Turrieta

Opinion of the Court by Jenkins, J.

The California Labor and Workforce Development Agency (LWDA) has statutory authority to collect civil penalties from employers that violate certain provisions of the Labor Code. The Labor Code Private Attorneys General Act of 2004 (PAGA) (Lab. Code, § 2698 et seq.)1 authorizes “aggrieved” employees (§ 2699, subd. (a)) — defined in part as “any person who was employed by the alleged violator and against whom one or more of the alleged violations was committed” (§ 2699, subd. (c)(1)) — to bring an action to recover the civil penalties on the state’s behalf after the LWDA, having been notified of the alleged violations, declines to pursue them (id., subd. (a); § 2699.3). In such actions, the LWDA generally receives the majority of any recovered penalties and “the aggrieved employees” receive the remaining amount. This case involves what has become a common scenario in PAGA litigation: multiple persons claiming to be an “aggrieved employee” within the meaning of PAGA file separate and independent lawsuits seeking recovery of civil penalties from the same employer for the same alleged Labor Code violations. Tina Turrieta, Brandon Olson, and Million…