 23 Cal.4th at p. 138 [“We 
note, moreover, that, because a UCL action is one in equity, in 
any case in which a defendant can demonstrate a potential for 
harm or show that the action is not one brought by a competent 
plaintiff for the benefit of injured parties, the court may decline 
to entertain the action as a representative suit”].) 
Thus, in considering whether to permit pre-2004 UCL 
representative claims, courts were free to exercise their inherent 
equitable powers without concern about unduly truncating 
legislative power authorizing such claims.  
  In contrast, as 
already explained, the right to bring a statutory claim under 
PAGA is not rooted in a court’s inherent equitable powers. 31   
Rather, the private right of action provided in PAGA was 
specifically authorized by the Legislature to counter systematic 
underenforcement of labor laws.  Thus, the jurisprudential 
history that serves as the basis for exercising judicial inherent 
 
30   
Such requirement closely parallels the superiority 
requirement in our class action jurisprudence.  (See Linder, 
supra, 23 Cal.4th at p. 435 [trial courts are required to 
“ ‘ “carefully weigh respective benefits and burdens and to allow 
maintenance of the class action only where substantial benefits 
accrue both to litigants and the courts” ’ ”].) 
31  
In LaFace, the Court of Appeal concluded that there is no 
right to a jury trial in a PAGA action, in part, because it is 
equitable in nature.  (LaFace, supra, 75 Cal.App.5th at p. 402.)  
However, LaFace does not suggest that a PAGA action arose 
from the courts’ exercise of their inherent equitable powers. 



[PDF page 38]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
37 
powers with respect to pre-2004 UCL representative claims is 
lacking for PAGA claims. 32 
E. Royalty Has Not Demonstrated Any Potential 
Violation of Its Right to Due Process, and We 
Decline To Decide Any Hypothetical Due 
Process Claims Not Presented in This Case  
Royalty’s brief also could be read to raise the claim that 
the retrial of the plaintiffs’ representative PAGA claim 
mandated by the Court of Appeal will violate its right to due 
process.  We are unpersuaded.   
Royalty argues that defendants, including employers in 
class or representative actions, have a due process right to 
present an affirmative defense.  
  (Citing Duran, supra, 
59 Cal.4th at p. 33.)  We agree.  In discussing class actions in 
Duran, we said that “defendants must have an opportunity to 
present proof of their affirmative defenses.”  (Id. at p. 38.)  There 
 
32   
At oral argument, counsel for amicus curiae Chamber of 
Commerce noted that the Wesson court perceived South Bay, 
supra, 72 Cal.App.4th 861, a decision involving a pre-2004 UCL 
representative claim, as persuasive authority regarding the 
PAGA issue before us.  We conclude otherwise.  In South Bay, 
the Court of Appeal upheld a trial court’s exercise of its inherent 
equitable powers in determining a plaintiff car dealership had 
failed to show that the harm the defendant allegedly had caused 
was “sufficiently uniform” to support adjudication in a 
representative action under the UCL.  (South Bay, at p. 897.)  
However, since a “uniform policy . . . is not a condition” of a 
statutory claim under PAGA (Williams, supra, 3 Cal.5th at 
p. 559, italics added), the significance that the South Bay court 
accorded to the lack of a “sufficiently uniform” harm makes that 
decision inapposite.  (South Bay, at p. 897.)  Accordingly, we 
conclude that the Wesson court’s reliance on South Bay, echoed 
by Royalty (see fn. 29, ante) and amicus curiae, is unpersuasive. 



[PDF page 39]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
38 
is no reason to think defendants have lesser due process rights 
in defending against representative PAGA claims. 
However, we reject Royalty’s and amici curiae’s suggestion 
that a defendant’s right to present an affirmative defense as 
recognized in Duran, supra, 59 Cal.4th at page 27, carries with 
it a concomitant right to present the testimony of an unlimited 
number of individual employees in support of such affirmative 
defense.  
  Indeed, in Duran, immediately after stating that 
“defendants must have an opportunity to present proof of their 
affirmative defenses,” we added that such adjudication is to 
occur “within whatever method the court and the parties fashion 
to try these issues.”  (Id. at p. 38.) 
In fact, we suggested that class action defendants do “not 
have an unfettered right to present individualized evidence in 
support of a defense.”  (Duran, supra, 59 Cal.4th at p. 34, italics 
added.)  We also added, “No case, to our knowledge, holds that 
a defendant has a due process right to litigate an affirmative 
defense as to each individual class member.”  (
defense as to each individual class member.”  (Id. at p. 38.)  
Further, we emphasized that courts may exercise discretion 
regarding how to adjudicate such defenses, so long as the 
defendant is permitted “to introduce its own evidence, both to 
challenge the plaintiffs’ showing and to reduce overall 
damages.”  (Ibid.)  In particular, if plaintiffs seek to prove their 
claims using a statistical model, we explained that the 
defendant “must be given a chance to impeach that model or 
otherwise show that its liability is reduced.”  (Ibid.)  
Royalty fails to demonstrate why these limitations on the 
right to present an affirmative defense in class actions do not 
also apply to the defense of representative PAGA claims.  
Accordingly, we reject Royalty’s and amici curiae’s contention 



