In Pollock v. Tri-Modal Distribution Services, the Supreme Court today interprets the statute of limitations for employment harassment cases to give certain plaintiffs more leeway to bring their lawsuits, and it protects many unsuccessful plaintiffs from paying defendants’ appellate costs.
The court’s unanimous opinion by Justice Goodwin Liu holds that a cause of action under the Fair Employment and Housing Act for quid pro quo harassment by not promoting an employee “accrues, and thus the statute of limitations begins to run, at the point when an employee knows or reasonably should know of the employer’s allegedly unlawful refusal to promote the employee.” Under that standard, accrual might occur later than when another employee is offered and accepts the promotion the plaintiff didn’t get, but the opinion also says it can occur before the other employee’s promotion takes effect. The court further decides that it is the defendant who has the burden of proving when the employee plaintiff attained the relevant knowledge.
The court also concludes appellate costs are among those costs that a statute says can’t be assessed against a losing FEHA plaintiff unless there’s a finding that “the action was frivolous, unreasonable, or groundless when brought, or the plaintiff continued to litigate after it clearly became so.” It’s not stated whether such a costs award will require a separate motion or court notice under rule 8.276.
The court reverses the Second District, Division Eight, Court of Appeal on both issues.