Sometimes Appealing
By Art Vandelay
Pac. Lutheran Univ. v. Lloyd’s of London, No. 100752-3 (Jan. 18, 2024). At issue: in an insurance coverage dispute arising from the Covid-19 pandemic, whether the trial court properly dismissed based on forum non conveniens and enjoined defendants from further action in parallel, out-of-state litigation. Washington’s Supreme court affirmed both the dismissal and injunction.
Through the Educational & Institutional Insurance Administrators, Inc., over a hundred colleges and universities nationwide obtained identical “all risk” property insurance from sixteen carriers. EIIA is a nonprofit which provides risk management and insurance services; among other services, it acquires and purchases insurance policies on behalf of member institutions.
Three member institutions in Washington joined others in suing their carriers in Pierce County Superior Court. Suit was filed in plaintiffs’ chosen forum consistent with the policies’ “suit against the company” clause.
Plaintiffs seek a declaratory judgment that their losses are covered under the insurance policies and recovery for alleged breach of contract. EIIA is not a party and does not allege to have suffered any losses.
Months after the complaint was filed in Pierce County, two Defendant carriers filed a complaint against EIIA in Illinois state court seeking a declaratory judgment that the losses suffered are not covered by the policies. The carriers then filed a third-party complaint and joinder in that Illinois action, joining the insured and seeking declaratory relief regarding policy coverage.
Back in Pierce County, Plaintiffs moved to enjoin Defendants from taking further action in Illinois, relying on Washington’s priority of action rule. Defendants filed cross motions to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction and forum non conveniens. The superior court granted Plaintiffs’ motion, enjoining Defendants from any further action or proceedings in Illinois, but they would be permitted to seek dismissal with prejudice. The court denied Defendants’ motions to dismiss.
Forum Non Conveniens. Decisions based on forum non conveniens are reviewed for abuse of discretion, which occurs when the trial court’s “‘decision is manifestly unreasonable or based upon untenable grounds or reasons.’”1
Plaintiffs enjoy the original choice to file their complaint in any court of competent jurisdiction, and courts generally do not interfere with the choice of forum.2 Nevertheless, the common law doctrine of forum non conveniens refers to the discretionary power of a court to decline jurisdiction “‘when the convenience of the parties and the ends of justice would be better served if the action were brought and tried in another forum.’”3 The doctrine functions to prevent plaintiffs from “inflicting upon [the defendant] expense or trouble not necessary to [the plaintiff’s] own right to pursue [their] remedy.”4
Several factors must be considered, including ease of access to evidence, availability of compulsory process for unwilling witnesses, cost associated with litigating the case in the forum, and the enforceability of a judgment if one is obtained. Courts will also consider whether the plaintiff’s choice of forum is so inconvenient that it tends to “‘vex,’ ‘harass,’ or ‘oppress’ the defendant . . . But unless the balance is strongly in favor of the defendant, the plaintiff’s choice of forum should rarely be disturbed.”5
Here, additional considerations include the policies’ “service of suit” and “suit against the company” clauses. Naturally, the parties disputed their meaning. Plaintiffs took the position those clauses defeat any forum non conveniens argument because Defendants contractually waived their right to assert such an argument as they knew of the inconvenience when they entered into the agreement. Defendants, however, argued nothing in the insurance policies precludes them from seeking to dismiss the action under that doctrine.
Washington courts interpret language in insurance policies as a matter of law. When the policy language is clear and unambiguous, courts must enforce the language as written. In interpreting an insurance contract, Washington courts consider the policy as a whole, according to the entirety of its terms and conditions. The policy is given a fair, reasonable, and sensible construction as would be given to the contract by the average person purchasing insurance. Potentially conflicting clauses will be harmonized to give effect to all of the contract’s provisions.6
The “suit against the company” clause states:
It is agreed that in the event of the failure of the Company to pay any amount claimed to be due hereunder or in the event of any other dispute relating to this policy, the Company, at the request of the Insured, will submit to the jurisdiction of any court of competent jurisdiction within the United States and will comply with all of the requirements necessary to give such court jurisdiction and all matters hereunder shall be determined in accordance with the law and practice of such court, not including the court’s law regarding choice of law. The Company shall not transfer, change venue, or remove, or seek to transfer, change venue, or remove any lawsuit filed by the Insured in any such court.
