2007 California Financial Code Article 1. General

CA Codes (fin:1650)

1650.  Notice to a bank operating a safety deposit department or to
a company conducting a safety deposit business of an adverse claim
(the person making the adverse claim being hereinafter in this
section called "adverse claimant") to any personal property in a
safety deposit box maintained by a bank or company and rented to any
person, or to any personal property held by the bank or company in
safekeeping or storage for any person shall be disregarded, and the
bank or company, notwithstanding such notice, shall permit access to
the box to the person to whom it is rented or shall deliver the
contents thereof to or on the order of the person or shall deliver
the property held in storage or safekeeping to or on the order of the
person for whom it is held, without any liability on the part of the
bank or company; subject, however, to the exceptions provided in
subdivisions (a) and (b) of this section:
   (a) If an adverse claimant delivers to the bank at the office at
which the safety deposit is maintained or the property is held his
affidavit stating that of his own knowledge the person in whose name
the box stands or for whom the property is held is a fiduciary for
the adverse claimant and that he has reason to believe such fiduciary
is about to misappropriate the contents of the box or the property,
and stating the facts upon which such claim of fiduciary relationship
and such belief are founded, the bank or company shall refuse access
to the safety deposit box or refuse to deliver the personal property
for a period of not more than three (3) court days (including the
day of delivery) from the date that the bank or company received the
adverse claimant's affidavit, without liability on its part and
without liability for the sufficiency or truth of the facts alleged
in the affidavit.
   (b) If at any time, either before, after, or in the absence of the
filing of an affidavit by the adverse claimant, the adverse claimant
procures and serves upon the bank or company at the office at which
the safety deposit box is maintained or the property is held a
restraining order, injunction, or other appropriate order against the
bank or company from a court of competent jurisdiction in an action
in which the adverse claimant and all persons in whose names said box
stands or for whom the property is held are parties, the bank or
company shall comply with such order or injunction, without liability
on its part.
   (c) The provisions of this section shall be applicable even though
the name of the person appearing on the bank's or company's books as
the renter of the box or as the depositor of the property held in
storage or safekeeping is modified by a qualifying or descriptive
term such as "agent", "trustee", or other word or phrase indicating
that the person may not be the owner in his own right of the contents
of the box or of the property held in storage or safekeeping.
   Before giving access to any safe-deposit box, the bank or company
may demand payment to it of all costs and expenses of opening the
safe-deposit box and all costs and expenses of repairing any damage
to the safe-deposit box caused by the opening thereof.