Ayala v. Antelope Valley Newspapers: California Supreme Court Calendars Oral Argument in Independent Contractor Class Action

In Ayala v. Antelope Valley Newspapers, Inc. (9/19/12, pub. 10/17/12) 210 Cal.App.4th 77 (discussed here), the plaintiffs sought to certify a class of newspaper home delivery carriers, alleging that AVP improperly classified them as independent contractors rather than employees. The trial court held that individual issues predominated because of numerous variations in how the carriers performed their jobs. The Court of Appeal reversed in part, holding that such variations did not preclude class certification under S.G. Borello & Sons, Inc. v. Department of Industrial Relations (1989) 48 Cal.3d 341.

The California Supreme Court granted the defendant's petition for review and On June 26, ordered the parties to submit letter briefs: 

discussing the relevance of Martinez v. Combs (2010) 49 Cal.4th 35, 52-57, 73, and IWC wage order No. 1-2001, subdivision 2(D)-(F) (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 8, § 11010, subd. 2(D)-(F)), to the issues in this case. (See also Sotelo v. Medianews Group, Inc. (2012) 207 Cal.App.4th 639, 660-662; Bradley v. Networkers Internat., LLC (2012) 211 Cal.App.4th 1129, 1146-1147.)  

The Court will hear oral argument on April 2, 2014, at 9:00 a.m., in Los Angeles. This is the same day that the Court is hearing Iskanian v. CLS Transportation. The Supreme Court's docket for Ayala is here (Case No. S206874). 

Like Iskanian, Ayala will be covered at the State Bar's Fourth Annual Advanced Wage and Hour Conference on July 30, 2014, in Los Angeles, and the discussion will be broadcast on the internet. As a result, we are not planning to conduct a Watch List webinar on the case.