Carnival Cruise Lines, Inc. v. Superior Court

Carnival Cruise Lines, Inc. (Carnival) petitions this court for writs of mandate directing the trial court to vacate its orders denying their motions to dismiss or stay in Williams v. Carnival Cruise Lines, Inc. (L.A. Super. Ct. No. SOC 96347) (Williams) and Secard v. Carnival Cruise Lines, Inc. (L.A. Super. Ct. No. SOC 96301) (Secard) and to enter new and different orders granting the motions.

We have consolidated the two proceedings since they present identical questions of law and fact.

We grant the petitions insofar as they seek writs of mandate directing the trial court to vacate its orders denying their motions to dismiss or stay the subject actions. The petitions are otherwise denied. As discussed, post, we remand the matter for further proceedings on the issue of notice.

Issue Presented

Tickets purchased by plaintiffs in the underlying actions (plaintiffs), for a round-trip cruise from Los Angeles to Mexico on a ship owned and operated by Carnival, contained a forum-selection clause which provided that all disputes arising under or in connection with the ticket contract would be litigated, if at all, in a court located in Florida. The core issue presented is…