Estill v. County of Shasta

Estill v. County of Shasta (CA3 C077513 7/31/18) Government Claim/Internal Investigation

Renee Estill submitted a government claim against the County of Shasta and others, specifically representing that she first became aware of the alleged incident [an internal affairs investigation by her employer] on September 9, 2011.  The County accepted Estill’s representation and denied her claim on the merits.  Because it accepted the claim as timely, the County did not warn Estill to seek leave to present a late claim.  This lawsuit followed.
          
During Estill’s deposition, however, defendants learned she was aware of the alleged wrongdoing as early as 2009.  The trial court granted defendant’s motion for summary judgment primarily on the ground that Estill’s government claim was untimely, but later granted her motion for a new trial, ruling there are triable issues of fact as to whether defendants waived their defense of untimeliness because the County did not warn Estill that she should seek leave to present a late claim pursuant to Government Code section 911.3, subdivision (b).  Defendants appeal from the order granting Estill a new trial, and Estill cross-appeals from the judgment in favor of defendants.
          
After oral argument in this case, we asked the parties for supplemental briefing on the application of equitable estoppel in this context.  We conclude that a claimant may be estopped from invoking the section 911.3 waiver provision where a public entity’s failure to notify the claimant that a claim is untimely is induced by the claimant’s representation on the government claim form.  And in this case, based on the entire appellate record, including the supplemental briefs, we conclude Estill is estopped from asserting that defendants waived their defense of untimeliness.  She represented in her government claim that the incident of wrongdoing occurred in September 2009, but that she “first became aware” of the incident on September 9, 2011.  She included an attachment to her government claim in which she could have explained what she had learned in 2009 and 2010 about the alleged misconduct, but she did not mention her prior knowledge.  Thus, the record indicates she intended for the County to rely on her representation in the government claim, and the County did in fact rely on the representation.  Accordingly, we will reverse the trial court’s order granting Estill’s motion for a new trial and affirm the judgment entered in favor of defendants.

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