Meinhardt v. City of Sunnyvale
Annotate this CasePlaintiff Officer David Meinhardt failed to timely appeal a trial court ruling that denied his petition for writ of administrative mandate in its entirety, completely resolved all of the issues in the matter, and contemplated no further judicial action. Although the ruling was denominated an “order,” it was, under case law, a final judgment. Instead, Meinhardt filed a notice of appeal from a document that the trial court subsequently entered, which was styled as a “judgment,” but merely restated the prior judgment. In light of a line of cases relating to the issue presented here, the Court of Appeal solicited supplemental briefing from the parties on the timeliness of Officer Meinhardt’s appeal. In his supplemental brief, Meinhardt contended that to dismiss his appeal would contravene applicable statutory language, conflict with certain case law, and be “patently inequitable.” Furthermore, Meinhardt contended Laraway v. Pasadena Unified School Dist., 98 Cal.App.4th 579 (2002) and City of Calexico v. Bergeson, 64 Cal.App.5th 180 (2021) were distinguishable, and the Court of Appeal “should resist the impulse to extend Laraway’s questionable logic further.” The Court found Laraway and City of Calexico were directly on point and mandated dismissal of his appeal. The Court published this opinion to explain how Dhillon v. John Muir Health, 2 Cal.5th 1109 (2017) supported the conclusion that Laraway and City of Calexico were correctly decided, and to reiterate "the critical importance of determining whether a ruling on a petition for writ of mandate is a final judgment in seeking appellate review of such a ruling."
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.