The “service of suit” language reads:
[I]t is agreed that in the event of the failure of the Company to pay any amount claimed to be due hereunder, the Company, at the request of the Named Insured, will submit to the jurisdiction of a court of competent jurisdiction within the United States and will comply with all requirements necessary to give such court jurisdiction and all matters arising hereunder shall be determined in accordance with the law and practice of such court. Nothing in this clause constitutes or should be understood to constitute a waiver of the Company’s rights to commence an action in any court of competent jurisdiction in the United States, to remove an action to a United States District Court or to seek a transfer of a case to another court as permitted by the laws of the United States or of any state in the United States. It is further agreed that . . . in any suit instituted against the Company upon this policy, the Company will abide by the final decision of such Court or of any Appellate Court in the event of an appeal.
With EIIA’s approval, Plaintiffs exercised their right under the contract when they selected Pierce County Superior Court as their chosen forum. Once they invoked this right, Plaintiffs argued, Defendants must submit to the chosen forum and may “not transfer, change venue, or remove, or seek to transfer, change venue, or remove” that action. Thus, the contract expressly bars Defendants from seeking to change the chosen forum, which is exactly what Defendants’ motion to dismiss requests.
Defendants asserted the insurance policy does not prohibit them from seeking to dismiss based on forum non conveniens, as the contractual language is merely permissive, and does not expressly prevent them from bringing a forum non conveniens argument. Defendants cited to several out-of-state opinions holding service of suit clauses do not preclude the application of the doctrine of forum non conveniens.
But even if the Court had been inclined to agree, those opinions do not support Defendants’ argument because they involve service of suit clauses which are materially distinct from the one at issue. None includes language which limits or prohibits the insurers from seeking to transfer, change venue, or remove an action, as is present in the contract here.
Defendants also argued courts must harmonize contract clauses which seem to conflict to give effect to all the contract’s provisions, and when read together, the clauses above do not waive Defendants’ rights to seek dismissal under forum non conveniens because the contract expressly states Defendants’ rights to remove or seek to transfer the case to another court is not waived. Plaintiffs responded by noting Defendants’ interpretation contradicts the unambiguous language of both clauses. The Court agreed.
In the Court’s view, the two clauses do not conflict, and no ambiguity exists. Under the service of suit clause, Defendants have the right to commence an action against the insured in any court of competent jurisdiction in the United States. And where the insurer is the first to file an action, the insurers could seek removal or transfer, but that is not the situation here.
Under the suit-against-the-company clause, the insured have the right to bring an action against the insurers in any court of competent jurisdiction in the United States and the insurers are prohibited from seeking to transfer, change venue, or remove the action to another court. Thus, when the insured commence an action against the insurers, the insured have the contractual right to choose the forum in which the dispute is heard free from the threat of alteration by the insurers.
To give meaning and effect to all provisions, courts cannot simply ignore mandatory language and clear prohibitions. The Court agreed with Plaintiffs that the contract is not ambiguous and includes a forum selection clause which grants the insured the contractual right to bring an action against the insurers in the forum of their choice.
Defendants’ position was that both private and public interest factors relevant to a forum non conveniens analysis establish Illinois as the more convenient forum to litigate the coverage dispute. Defendants’ counsel argued that because the majority of the plaintiff-colleges are located “east of the Mississippi [River],” that is where the dispute should be heard.7 And the private interest factors, such as the cost of discovery, access to evidence, and availability of out-of-state witnesses, weigh in favor of dismissing suit in Pierce County. More, because most of the colleges are located in “America’s heartland,” Washington has no meaningful connection to the dispute.
The Court noted, however, the fact that 57 of 60 out-of-state colleges joined and support Pierce County as the proper forum undermined counsel’s Heartland arguments. Nor did Defendants identify what evidence could not easily be brought to Washington.
Besides, the complaint seeks a declaratory judgment, where coverage is determined under the policy as a matter of law. Should coverage be triggered, the same burden to establish damages would exist in whatever forum is chosen. Most importantly to the Court, Plaintiffs have the contractual right to select their desired forum and all 60, including the 40 institutions located east of the Mississippi River, chose Pierce County Superior Court.
