An opening brief on appeal must provide “a summary of the significant facts limited to matters in the record.” (Cal. Rules of Court, rule 8.204(a)(2)(C).) The summary in appellants’ opening brief is mostly cut and pasted from their posttrial brief to the trial judge, which was filed long before the record on appeal was prepared. Appellants neglected to update the record citations from their earlier brief, which were based on the court reporter’s daily transcripts. Consequently, none of the “RT” citations in appellants’ opening brief correspond to the reporter’s transcript in the record on appeal. To put it bluntly, the “RT” citations are useless. Many of appellants’ substantive arguments are also cut and pasted from their posttrial brief, so the indecipherable “RT” citations appear throughout the opening brief.
Appellants’ opening brief is also replete with record citations using the unexplained abbreviation “TE.” We can deduce that “TE” stands for Trial Exhibit, but the citations merely reference the exhibit number, e.g., “TE 184.” Appellants do not indicate where within the 1,832-page clerk’s transcript any of the exhibits are located. The exhibits are not presented in numerical order within the clerk’s transcript, nor are they listed in numerical order in the index. Many of the exhibits are lengthy, but appellants never explain what portions of the cited exhibits are germane to their assertions. Appellants even cite to trial exhibits that were not included in the record on appeal.
Furthermore, appellants present as facts certain positions rejected by the trial court and thus inconsistent with the trial court’s ultimate findings. This is another consequence of the cut-and-paste approach to appellate briefing.
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