In California, Corporations Can Be Individuals Too

Many were upset with the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission,  Citizens United v. FEC, 558 U.S. 310 (2010).  The California legislature was so upset that it passed a resolution memorializing its disagreement and asseverating that "Corporations are not people but, instead, are entities created by the laws of states and nations".  AJR No. 22

If not people, can a corporation at least be an individual under California law?  The answer is "yes" if you ask the very same body that declared corporations are not people.  Section 27002 of the California Corporations Code defines "individual" to include, among others, every domestic or foreign private corporation.  The statute is part of California's security owners protection statute that imposes civil and criminal liability on persons who engage in specified fraudulent acts in connection with soliciting or receiving compensation from an owner of a security for the purpose of protecting, enforcing or representing the security holders.

The law may not care for trifles, but I care about de minimis

Readers of this blog will identify immediately the error in the following sentence that appeared this week in  Tripplett v. Workers' Comp. Appeals Bd., 2018 Cal. App. LEXIS 652

He asserts that his residency in the state, combined with his participation in two games in California during his career, demonstrated he had a greater than de minimus contact with the State of California.
 
De minimis is Latin.  De is a preposition.  In Latin, nouns following de are generally in the ablative case.  This means that the "us" case ending in minimis must change to "is" (in the plural).   For example, "De minimis lex non curat" (the law doesn't care about the smallest things).