In short, Defendants failed to establish a legitimate basis to deny Plaintiffs their contractual right. The superior court did not abuse its discretion in denying the motion to dismiss based on forum non conveniens and, accordingly, the Court affirmed.
Injunction. A court’s decision to grant an injunction is presumed to be correct and will be sustained absent an affirmative showing of error.8 Determining the appropriate legal standard and assessing whether the trial court applied the correct legal standard, however, are both issues of law to be reviewed de novo.9
Here, the superior court, relying on Washington’s priority of action rule, granted Plaintiffs’ motion to enjoin Defendants from pursuing their parallel action in Illinois. The priority of action rule holds “the first court to obtain jurisdiction over a case possesses exclusive jurisdiction to the exclusion of other coordinate courts” until the controversy is resolved.10
That common law rule is based on “‘an accepted principle that, when a court of competent jurisdiction has become possessed of a case, its authority continues, subject only to the appellate authority, until the matter is finally and completely disposed of, and no court of co-ordinate authority is at liberty to interfere with its action.’”11 As the Court has previously acknowledged, courts may enforce the rule by enjoining parties from further action in the second-filed case.12 The rule applies when the competing cases are parallel actions; that is, they are identical as to subject matter, relief, and parties.
When the competing actions are parallel, the later-filed action should abate to allow the prior action to reach a resolution. If the actions are not parallel, then courts will apply the priority of action rule based on equitable considerations.13 Courts also consider the rule’s underlying purpose: “to prevent unseemly, expensive, and dangerous conflicts of jurisdiction and of process.”14
The rule has been recognized and applied where similar or parallel actions are filed in multiple Washington counties, in a federal district court in Washington and a Washington state court, and in an administrative agency tribunal and a Washington state court. The Court’s early cases establish it remains well within a trial court’s authority and discretion to issue an injunction in the circumstances here and do not compel the conclusion that the superior court lacks authority or discretion to issue an injunction nor do they establish a rule that a court cannot enjoin a party from pursuing an out-of-state action.
An injunction is an equitable remedy requiring a party to do or refrain from doing specified acts.15 Here, the object and purpose of the superior court’s injunction “is to preserve and keep things in statu quo until otherwise ordered, and to restrain an act which, if done, would be contrary to equity and good conscience.”16
The Court’s early cases recognize the proper exercise of this discretionary power. In Rader v. Stubblefield17 and Northern Pacific Railway Co. v. Richey & Gilbert Co.,18 the Court affirmed injunctions which prohibited a party from pursuing an out-of-state action based on equitable factors. As those cases demonstrate, directing a party to refrain from pursuing a case in another jurisdiction to prevent an act contrary to equity and good conscience goes to the purpose of an injunction as an equitable action.
Those cases establish an interstate antisuit injunction is an appropriate remedy in certain circumstances. Because an injunction “is pointed solely at the party and does not extend to the tribunal where the suit or proceeding is pending, it is wholly immaterial that the party is prosecuting [their] action in the courts of a foreign state or country.”19
Nor have the parties disputed the premise a court has the authority to enjoin further action in an out-of-state case. Instead, the parties disputed whether the injunction was proper. In Rader, the Court upheld a decision to enjoin “‘persons within their jurisdiction from instituting legal proceedings in other states, or from further proceedings in actions already begun’” where the equities so require.20
[T]he jurisdiction is founded on the clear authority vested in courts of equity over persons within the limits of their jurisdiction and amenable to process to restrain them from doing acts which will work wrong and injury to others, and are therefore contrary to equity and good conscience. As the decree of the court in such cases is pointed solely at the party and does not extend to the tribunal where the suit or proceeding is pending, it is wholly immaterial that the party is prosecuting his action in the courts of a foreign state or country.21
The underlying purpose of this authority is to “restrain[] persons within its own jurisdiction from using foreign tribunals as instruments of wrong and oppression.”22 There, the Court affirmed a trial court’s ruling enjoining a party from pursuing a later-filed, similar action out of state, as permitting the litigant to pursue the out-of-state action would “permit her to perform a most unconscionable and inequitable act, to the great prejudice and injury” of the other party.23
