Martinez v. Landry’s Rest., Inc., 2018 WL 4091279 (Cal. Ct. App. 2018)

The trial court dismissed this putative class action due to plaintiffs’ failure to bring it to trial within five years as required by the Code of Civil Procedure.  The Court of Appeal affirmed, holding that the trial court did not abuse its discretion by failing to exclude from its calculation of the five-year period the following periods: 319 days during which a writ petition was pending; 169 days between the notice of remand following removal of the case to federal court and the Ninth Circuit’s order affirming the remand; and a nine-month period between the court’s order granting plaintiffs’ motion to compel production of electronically stored information and full compliance with that order.