Mitsubishi Materials Corp. v. Superior Court

Herman, Mathis, Casey, Kitchens & Gerel, David S. Casey, Jr., and Bonnie E. Kane, San Diego, for Real Parties in Interest.

Bill Lockyer, Attorney General, Richard M. Frank, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Louis Verdugo, Jr., Senior Assistant Attorney General, Catherine Z. Ysrael, Supervising Deputy Attorney General, and Angela Sierra, Deputy Attorney General, for the State of California as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Real Parties in Interest.

SILLS, P.J.

Before us are claims by surviving American prisoners of war against a number of Japanese companies for whom they were forced to do slave labor during World War II. It is a remarkable case, one in which the Attorney General of the United States and the Attorney General of the State of California are on opposite sides.

The immediate cause of the litigation is a recent change to our state law which was intended to allow "Second World War slave labor" victims to bring a lawsuit to recover compensation under state law for their labor against private companies who benefited by that labor during the war. (Code Civ. Proc, § 354.6.) The legislation actually creates a state law claim which would not otherwise exist, [1] or if it ever…