In Northern Pacific Railway, the Court affirmed an injunction prohibiting the plaintiff from pursuing a later-filed, parallel action in another state. In that case, the plaintiff initiated an action against the respondent in a Washington state court. After the action was successfully removed to federal district court in Washington, the plaintiff filed an identical action in a Minnesota state court. The respondent sought an injunction in Washington, seeking to enjoin the plaintiff from pursuing the Minnesota action. The court concluded all equities weighed in favor of granting the injunction: (1) the Minnesota suit was not brought in good faith, (2) respondent would be subjected to enormous expense and the ends of justice would not be met by transferring the place of litigation from Washington to Minnesota, (3) any evidence from eastern states could be obtained by deposition, and (4) the filing of the suit in Minnesota was “a needless and vexatious proceeding brought for the wrongful and unjust purpose of harassing and vexing respondent.”24
Other relevant factors may include whether the out-of-state action was brought in bad faith or “for the wrongful and unjust purpose of harassing and vexing” the other party, the convenience of witnesses and the interests of justice, and the ability to obtain out-of-state evidence.25 The Court also considers the presence of venue agreements in the parties’ contract and possible motivations for filing decisions as determined from the surrounding circumstances.26
In the alternative, Defendants argued the Court should adopt a different standard: the “foreign antisuit injunction” standard, which is applied in some federal jurisdictions when determining whether to enjoin a party from pursuing a parallel action in another country. Under that standard, courts have the same authority and discretion to issue an injunction and generally will balance equitable factors with international comity to determine whether an injunction is appropriate. Cases setting forth that standard, however, recognize the same principles of discretion and equity which guide decisions under Washington law and, accordingly, the Court found no substantive difference between the precedential test and the international test offered by Defendants.
Washington courts may enjoin parties from pursuing out-of-state actions when equity demands. That analysis is necessarily fact-specific and within a trial court’s discretion. Here, the important factors relied on by the superior court are the timing in which the actions were filed, the parallelism of the actions, and the presence of a forum selection clause which established the contractual right of the insured to choose the forum in which their case is heard. The Court held the trial court properly issued the injunction in order to protect those interests.
The forum selection clause established Plaintiffs’ contractual right to choose the forum in which their case will be heard. By filing a subsequent, parallel action in Illinois, Defendants attempted to circumvent that contractual right. Accordingly, the Court held the superior court applied the correct legal standard and did not abuse its discretion.
Velazquez Framing, LLC v. Cascadia Homes, Inc., No. 101591-7 (Jan. 11, 2024). At issue: whether chapter 60.04 of the Revised Code of Washington requires prelien notice for labor liens. Washington’s Supreme Court held it does not.
Cascadia, a general contractor, purchased real property in Lakewood. Cascadia asked a subcontractor it had worked with before to submit a bid for framing the home that would eventually be built on the parcel. The sub successfully bid and entered into an oral contract with Velazquez to finish the framing work. The sub did not inform Cascadia of Velazquez’s involvement.
After Velazquez performed the work, the sub billed Cascadia. Cascadia paid the sub. But the sub did not pay Velazquez. Velazquez contacted Cascadia directly. As no extra or additional payment was forthcoming, Velazquez recorded a lien on the Lakewood property.
The lien states Velazquez “furnished labor, professional services, materials and/or equipment to the subject property . . . at the request of Cascadia Homes, Inc.”27 Velazquez later explained it provided labor, a generator, a compressor, and five boxes of nails for the project. Velazquez mailed a copy of the lien to Cascadia but acknowledged it did not give prelien notice.
After waiting several months in vain to be paid, Velazquez sought to foreclose on its lien. Concluding prelien notice was required, the trial court dismissed at summary judgment and the Court of Appeals affirmed.28
The first question the Court must answer is whether Washington law requires prelien notice to lien for labor. As a question of statutory interpretation, it is to be reviewed de novo.29 The Court must identify and implement the legislature’s intent.30 That analysis begins with the statutory language and might end there if its meaning be plain.31 “In discerning the plain meaning of a provision,” the Court considers “the entire statute in which the provision is found, as well as related statutes or other provisions in the same act that disclose legislative intent.”32 Whenever possible,” the Court interprets “the statutory language [so] no clause, sentence or word shall be superfluous, void, or insignificant.33 Where the statutory language is plain on its face, the Court gives effect to that plain language and the inquiry ends.34
Where the statutory language allows for more than one reasonable interpretation, the Court may turn to legislative history to assist its interpretation.35
Velazquez argued the plain language of RCW 60.04.031 requires prelien notice to be provided for professional services, materials, and equipment, but not for labor. The Court agreed.