[PDF page 40]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
39 
that certain affirmative defenses to representative PAGA claims 
require the testimony of nearly all alleged aggrieved employees 
in a case.  We further reject their contention that to limit the 
presentation of individual employees’ testimony in such cases 
necessarily amounts to an abridgment of the meaningful right 
to present an affirmative defense and a violation of an 
employer’s right to due process under Duran.   
In light of these principles, we are unpersuaded by 
Royalty’s suggestion that retrial of plaintiffs’ representative 
PAGA claim would violate its right to due process.  Royalty 
argues that “where determining whether employees’ late or 
missed meal periods were violations of the Labor Code will 
require testimony from each one, the Court of Appeal’s only 
response is ‘limit witness testimony and other forms of 
evidence.’  [Citation.]  This will deprive the PAGA defendant of 
any meaningful ability to present the affirmative defense that 
the employee group whom the plaintiff is representing (or many 
individuals within it) are not ‘aggrieved’ within the meaning of 
the statute.”   
In this case, however, it bears emphasis that Royalty 
presented the testimony of just two former employees and one 
expert witness at the initial trial.  The trial court did not 
prohibit Royalty from calling additional witnesses.  It was only 
after the presentation of evidence at trial that the trial court 
struck the plaintiffs’ representative PAGA claim. 33   Under these 
 
33   
As noted in part I, ante, the Court of Appeal stated that 
the trial court had discretion whether to allow “additional 
witnesses or other evidence” on remand.  (
on remand.  (Estrada, supra, 
76 Cal.App.5th at p. 731.)  Royalty raises no claim in this court 
as to this aspect of the Court of Appeal’s disposition. 



[PDF page 41]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
40 
circumstances, Royalty has not established that it has a due 
process right to present the individual testimony of each 
allegedly aggrieved employee.  And it has not established that 
the retrial of plaintiffs’ representative PAGA claim would 
violate its right to due process by failing to permit such 
testimony. 34   
Royalty and amici curiae also appear to raise the broader 
claim that trial courts have inherent authority to strike a PAGA 
claim to protect a defendant’s due process rights generally.  
While certain characteristics of some PAGA claims, occasioned 
by the statute’s broad standing rules and the lack of need for 
common proof or class certification, may present trial courts 
with challenges in ensuring that a defendant’s due process 
rights are preserved, we express no opinion as to the 
hypothetical 
questions 
of 
whether, 
and 
under 
what 
circumstances, a defendant’s right to due process might ever 
support striking a PAGA claim.   
We also emphasize that trial courts have numerous tools 
that can be used to manage complex cases generally, and PAGA 
cases in particular, that do not involve striking a PAGA claim.  
All of those case management tools remain undisturbed by our 
decision in this case. 35   To that end we note that the Judicial 
 
34   
By the same token, plaintiffs also do not have an 
unfettered right to present an unlimited number of witnesses.  
Indeed, in the Court of Appeal below, it was plaintiffs who 
claimed that the trial court had erred in refusing to allow them 
to call all their proposed witnesses with respect to the 
Dyer/Derian meal period subclasses. 
35    
We have concluded that manageability is an improper 
basis upon which to strike a PAGA claim and that any striking 
 



[PDF page 42]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
41 
Council has described many of the tools that courts may use in 
managing discovery, other pretrial proceedings, and the trial of 
complex cases, including cases involving PAGA claims.  (See 
generally 
Judicial 
Council 
of 
Cal., 
Deskbook 
on 
the 
Management of Complex Civil Litigation (2016) (Deskbook); see 
id. at ch. 5.I. [discussing PAGA litigation].) 36 
Indeed, in cases involving many employees or distinct 
types of violations over a long period of time or in different 
locations, the adjudication of PAGA claims may benefit from 
evidence other than, or in addition to, individual testimonies.  
With respect to the alleged Labor Code violation at issue in this 
case, we have recently held that, when adjudicating the 
affirmative defense of waiver to a meal break claim in the class 
action context, “ ‘Representative testimony, surveys, and 
statistical analysis,’ along with other types of evidence, ‘are 
available as tools to render manageable determinations of the 
extent of liability.’  (Brinker, supra, 53 Cal.4th at p. 1054 (conc. 
opn. of Werdegar, J.).)”  (Donohue v. AMN Services, LLC (2021) 
11 Cal.5th 58, 77 (Donohue).) 37 
 
of a PAGA claim to protect a defendant’s due process right would 
derive from a narrow authority of last resort to protect a 
constitutional right rather than the broad discretionary 
authority recognized by the Wesson court.   
36   
Among the sources that the Deskbook cites is the Federal 
Judicial Center’s Manual for Complex Litigation, Fourth 
Edition (2004).  (See, e.g., Deskbook, supra, § 2.03.)  This 786- 
page treatise contains numerous case management techniques 
for complex cases.  We express no opinion regarding the use of 
these techniques in any particular case. 
37   
In Donohue, which we decided after the trial court 
decertified the Dyer/Derian meal period subclasses (see 
 



