Aleksanian

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

In December 2011, Aleksanian visited the Los Angeles Superior Court, Van Nuys Courthouse East (Van Nuys Courthouse) to help her son pay a traffic ticket. As she approached the elevators in the main floor lobby, Aleksanian tripped and fell over a crack in the terrazzo floor, breaking her arm and sustaining other injuries. At the time Aleksanian fell, the State of California, acting through the Judicial Council of California, Administrative Office of the Courts (Judicial Council) owned the Van Nuys Courthouse. The County previously owned the Van Nuys Courthouse. Between 1988 and 2002, the Legislature passed various trial court funding and facilities acts authorizing all counties to transfer their trial court facilities to the Judicial Council. (See Gov. Code, §§ 70301 et seq., 77000 et seq., 77200 et seq.)1 This legislation required each county and the Judicial Council to enter into agreements establishing the terms and conditions for the county to transfer ownership and responsibility for its trial court facilities. (See, e.g., §§ 70321, 70312.) For trial court buildings that a county continued to use jointly with the Judicial Council, the legislation…