State law provides contractors with the right to lien to secure payment for their services.
Except as provided in RCW 60.04.031, any person furnishing labor, professional services, materials, or equipment for the improvement of real property shall have a lien upon the improvement for the contract price of labor, professional services, materials, or equipment furnished at the instance of the owner, or the agent or construction agent of the owner.36
Some claimants must provide prelien notice:
Except as otherwise provided in this section, every person furnishing professional services, materials, or equipment for the improvement of real property shall give the owner or reputed owner notice in writing of the right to claim a lien. . . . The notice may be given at any time but only protects the right to claim a lien for professional services, materials, or equipment.37
Should such a claimant fail to provide prelien notice, the lien will not be enforced.38 RCW 60.04.031(1), however, does not expressly require prelien notice for labor. The legislature has provided a sample prelien notice form which claimants must substantially follow when prelien notice is required.39 The form is meant to tell the owner “who is providing professional services, materials, or equipment for the improvement of [their] property and to advise [the owner] of the rights of these persons.”40 The form gives owners notice that claimants “have or will be providing professional services, materials, or equipment” and may claim a lien, but the form does not include “labor.”41
RCW 60.04.091 also provides a sample claim of lien form. But unlike the sample prelien notice form, the lien claim form includes language expressly addressing labor.42 This form includes space to complete the “first and last date on which the labor, professional services, materials, or equipment was furnished or employee benefit contributions were due.”43
The Court viewed those provisions together and concluded prelien notice for professional services, materials, and equipment is required but not for labor. The presence or absence of “labor” throughout the chapter is consistent with there being no prelien notice requirement for labor.
Under RCW 60.04.021, a claimant may explicitly be entitled to a lien for their labor. The term “labor” is noticeably absent in the prelien notice requirement statute. This suggests the legislature intended to require prelien notice in limited circumstances; i.e., for the provision of professional services, materials, or equipment, only.
Cascadia advocated for a different interpretation of the statute, arguing that unless an exception under RCW 60.04.031(2) applies, a subcontractor must provide prelien notice. The Court disagreed.
Under RCW 60.04.031(2) notice is not required by
(a) Persons who contract directly with the owner or the owner’s common law agent;
(b) Laborers whose claim of lien is based solely on performing labor; or
(c) Subcontractors who contract for the improvement of real property directly with the prime contractor, except as provided in subsection (3)(b) of this section.
None of those exceptions applies to Velazquez’s labor. And yet the Court still maintained that, taken together, Washington’s statutes do not require prelien notice to lien for labor, either by a subcontractor that provides the labor or by the laborers themselves.
The general right to lien under RCW 60.04.021 is subject to the requirements of RCW 60.04.031. But, for the Court, Cascadia’s proposed reading of RCW 60.04.031(2), requiring prelien notice in all but three circumstances, would violate the plain language of RCW 60.04.031(1). The Court held instead that the statutes unambiguously do not require Velazquez to give prelien notice before filing a labor lien.
Even if the plain language were ambiguous, the Court reasoned, the legislative history leads to the same conclusion that prelien notice is not required to lien for labor. The legislature tackled the issue in 1991.44 Consumer protection concerns largely motivated those changes.45 The legislature and the attorney general received reports that subcontractors made lien claims after the homeowners paid the general contractor. The legislation was proposed to address this concern.
Although the legislature seemed primarily concerned with consumer protection, the legislature was responding to other concerns as well.46 Specifically, “construction lien laws ha[d] not been substantially amended or modernized during [the 20th] century” and “[v]irtually all industry segments ha[d] reported problems with the current [lien] law[s].”47 As a result, much of Substitute S.B. 5497 was also “concerned with simply modernizing the language of the existing law without making substantive changes” and with addressing industry concerns about the law.48
The enacted language does not require prelien notice for labor. Legislative history in the house is consistent. A house bill report explains that under current law, “[a] notice of the right to claim a lien is required to establish a lien for material and equipment supplied for the project (not labor liens)” and that under the new notice requirements, “notice of the right to claim a lien is not required for a person supplying labor.”49
In the Court’s view, this “robust” legislative history sheds light on the complexity of the legislature’s intent in enacting the lien granting and prelien notice requirement statutes. The Court concluded that history is consistent with the plain language of the statutes. In other words, the legislature intended to require prelien notice unless the lien was based on labor.