[PDF page 43]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
42 
Such tools may also be used to help efficiently adjudicate 
PAGA cases, including affirmative defenses to alleged PAGA 
violations.  Indeed, given that the purpose of the recovery of civil 
penalties in a PAGA action is to “ ‘remediate present violations 
and deter future ones’ ” rather than to “redress employees’ 
injuries” (Kim, supra, 9 Cal.5th at p. 86), statistical methods 
“designed to reveal generalized characteristics of a population” 
seem particularly appropriate for use in adjudicating such 
claims.  (Duran, supra, 59 Cal.4th at p. 55 (conc. opn. of Liu, J.).)  
In other words, evidence that reveals the “generalized 
characteristics” of a population (ibid.) may be useful to estimate 
the number of aggrieved employees, even if such evidence 
cannot demonstrate the extent of any particular injury. 
We also emphasize that our holding that trial courts lack 
inherent authority to strike a PAGA claim on manageability 
grounds does not preclude trial courts from limiting the types of 
evidence a plaintiff may present or using other tools to assure 
that a PAGA claim can be effectively tried.  (See Estrada, supra, 
76 Cal.App.5th at p. 713 [“courts may, where appropriate and 
within reason, limit witness testimony and other forms of 
evidence when determining the number of violations that 
occurred and the amount of penalties to assess”]; Woodworth, 
supra, 93 Cal.App.5th at p. 1070, review granted [courts “may 
 
Estrada, supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at p. 719), we concluded that 
“time records showing noncompliant meal periods raise a 
rebuttable presumption of meal period violations at summary 
judgment.”  (Donohue, supra, 11 Cal.5th at p. 74.)  The Court of 
Appeal in this case “reverse[d] the [trial] court’s decertification 
order [as to the Dyer/Derian meal period subclasses] and 
remand[ed] this case so these claims may be retried in light of 
the Donohue presumption.”  (Estrada, at p. 719.) 



[PDF page 44]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
43 
limit the evidence to be presented at trial or otherwise limit the 
scope of the PAGA claim, but they may not strike the claim 
altogether”].) 38 
In addition, as the Court of Appeal observed, since the 
plaintiff has the burden of proving a PAGA claim and the trial 
court may limit the presentation of evidence, it behooves the 
PAGA plaintiff to ensure that trial of the action is manageable 
so the maximum number of potential violations may be 
established.  (See Estrada, supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at p. 713 
[noting that a trial court’s power to limit the presentation of 
evidence may “encourage plaintiffs’ counsel to be prudent in 
their approach to PAGA claims and . . . ensure they can 
efficiently prove alleged violations to unrepresented employees,” 
since “[i]f a plaintiff alleges widespread violations of the Labor 
Code by an employer in a PAGA action but cannot prove them 
in an efficient manner, it does not seem unreasonable for the 
punishment assessed to be minimal”].) 
And, of course, a trial court may issue substantive rulings, 
including those on demurrer, or on motions for summary 
judgment or judgment notwithstanding the verdict, provided for 
in the Code of Civil Procedure to fairly and efficiently adjudicate 
an action in cases in which a plaintiff pleads the claim in such 
an overbroad or unspecific manner that the plaintiff is unable to 
prove liability as to all or most employees. 39 
 
38   
Plaintiffs also acknowledge that “the trial court is not 
powerless to manage the entire Estrada action, including the 
PAGA claims.”   
39   
Our discussion of the types of tools that a trial court may 
use to manage a PAGA claim is illustrative rather than 
exhaustive. 



