Q: SC-105 Request for Court Order and Answer
Hi. I filed a small claim (Van Nuys, California) against a drafter who did not perform as promised drawing our Tenant Improvement project. He has now initiated an SC-105 to consolidate my case with his own retaliatory Unlimited Jurisdiction case. The court is asking me to accept to consolidate or not. Should I accept or should I stick with my Small Claim court date? What are the ramifications? Thank you.
A: I assume what this means is that the defendant in your small claims court case has filed his own, separate, Superior Court Case Civil Case, and the Judge is asking you if you want to consolidate the two cases. Option 1: If you consolidate the two cases, I assume that the Court will be having both cases consolidated under one case number, and the cases will be tried together in Superior Court. Option 2: If you decline the request to consolidate, you will proceed with your small claims case, but you will have to respond to the drafter's Superior Court case. In other words, under Option 2 you will have to deal with two different cases at the same time. There are advantages and disadvantages to both. If you decline the consolidation request and win your small claims action, the defendant drafter can still appeal that decision to Superior Court, in which case you will have to defend that action as a defendant. If you lose the small claims action, that case is over with, and you now will be fighting the Superior Court case as a defendant. In my opinion (and just my opinion) I would accept the consolidation request, since one way or other you are going to be in Superior Court anyway. I would also suggest that you have an attorney with you in the Superior Court case. You might want to consult another attorney about this. Good Luck.
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