However, because Velazquez did not lien solely for labor, the Court must also decide whether a claimant who provides materials and equipment in addition to labor may lien for their labor despite not having provided prelien notice. The Court determined they may. Although Velazquez will not be able to lien for its materials or equipment, its labor lien remains enforceable.
The practice of lien segregation can be found in many pre-1990s cases. Those cases suggest that where a claimant liens for both labor and material without providing prelien notice, the claimant may enforce that portion relating to labor so long as the court has an evidentiary basis to segregate the value of the labor from materials.
The Court of Appeals, however, held that body of case law to be irrelevant for determining legislative intent because it predates the legislative amendments discussed above. But because that case law interprets earlier lien statutes which are substantially similar in substance and form to Washington’s current lien statutes, the Court disagreed.
Where a contractor liens for both labor and equipment without prelien notice, remand to determine the value of labor is usually appropriate.50 A claimant may not maintain a lien for labor where the record does not allow the value of the labor to be determined.51 In Hallett, subcontractors liened for their labor and materials without providing notice.52 There, the Supremes determined the subcontractors could not maintain a lien for their materials without providing notice.53 Because there was no evidence “showing what proportion of [the] claims was for material and what proportion was for labor . . . it [was] impossible to fix or award any amount for which [the subcontractors could] maintain labor liens.”54 By contrast, a claimant may maintain a lien for labor where there is evidence to segregate the value of the labor from that of the materials and equipment.55
Accordingly, the Court held Velaz-quez may lien its labor without prelien notice so long as it can establish an evidentiary basis to segregate labor costs from others.
1 In re Marriage of Horner, 151 Wn.2d 884, 893, 93 P.3d 124 (2004) (quoting State v. Brown, 132 Wn.2d 529, 572, 940 P.2d 546 (1997)).
2 Sales v. Weyerhaeuser Co., 163 Wn.2d 14, 19, 177 P.3d 1122 (2008) (citing Baker v. Hilton, 64 Wn.2d 964, 965, 395 P.2d 486 (1964) (“[T]he choice lies with the plaintiff in the first instance.”)).
3 Sales, 163 Wn.2d at 20 (quoting Johnson v. Spider Staging Corp., 87 Wn.2d 577, 579, 555 P.2d 997 (1976)).
4 Sales, 163 Wn.2d at 20 (internal quotations and citations omitted).
5 Johnson, 87 Wn.2d at 579 (emphasis added).
6 Seattle Tunnel Partners v. Great Lakes Reinsurance (UK) PLC, 200 Wn.2d 315, 320, 336, 516 P.3d 796 (2022); Queen Anne Park Homeowners Ass’n v. State Farm Fire & Cas. Co., 183 Wn.2d 485, 489, 352 P.3d 790 (2015).
7 Op. at 14-15 (citing Wash. Sup. Ct. oral arg., Pac. Lutheran Univ. v. Certain Underwriters at Lloyd’s London, No. 100752-3 (June 27, 2023), 1 min., 46 sec. to 1 min., 48 sec.; 16 min., 15 sec. to 16 min, 16 sec., video recording by TVW, Washington State’s Public Affairs Network, http://www.tvw.org (arguing that Illinois is the more convenient forum because the dispute’s “center of gravity is so clearly in America’s heartland” (at 3 min., 10 sec. to 3 min., 13 sec.) and “Illinois is a heartland state and Cook County is a heartland court” (at 16 min., 57 sec. to 17 min., 01 sec.)).
8 Resident Action Council v. Seattle Hous. Auth., 177 Wn.2d 417, 446, 327 P.3d 600 (2013).
9 In re Dependency of M.H.P., 184 Wn.2d 741, 752-53, 364 P.3d 94 (2015).
10 Am. Mobile Homes of Wash., Inc. v. Seattle-First Nat’l Bank, 115 Wn.2d 307, 317, 796 P.2d 1276 (1990).
11 Am. Mobile, 115 Wn.2d at 316 (quoting State ex rel. Greenberger v. Superior Ct., 134 Wn. 400, 401, 235 P. 957 (1925)).
