Marina Pacific Hotel and Suites, LLC v. Fireman's Fund Ins. Co.

facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action, what we think we know—beliefs not yet appropriately subject to judicial notice— has never been a proper basis for concluding, as a matter of law, those alleged facts cannot be true and, on that ground, sustaining a demurrer without leave to amend. Yet that is precisely what occurred here. The owners of Hotel Erwin and Larry’s (a restaurant adjacent to the hotel) in Venice Beach—Marina Pacific Hotel & Suites, LLC; Venice Windward, LLC; Larry’s Venice, L.P.; and Erwin H. Sokol, as trustee of the Frances Sokol Trust (collectively insureds)—sued Fireman’s Fund Insurance Company alleging the COVID-19 virus was present on, and had physically transformed, portions of the insured properties—“direct physical loss or damage” within the meaning of Fireman’s Fund’s first- party commercial property insurance policy—but Fireman’s Fund refused to pay policy benefits for covered losses incurred as a result. The trial court sustained Fireman’s Fund’s demurrer to the insureds’ first amended complaint without leave to amend and dismissed the lawsuit, ruling the COVID-19 virus cannot cause direct physical loss or damage to property for purposes of

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