Sierra-Nevada Memorial-Miners Hospital, Inc. v. Superior Court

This matter arises on a petition by defendant hospital for a writ of mandate overturning the denial of its motion to dismiss a medical malpractice action brought by real parties in interest (plaintiffs) for failure to bring it to trial within five years as required by Code of Civil Procedure section 583.310.

The failure was due to a computational error by plaintiffs’ law firm in calendaring the case for timely action on its part. Petitioner (defendant hospital) moved for dismissal of the action under section 583.310. The trial court denied the motion on the ground that the five years was tolled for seventy-seven days. The court reasoned that ”[b]ringing the action to trial, . . . was impossible, impracticable, or futile” under subdivision (c) of section 583.340 because the only experienced trial attorney in the firm was disabled for that accumulated period due to three episodes of surgery and convalescence during the five-year period.

We will grant the petition because the failure of plaintiffs’ law firm to calendar the case in a timely manner had nothing to do with counsel’s physical disabilities. We decline to read section 583.340 as an open-ended sick leave program…