Unreported / Non-Citable
Background
Plaintiffs United African-Asian Abilities Club and its member James Lee, who has a vision disability and uses a device for mobility because he is unable to walk, filed this action in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. They allege that physical and communication barriers at defendant Parthenia Terrace 02's property and website prevent Lee's access, in violation of, among other laws, the Americans with Disabilities Act and California's Unruh Civil Rights Act.
The court acknowledged that it has authority to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over the Unruh Act claim under 28 U.S.C. § 1367(a) because that claim is closely related to the ADA claim over which the court has original jurisdiction. But the court stressed that supplemental jurisdiction is a doctrine of discretion, not of plaintiff's right, and that § 1367(c) codifies the circumstances in which a district court may decline to exercise it, including novel or complex state-law issues, state claims that substantially predominate, dismissal of all claims over which the court has original jurisdiction, and exceptional circumstances presenting other compelling reasons for declining jurisdiction.
The Court’s Holding
The court grounded its analysis in the Ninth Circuit's published decision in Arroyo v. Rosas, 19 F.4th 1202 (9th Cir. 2021). There, the Ninth Circuit explained that California's 2012 and 2015 amendments to the Unruh Act, intended to protect businesses from abusive litigation by high-frequency litigants bringing construction-related claims, had led to a surge of federal filings of ADA cases seeking statutory damages under the Unruh Act. The court held that this shift from state to federal court circumvented the legislature's goals and rendered the new statutory requirements largely toothless, and that retention of supplemental jurisdiction over ADA-based Unruh Act claims threatens to substantially thwart California's carefully crafted reforms and deprive state courts of their role in effectuating those policies—circumstances the Ninth Circuit treated as exceptional within the meaning of § 1367(c)(4).
Unlike Arroyo, where the district court waited until after granting summary judgment on the ADA claim—thereby effectively deciding the Unruh Act claim—before declining supplemental jurisdiction, this case is still at a very early stage and the court has not yet addressed or adjudicated the merits of any of plaintiffs' claims. The court therefore concluded that it should decline supplemental jurisdiction over the Unruh Act claim to protect the comity interests identified in Arroyo, and it ordered plaintiffs within 14 days after entry of the order to show cause in writing why the court should not dismiss that claim without prejudice under § 1367(c)(4).
The order specifies what a sufficient response must contain: plaintiffs must identify the amount of statutory damages they seek to recover and must support their response with declarations, signed under penalty of perjury, providing all facts necessary for the court to determine whether plaintiffs and their counsel satisfy the definition of a high-frequency litigant under California Code of Civil Procedure § 425.55(b)(1)–(2). The court warned that if plaintiffs fail to file a response within 14 days after entry of the order, it will decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over the Unruh Act claim, and that claim will be automatically dismissed without prejudice without further order of the court.
Key Takeaways
- Federal courts may decline supplemental jurisdiction over Unruh Act claims paired with ADA claims when doing so protects California's comity interests in enforcing its reforms targeting high-frequency litigants.
- Timing matters: declining supplemental jurisdiction only after adjudicating the federal claim on the merits, as in Arroyo, can be an abuse of discretion, so courts should act at an early stage.
- A show-cause response here must state the statutory damages sought and include sworn declarations addressing whether plaintiffs and their counsel meet the § 425.55(b) high-frequency-litigant definition.
- An order to show cause is not a dismissal; if plaintiffs do not respond within 14 days, the Unruh Act claim is automatically dismissed without prejudice, while the ADA claim remains pending and unaffected.
Why It Matters
This order illustrates the ongoing tension between federal courts' supplemental jurisdiction over state-law claims and California's efforts to curb abusive disability-access litigation through procedural reforms. By invoking Arroyo at the earliest stage of the case, before any merits adjudication, the court signaled its intent to follow the comity-based approach the Ninth Circuit endorsed and to avoid the timing error that required reversal in Arroyo.
The order also places a concrete burden on plaintiffs and their counsel to disclose, under penalty of perjury, whether they qualify as high-frequency litigants under California law—a determination that may affect their ability to pursue statutory damages in federal court. The ADA claim is unaffected by the show-cause order and remains pending.