Turrieta v. Lyft, Inc.

A PAGA plaintiff's status as the state's deputy stops at the edge of that plaintiff's own action. Justice Jenkins, writing for five members of the court, held that 'an aggrieved employee's status as the State's proxy in a PAGA action does not give that employee the right to seek intervention in the PAGA action of another employee, to move to vacate a judgment entered in the other employee's action, or to require a court to receive and consider objections to a proposed settlement of that action.' Chief Justice Guerrero and Justices Corrigan, Kruger, and Groban signed; Kruger concurred separately, joined by Groban, and Justice Liu dissented, joined by Justice Evans. The Court of Appeal's judgment — upholding denial of intervention, denial of the motions to vacate, and approval of the settlement — was affirmed.

The route is the scope of the delegation, not a prohibition. PAGA authorizes an aggrieved employee to 'commence a civil action' once the notice prerequisites are met, and the majority accepted that the power to commence implies the power to prosecute and to use 'the ordinary tools of civil litigation' — discovery, motions, trial. Entering someone else's case is not one of them. Because Brandon Olson disclaimed any personal interest and rested entirely on the state's, he could not establish the 'interest' Code of Civil Procedure § 387 requires for mandatory or permissive intervention, and his § 663 motion to vacate — the route by which a denied intervenor becomes a party of record with a right to appeal — failed for the same reason. The court disapproved Moniz v. Adecco USA, Inc. (2021) 72 Cal.App.5th 56 'insofar as its analysis and conclusion conflict with ours.'

Tina Turrieta, Brandon Olson, and Million Seifu each drove for Lyft and each filed a separate PAGA action alleging misclassification and unpaid minimum wages, overtime premiums, and business expenses. Olson petitioned in April 2019 to coordinate the actions under Code of Civil Procedure § 404.1; the petition was denied without prejudice because four were stayed, and he neither sought writ review under § 404.6 nor moved to intervene. Turrieta and Lyft then mediated, failed to agree, and accepted the mediator's proposal — a settlement whose amended LWDA notice and amended complaint were designed so the release would cover 'all potential PAGA claims.'

Turrieta moved for approval on December 9, 2019, serving the LWDA the same day; the agency filed nothing. Olson moved to intervene on December 24, Seifu on December 31, and both objected. The trial court found neither had 'standing to be heard,' approved the settlement as 'fair, adequate and reasonable,' and rejected on the facts Seifu's contention 'that Lyft engaged in gamesmanship such that plaintiffs in other cases (as well as the State) could be shortchanged.' Judgment was entered and the § 663 motions denied. The Second District affirmed (Turrieta v. Lyft, Inc. (2021) 69 Cal.App.5th 955); review was granted on one framed question, leaving outside it whether Turrieta had settled claims she was never deputized to pursue.

The majority reframed the question before answering it. Olson argued that § 387 supplies the right independently of PAGA. A prior question controls, the court answered: what PAGA delegates. Calling a PAGA plaintiff the state's 'representative,' 'agent,' or 'proxy' does 'little to establish or define the scope' of the authority conferred. Amalgamated Transit Union held that a PAGA plaintiff cannot assign the claim; ZB, N.A. held one cannot recover the underpaid-wage component of § 558 the Labor Commissioner can. The proxy is not coextensive with the principal.

Text, structure, and history did the rest. Where PAGA addresses participation beyond the plaintiff, defendant, and court, it addresses only the state: the complaint, any proposed settlement, and the judgment all go to the LWDA, the settlement 'at the same time that it is submitted to the court.' Had the Legislature contemplated a formal oversight role for other PAGA plaintiffs, it would at least have required that they receive notice. Every expansion of oversight — court approval of settled penalties in 2004, of all settlements in 2016, plus filing fees and $1.6 million for a PAGA unit — ran to the courts and the agency, never to competing plaintiffs. The claim that the LWDA lacks capacity, pressed by Olson and the Division of Labor Standards Enforcement, was an unsupported assertion in a brief.

The majority also catalogued questions PAGA does not answer: which proxy controls the litigation, whether one may settle over another's objection, whether every intervenor's counsel may claim fees under § 2699(g)(1). Olson's proposed complaint in intervention had asked for lead counsel designation, a service payment, and fees.

