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Construction Industry News

Trucking Company That Delivered Fill to Job Site Is Entitled to Enforce Stop Notice


November 6, 2000


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By John W. Ralls
Thelen Reid Brown Raysman & Steiner LLP

Ivy Trucking was hired by a subcontractor to haul fill to a California Department of Transportation freeway project but was not paid. Ivy served a stop notice and then sued to enforce the stop notice. The trial court ruled that Ivy was not entitled to serve a stop notice. The Court of Appeal reversed. Ivy Trucking, Inc. v. Creston Brandon Corp., 2000 Daily Journal D.A.R. 11105 (Cal.App. 2000)

California Civil Code §3188 provides that all persons named in Civil Code §3110 are entitled to serve a stop notice. Civil Code §3110 names "all persons and laborers… performing labor upon or bestowing skill or other necessary services on, or furnishing materials… to be used or consumed in… a work of improvement… whether done or furnished at the instance of the owner or of any person acting by his authority or under him as contractor or otherwise."

Civil Code §3110 continues, "For the purposes of this chapter, every contractor, subcontractor, sub-subcontractor, architect, builder, or other person having charge of a work of improvement or portion thereof shall be held to be the agent of the owner."

The court wrote that, as a general rule, a person who transports materials to a job site is not entitled enforce a stop notice because the "transportation of materials does not constitute labor, services, or materials within the meaning of section 3110, citing Adams v. Burbank, 103 Cal. 646, 648, 651 (1894). However, when the transportation services are rendered under contract with a statutory agent of the owner, such as a subcontractor, the hauler does come within CC §3110.

"In this case, because Ivy contracted to haul dirt for [a subcontractor] who… was the statutory agent of CalTrans, Ivy was entitled to enforce its rights arising out of the stop notice." Had Ivy been hired by the supplier of fill, Ivy would not have had stop notice rights.


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For more information about the issues covered in this report, please contact John Ralls in our San Francisco office at 415-369-7210 or at jralls@thelen.com or contact your Thelen attorney. For more information about Thelen's Construction and Government Contracts Department, click here.





©2000 Thelen Reid Brown Raysman & Steiner LLP

More than 500 online news and legal reports on construction law, including claims, payment remedies, damages, government contracting, insurance, building codes, licensing, technology, arbitration, engineering, architecture, infrastructure

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