Kmart Arbitration Agreement Signed By Minor Is Unenforceable, Court Decides

A Kmart Corp. cashier in California may proceed in court with his proposed class action asserting state-law wage and hour violations despite signing an agreement to arbitrate employment-related disputes when he was a minor, a federal judge ruled May 4, addressing an issue of first impression (Lopez v. Kmart Corp., N.D. Cal., 3:15-cv-01089-JSC, 5/4/15).

Denying Kmart’s motion to compel arbitration, Magistrate Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California found that, although Adrian Lopez had the capacity to enter into the contract when he was 16 years old, he properly ...