The California Academy of Appellate Lawyers recently submitted this amicus curiae brief in Cohen v. Superior Court asking the Supreme Court to resolve a conflict “whether [a Court of Appeal] may overrule prior decisions from the same district or division, or whether they may only disagree with such decisions.” We’ve written a little about this issue before. (See here and here.)
It’s a true “friend of the court brief” as it supports neither party and in fact addresses an issue of no consequence to how the Supreme Court decides the Cohen case. Nonetheless, the issue is of significance to the administration of justice. As the brief explains:
Superior courts need to know whether, under Auto Equity Sales, Inc. v. Superior Court . . . (1962) 57 Cal.2d 450 . . . , they may choose to follow a Court of Appeal opinion that the Court of Appeal has purported to overrule, or whether they are bound by the overruling opinion. Similarly, whether an appellate court can overrule a prior panel’s decision affects whether there is a conflict in the case law that this Court should resolve by the grant of review.
Horvitz & Levy partner John Taylor was the primary author of the brief. I supervised and edited. The Academy president, Sean SeLegue, and members of its amicus committee also contributed to the brief.
