Unreported / Non-Citable
Background
Lylia Delgado sued Nissan North America, Inc. in Orange County Superior Court on January 2, 2026, under the Song-Beverly Consumer Warranty Act. She alleged that her 2024 Nissan Versa, bought on or about February 24, 2024, developed engine, emission, electrical, structural, suspension, and transmission defects and was presented for repair several times. The complaint alleged an amount paid or payable of $41,657.60, listed mileage at each repair attempt, and sought actual damages according to proof, rescission, restitution, a civil penalty of two times actual damages, and fees and costs.
On February 24, 2026, Nissan removed the case to federal court based on diversity jurisdiction. Plaintiff moved to remand on one ground: that removal was untimely because the complaint made the amount in controversy ascertainable and so started the 30-day clock under 28 U.S.C. section 1446(b)(1). Nissan opposed. Because Plaintiff did not challenge diversity or the amount in controversy itself, the court did not address Nissan's arguments on those points.
The Court’s Holding
The court denied the motion and found removal timely. The 30-day period under section 1446(b)(1) runs only if the initial pleading itself reveals removability, and under Ninth Circuit authority a defendant need not look to its own files or other materials outside the complaint to start that clock. The complaint here stated no specific damages amount, only a price figure and mileage at repair visits. The court found the $41,657.60 figure indeterminate: it did not say whether it was the total sale price or the cash price, or whether it included fees not recoverable under the Act, so it was unclear whether actual damages, including any mileage offset, could be calculated from it alone.
In a footnote, the court noted that Nissan's purchase agreement, submitted with its opposition, shows $41,657.60 is the total sale price including financing costs and fees, and that the cash price is $22,855.00. The court also found that the complaint alleged no facts allowing Nissan to determine whether the unpaid financing offset applied. Since actual damages could not be reliably calculated, any estimate of the civil penalty, pleaded at twice actual damages, was equally uncertain.
The court stressed that when the 30-day period begins is a separate question from whether removal is substantively proper, and that a defendant may remove before it must. It found persuasive Central District decisions applying the rule strictly so a plaintiff cannot start the clock with an incomplete complaint and then call the defendant's damages estimate speculative for ignoring offsets. It also ordered a joint supplemental Rule 26(f) report of up to five pages and proposed pretrial dates within seven days.
Key Takeaways
- A Song-Beverly complaint that pleads one price figure, without saying whether it is the cash price or a total sale price including financing and fees, may not start the 30-day removal clock under section 1446(b)(1).
- Whether the clock has started is a different question from whether removal was substantively proper, and a defendant may remove before the deadline is triggered.
- The court treated uncertainty about offsets, including the mileage offset and the unpaid financing offset, as an obstacle to reliably calculating actual damages and the derivative civil penalty from the complaint alone.
- The ruling decides only timeliness; the court did not rule on diversity or on whether the amount in controversy exceeds $75,000, because Plaintiff did not challenge those points.
- Denying remand keeps the case in federal court, and the parties must file a joint supplemental Rule 26(f) report and proposed pretrial dates within seven days.
Why It Matters
This minute order adds to a line of Central District of California decisions in lemon-law removal disputes that treat an indeterminate Song-Beverly complaint as insufficient to start the removal clock. It relies on Kuxhausen and Harris for the point that a clear rule spares defendants from searching their files in the first 30 days, and it endorses a stricter approach to the clock when a complaint omits offset-related facts.
The order is unpublished and is not a final judgment, since denial of a remand motion is interlocutory. Its persuasive weight rests on its reasoning and the authorities it collects. It turned on this complaint's lack of detail, so a complaint pleading the cash price and financing facts might be analyzed differently.