Process Serving - California
Author: David G. Hallstrom, Sr.
Section 415.20 (b) of the California Civil Code Of Procedure
States: If a copy of the summons and complaint cannot with
reasonable diligence be personally delivered to the person to be
served, as specified in Section 416.60, 416.70, 416.80, or
416.90, a summons may be served by leaving a copy of the summons
and complaint at the person's dwelling house, usual place of
abode, usual place of business, or usual mailing address other
than a United States Postal Service post office box, in the
presence of a competent member of the household or a person
apparently in charge of his or her office, place of business, or
usual mailing address other than a United States Postal Service
post office box, at least 18 years of age, who shall be informed
of the contents thereof, and by thereafter mailing a copy of the
summons and of the complaint by first-class mail, postage
prepaid to the person to be served at the place where a copy of
the summons and complaint were left. Service of a summons in
this manner is deemed complete on the 10th day after the mailing.
Most process servers understand dwelling house or usual
place of abode to mean the actual place where the person is
currently staying. It has, however, been our experience that
this means the official residence or place where the
person is currently staying. We have found that most courts
consider the dwelling house to be where the person is currently
staying and the usual place of abode to mean the persons
permanent residence, ie: the person lives with his parents but
is currently away at school. The persons dwelling house would be
where he is currently staying while in school and his usual
place of abode would be his parents house where he returns on
vacations and when school is on break and where he expects to
return when he finishes school. The same applies if the person
is currently in the hospital, away on a business trip or is on a
vacation.
Usual place of business can mean different things. Say a
person works every day in a factory on 8th St., that of course
would be a usual place of business. Say a Doctor is on staff and
shows up for work regularly at ABC Hospital. He also rents
office space from a doctor's group at another location where he
also sees paitents. It has been our experience that both places
could be considered the Doctors usual place of business.
Usual mailing address other than a United States Postal
Service post office box. Usual mailing address can be a private
mail box service or any other place (Other than a U.S Post
Office branch.) that the subject uses as a mailing address. This
does not mean that the person must actually pick up or receive
the mail. It only means that the person must use the address as
a mailing address. Some people in order to evade creditors or
others give out mailing addresses but never pick up the mail. If
a person directs people to send that person's mail to a certain
address then that address can be considered a usual place of
mailing as the server would have no way of verifying that the
mail is actually picked up.
Competent member of the household does not mean family
member. It means anyone who resides at that residence, including
full time live in nannys, maids, gardeners, friends, etc.. As
long as the person resides ther full time they can be considered
members of the household.
Person apparently in charge does not mean, as some
process servers believe, a manager or officer of the business or
place of mailing. It means "the person apparently in charge. If,
at an office, the receptionist will not let the process server
see anyone else in the office, then the receptionist is the
highest person in charge that the server can serve. If the only
person who works at a mail box service says that he or she is
only a clerk, that person is still the person apparently in
charge.
Serving a complaint in a gated community or security
building where the security guard will not allow entrance.
On May 28, 1992, in the case of Robert Bein vs Bechtel-Jochim,
the California Court Of Appeals held that a guard gate
does constitute part of the dwelling and therefore the
guard is a competent member within the dwelling. The court
reasoned that if a process server is not permitted to proceed to
the actual residence, then the outer bounds of the actual
dwelling place must be deemed to extend to the location at which
the process server's progress is arrested.
Reasonable diligence has been interpreted differently in
different jurisdictions, however, we have found that if three
attempts are made at least eight hours apart and if at least two
of those attempts are made at the address wher the papers are
served then a substituted service on the fourth attempt is
usually considered valid.
The foregoing information is not given as legal advice. It is
instead given as information and opinion gathered and developed
through experience over the last thirty years. David Hallstrom
is the owner of Hallstrom Detective Agency and although the
agency no longer offers process serving services, it has,
through it's servers, completed service of several hundred
thousand legal documents. Although the author believes the
information to be accurate no guarantee is made or implied.
Permission is given to reprint this article providing credit is
given to the author, David G. Hallstrom, and a link is listed to
Resources For
Attorneys the owner of this article. Anyone or any company
reprinting this article without giving proper credit and the
correct link, is doing so without permission
Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/law-articles/process-serving-california-1730.html
About the Author
David G. Hallstrom, Sr. is a retired private investigator and
currently publishes several internet directories including http://www.resourcesforattorneys.com a
legal and lifestyle resources directory for attorneys, lawyers
and the internet public.