Olson's strongest policy argument was that the rule invites a race to the bottom: a defendant facing multiple PAGA suits can 'put the case out to bid,' settle with whichever plaintiff takes the lowest number, and buy approval of 'a weak settlement that will preclude other claims against the defendant.' He asserted Lyft had done exactly that. The majority engaged the argument and declined to resolve it: the Legislature assigned settlement review to the trial court and the LWDA, and a reviewing court must ensure 'that [the] negotiated resolution is fair to those affected'; the trial court here 'expressly considered, and rejected as a matter of fact, a reverse-auction argument.' It took no side 'in the parties' policy debate' over allowing or disallowing such intervention.

The separate writings divide here. Justice Liu's dissent treated the risk as decisive, warning that the decision 'creates a substantial risk of auctioning the settlement of representative PAGA claims to the lowest bidder and insulating those settlements from appellate review.' Justice Kruger's concurrence supplied the counterweight: a trial court's duty includes 'carefully considering any indications that the settlement has benefited the parties involved at the expense of undermining the protections the Labor Code confers,' whether or not any aggrieved employee has a formal right to intervene.

Turrieta withdraws party status, not information. Courts 'remain free to exercise discretion to consider arguments and evidence informally offered by plaintiffs pursuing overlapping PAGA claims in separate actions,' and those plaintiffs may take their concerns to the LWDA — which may itself 'offer comments to courts on proposed settlements,' a power necessarily implied in the submission requirement.

The aggregation statutes also survive. The opinion points to Code of Civil Procedure §§ 404.1 and 1048(a) and notes that courts have applied both to overlapping PAGA actions, citing Leenay v. Superior Court (2022) 81 Cal.App.5th 553 and State ex rel. Cisneros v. Alco Harvest, Inc. (2023) 97 Cal.App.5th 456. That cuts both ways: a plaintiff who wants standing must get the actions into one courtroom before a settlement is on file, and a defendant hoping to resolve with one plaintiff should treat an invitation to coordinate as a substantive decision.

The reservations are unusually numerous. The court expressed no opinion on whether a PAGA plaintiff has a personal interest — as an employee aggrieved by the employer's practices — sufficient to satisfy § 387; Olson had disclaimed one, and Justice Kruger wrote separately that the question 'must await another case.' It expressed no opinion on whether the state itself may intervene, move to vacate, or require a court to receive objections; Kruger, agreeing with Liu here, saw 'no apparent basis for questioning the right of the state to participate.'

It declined to say whether those procedural problems could independently justify denying intervention to a movant who does satisfy § 387; expressed no view on the correctness of Uribe v. Crown Bldg. Maint. Co. (2021) 70 Cal.App.5th 986, distinguished because the trial court there had authorized intervention; and reserved on 'operation of the newly amended provisions' enacted by AB 2288 and SB 92. It assumed without deciding that overlapping PAGA actions are permissible, and never reached the preclusive effect of an approved settlement on parallel actions.

The disapproved case produced the first application. On remand in Moniz itself, the First District reexamined the objector's appellate standing and dismissed both appeals (published opn. filed Feb. 28, 2025, A168481, A168872). It also refused to let the personal-interest reservation do any work: the objector's share of the employee allocation 'is shared by all aggrieved employees, who must recover together or not at all,' and Turrieta's concerns 'apply with the same force when those same individuals seek vacatur based on private interests.' The caveat survives on paper; the first court to test it declined to widen it.

The 2024 reform left the architecture in place: the settlement-submission requirement the majority treated as the Legislature's chosen oversight channel, formerly at § 2699, subdivision (l), was recodified as § 2699(s)(2). Because the court reserved on the amended statute, a reform-era case will have to run the argument again, though the provision it turns on is unchanged. Both opinions handed the larger question to the Legislature, which 'remains free to consider the questions we have addressed and resolved' — the dissent adding that it should assess whether the LWDA can review settlements unaided. Until it moves, the operative screen is the approving court and an agency that may comment but need not.

Turrieta is the settlement-side counterpart to Adolph: Adolph settled who may litigate a PAGA claim after arbitration, Turrieta who may stop one from being resolved. For an employer facing several notices and parallel filed actions, the decision restores what competing appellate authority had put in doubt — the ability to negotiate a global PAGA release with one deputized plaintiff, obtain approval, and take a judgment the others have no standing to attack.

The screen that remains is real but narrow. The court still reviews for fairness, and Kruger's concurrence tells it to look for exactly the pathology Olson alleged; but a competing plaintiff cannot become a party, generate an appealable order, or hold the settlement hostage for a share of the fee. Sequence therefore matters as much as size — the first plaintiff to reach an approvable settlement forecloses the rest.