12 Am. Mobile, 115 Wn.2d at 317-18.
13 Am. Mobile, 115 Wn.2d at 320-23 (considering equitable factors, such as “convenience of witnesses and the interests of justice, the parties’ possible motivations for their filing decisions as determined from the surrounding circumstances, and the presence of venue agreements between some but not all of the various parties”).
14 Am. Mobile, 115 Wn.2d at 317 (quoting Sherwin v. Arveson, 96 Wn.2d 77, 80, 633 P.2d 1335 (1981)).
15 15 DOUGLAS J. ENDE, WASHINGTON PRACTICE, CIVIL PROCEDURE § 44:1, at 252-53 (3d ed. 2023).
16 Blanchard v. Golden Age Brewing Co., 188 Wn. 396, 415, 63 P.2d 397 (1936) (plurality opinion).
17 43 Wn. 334, 86 P. 560 (1906).
18 132 Wn. 526, 232 P. 355 (1925).
19 Rader, 43 Wn. at 352 (emphasis added).
20 43 Wn. at 351 (emphasis added) (quoting 1 JAMES L. HIGH, A TREATISE ON THE LAW OF INJUNCTIONS § 106, at 117 (1905)).
21 Rader, 43 Wn. at 352 (emphasis added) (quoting Dehon v. Foster, 86 Mass. (4 Allen) 545, 550 (1862)).
22 Rader, 43 Wn. at 351 (internal quotations and citation omitted).
23 Rader, 43 Wn. at 353 (emphasis added).
24 N. Pac. Ry. Co., 132 Wn. at 531 (emphasis added).
25 N. Pac. Ry. Co., 132 Wn. at 530-31.
26 Am. Mobile, 115 Wn.2d at 320-23.
27 Op. at 2.
28 Velazquez Framing, LLC v. Cascadia Homes, Inc., 24 Wn. App. 2d 780, 521 P.3d 257 (2022).
29 DOE v. Campbell & Gwinn, LLC, 146 Wn.2d 1, 9, 43 P.3d 4 (2002).
30 Id.
31 State v. Gonzalez, 168 Wn.2d 256, 263, 226 P.3d 131 (2010).
32 State v. Alvarado, 164 Wn.2d 556, 562, 192 P.3d 345 (2008).
33 Op. at 4 (quoting City of Seattle v. Long, 198 Wn.2d 136, 148, 493 P.3d 94 (2021)) (internal quotation marks omitted) (quoting Kasper v. City of Edmonds, 69 Wn.2d 799, 804, 420 P.2d 346 (1966)).
34 Gonzalez, 168 Wn.2d at 263.
35 Jametsky v. Olsen, 179 Wn.2d 756, 762, 317 P.3d 1003 (2014); State v. Evans, 177 Wn.2d 186, 192-93, 298 P.3d 724 (2013).
36 RCW 60.04.021.
37 RCW 60.04.031(1).
38 See RCW 60.04.031(6).
39 RCW 60.04.031(4).
40 Id.
41 Id.
42 RCW 60.04.091.
43 RCW 60.04.091(1)(b).
44 See LAWS OF 1991, ch. 281 (codified in RCW 19.27.095 and scattered
sections of Title 60 RCW).
45 FINAL B. REP. ON SUBSTITUTE S.B. 5497, at 1, 52d Leg., Reg. Sess. (Wash. 1991).
46 FINAL B. REP. ON SUBSTITUTE S.B. 5497, at 1.
47 Id.
48 S.B. REP. ON SUBSTITUTE S.B. 5497, at 2, 52d Leg., Reg. Sess. (Wash. 1991).
49 H.B. REP. ON SUBSTITUTE S.B. 5497, at 2, 3, 52d Leg., Reg. Sess. (Wash. 1991).
50 See Northlake Concrete Prods., Inc. v. Wylie, 34 Wn. App. 810, 818-19, 663 P.2d 1380 (1983).
51 See Hallett v. Phillips, 73 Wn. 457, 464, 132 P. 51 (1913).
52 Id. at 459-60, 464.
53 Id. at 464.
54 Id.
55 Culbert v. Lindvall, 73 Wn. 643, 645-46, 132 P. 729 (1913) (holding a subcontractor who provided a furnace and labor could not lien for the furnace without providing notice but could lien for its labor).