[PDF page 45]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
44 
In sum, Justice Tobriner once said that “[n]o class action 
is inherently unmanageable,” because “a court always has 
access to a variety of techniques” to render the action 
manageable, and “[t]he critical question . . . is whether the 
techniques necessary to render . . . [the] action manageable are 
unconstitutional, or so distort the values a particular cause of 
action is meant to further that class suit would be improper.”  
(Blue Chip Stamps v. Superior Ct. (1976) 18 Cal.3d 381, 390, 
fn. 3 (conc. opn. of Tobriner, J.).)  The same is true with PAGA 
claims.  
claims.  Trial courts face the sometimes difficult task of 
employing case management techniques in a way that preserves 
the parties’ statutory and constitutional rights. 40   For the 
reasons we have explained ante, striking a PAGA claim on 
manageability grounds alone, as the trial court did in this case, 
is inconsistent with a plaintiff’s statutory right to bring such a 
claim and is beyond a trial court’s inherent authority.  And while 
we do not foreclose the possibility that a defendant could 
demonstrate that a trial court’s use of case management 
techniques so abridged the defendant’s right to present a 
defense that its right to due process was violated, that showing 
has not been made here. 41 
 
40   
In considering the potentially large amount of judicial 
resources that it may take to manage a single representative 
PAGA action, one must also bear in mind that such action may 
reduce the judicial resources that would otherwise be expended 
to manage many individual PAGA claims and prevent the 
underenforcement of California law. 
41   
Similarly, it may also be possible for a plaintiff to 
demonstrate that the use of such case management techniques 
so abridged the right to present the plaintiff’s case that the trial 
court will have erred.  However, we have no occasion to address 
this issue in this case. 



[PDF page 46]
ESTRADA v. ROYALTY CARPET MILLS, INC. 
Opinion of the Court by Guerrero, C. J. 
 
45 
F. Conclusion 
We acknowledge the challenges presented by complex 
cases, including representative PAGA actions, and we leave 
undisturbed various case management tools designed to ensure 
that these cases are efficiently, fairly, and effectively tried.  
Nonetheless, there are limits to a trial court’s discretion when 
determining how to balance the interests of the parties before it.  
We hold that the Court of Appeal properly concluded that a trial 
court “cannot dismiss a PAGA claim based on manageability.”  
(Estrada, supra, 76 Cal.App.5th at p. 709.)  Accordingly, we 
further conclude that the Court of Appeal properly reversed the 
trial court’s order dismissing, on manageability grounds, that 
portion of the plaintiffs’ Dyer/Derian PAGA claim based on meal 
period violations and properly remanded for a new trial on this 
claim.  (Id. at p. 731.)   
III.  DISPOSITION  
We affirm the Court of Appeal’s judgment. 
GUERRERO, C. J. 
We Concur: 
CORRIGAN, J. 
LIU, J. 
KRUGER, J. 
GROBAN, J. 
JENKINS, J. 
EVANS, J. 



[PDF page 47]
 
 
See next page for addresses and telephone numbers for counsel who 
argued in Supreme Court. 
 
Name of Opinion  Estrada v. Royalty Carpet Mills, Inc. 
__________________________________________________________  
 
Procedural Posture (see XX below) 
Original Appeal  
Original Proceeding 
Review Granted (published) XX 76 Cal.App.5th 685 
Review Granted (unpublished)  
Rehearing Granted 
__________________________________________________________  
 
Opinion No. S274340 
Date Filed:  January 18, 2024 
__________________________________________________________  
 
Court:  Superior 
County:  Orange 
Judge:  Randall J. Sherman 
__________________________________________________________   
 
Counsel: 
 
Ginez, Steinmetz & Associates, Rudy Ginez, Jr.; CE Smith Law Firm 
and Clifton E. Smith for Plaintiffs and Appellants. 
 
Baker & Hostetler, Joseph L. Chairez, Daniel F. Lula, Vartan S. 
Madoyan, Joseph S. Persoff, David B. Rivkin, Jr., and Andrew M. 
Grossman for Defendant and Appellant. 
 
Shaw Koepke & Satter and Jens B. Koepke for Board of Trustees of the 
California State University as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Defendant 
and Appellant. 
 
Munger, Tolles & Olson, Malcolm A. Heinicke, Katherine M. Forster 
and Minkee Sohn for Chamber of Commerce of the United States of 
America, California Chamber of Commerce, National Retail Federation 
and Retail Litigation Center Inc. as Amici Curiae on behalf of 
Defendant and Appellant. 
 



[PDF page 48]
 
 
DLA Piper, Julie Dunne and Matthew Riley for Employers Group and 
California Employment Law Counsel as Amici Curiae on behalf of 
Defendant and Appellant.



[PDF page 49]
 
 
Counsel who argued in Supreme Court (not intended for 
publication with opinion):  
 
Clifton E. Smith 
CE Smith Law Firm 
1117 Village Drive 
Oceanside, CA 92057 
(760) 754-5472 
 
Daniel F. Lula 
Baker & Hostetler LLP 
600 Anton Boulevard, Suite 900 
Costa Mesa, CA 92626  
(714) 966-8890 
 
Malcolm A. Heinicke 
Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP 
560 Mission Street, 27th Floor  
San Francisco, CA 94105-2907 
(415) 512-4029