Saberin v. Alation: When California Employment Statutes Do Not Follow a Remote Worker Across State Lines

As remote work has scattered employees across state lines while leaving corporate headquarters in California, courts have faced a recurring and consequential question: do California's employee-protective statutes travel with the employer, or do they stop at the state border? Saberin v. Alation, Inc., No. A174549 (Cal. Ct. App. July 30, 2026), certified for publication, offers one of the most methodical judicial answers to date. The Court of Appeal affirmed a trial court's denial of a petition to vacate an arbitration award, holding that neither Government Code section 12952 nor Labor Code section 432.7 applied to a plaintiff who lived and worked in Utah, was arrested in Florida, and whose termination was decided by managers located in Illinois — even though the employer was headquartered in California and California human resources personnel had provided input into the process. The opinion is careful to mark what it does not decide, and practitioners on both sides of the remote-work divide should read those reservations as closely as the holding itself.

Procedural Posture: Arbitration, Stipulated Award, and the Scope of Judicial Review

The parties arbitrated pursuant to employment agreements, at least one of which contained California governing-law language. After the arbitrator concluded that the two statutes at issue did not apply extraterritorially to the plaintiff's circumstances, the parties entered a stipulated award. The stipulation recited that neither party could identify Utah, federal, or other non-California law authorizing a claim for termination based on an arrest without conviction, making the territorial ruling case-dispositive. The plaintiff then petitioned the superior court to vacate the award, and the trial court denied that petition. On appeal, the threshold question was not the merits of extraterritoriality in the abstract but rather how much a court may look behind an arbitration award at all.

The Court of Appeal acknowledged the narrow scope of judicial review that ordinarily governs arbitration awards under California law. Arbitrators are generally permitted to make errors of law without those errors furnishing grounds for vacatur. The court recognized a limited exception where a legal error would effectively prevent a party from receiving any merits hearing on rights protected by the Fair Employment and Housing Act. It held that the exception applied because the arbitrator's ruling had deprived Saberin of a merits hearing, and it therefore reviewed the legal issue de novo. On the merits, however, the court concluded that the arbitrator made no error of law: the extraterritoriality analysis was correct. The denial of vacatur was affirmed on that substantive ground.

Government Code Section 12952: Text, Scheme, and Territorial Reach

Section 12952 of the Government Code restricts employer use of criminal history information in hiring and employment decisions. The court applied the framework from Ward v. United Airlines, Inc. (2020) 9 Cal.5th 732, which treats extraterritoriality as a statute-specific inquiry: connections sufficient for one statute may not suffice for another. It rejected both the principal-place-of-work test Alation urged and the wrongful-conduct test Saberin urged because those tests came from decisions involving different statutes. The court then examined section 12952's text, its placement within the broader FEHA scheme, and the legislative aims underlying its enactment. Each of those analytical layers pointed in the same direction on the facts presented: the statute was designed to protect individuals whose employment relationship has a meaningful California nexus, and the plaintiff's relationship with Alation did not satisfy that standard on this record.

The court found that the plain language of section 12952 and the surrounding FEHA scheme do not specify the statute's intended geographic scope. It therefore turned to legislative history and aims. When section 12952 was enacted in 2017, the Legislature made findings and declarations indicating that it sought to reduce barriers to employment for Californians with arrest or conviction records and to prohibit private employers from asking about an applicant's record at the start of the hiring process. Those findings expressed an intent to reach applicants and employer conduct in California. The legislative history and stated aims of the provision reinforced that reading. Nothing in the text or background suggested the Legislature intended the statute to govern employment decisions made by out-of-state managers about out-of-state employees who were arrested in a third state.

Labor Code Section 432.7: A Parallel but Independent Analysis

Labor Code section 432.7 independently restricts an employer's ability to seek or use certain arrest and conviction records. The court treated this statute separately from section 12952, conducting its own examination of text, structure, and purpose rather than simply importing the Government Code analysis wholesale. That methodological choice matters: it signals that extraterritoriality questions under California employment law are statute-specific inquiries, not resolved by a single overarching rule.

The section 432.7 analysis reached the same destination by a parallel route. The statute's text and scheme did not reveal a legislative intent to extend protection to employees with no California employment situs. The plaintiff's arrest occurred in Florida, his day-to-day work was performed in Utah, and the decision to terminate him was made by decision makers in Illinois. Those facts, taken together, placed the employment relationship outside the territorial scope the court found the Legislature to have contemplated.

The Location Evidence: What the Record Showed and Why It Mattered

The factual record in Saberin is worth examining with care because the court's holding is explicitly tied to it. The plaintiff resided and performed his work in Utah. His arrest, which triggered the employer's review of his continued employment, took place in Florida. The two individuals who made the termination decision were located in Illinois. California's connection to the employment relationship came through two channels: Alation was headquartered in California, and California-based human resources personnel provided input into the process that led to termination. Rose was the individual who discovered Saberin's arrest through a public records search—not Laber, as Saberin's complaint had alleged. The opinion also noted that Saberin's direct supervisor worked remotely from Washington, not California, another territorial contact the court cited in concluding that neither Saberin nor his arrest had any connection to California.

The court also applied California Code of Regulations, title 2, section 11008, subdivision (e)(1)(C), which excludes an employee outside California when the allegedly unlawful conduct did not occur in California and was not ratified by California decision makers or participants. It held that Laber's advisory input and communication of the termination did not make her a participant or ratifier, and that Mousouris's California home base was insufficient because he was in Illinois when the decision was made. Headquarters location and California HR input were therefore insufficient, on this record, to bring the plaintiff within the protective reach of either statute. That phrasing — "on this record" — is deliberate and significant. The court did not announce that headquarters location is always irrelevant or that HR input can never tip the balance. It held that those two facts, standing alone against the weight of the plaintiff's Utah residence, Utah work situs, Florida arrest, and Illinois decision makers, did not establish the territorial nexus the statutes require. Litigants with different factual configurations should not read the opinion as settling their cases.

Express Limits: What the Court Declined to Decide

The Court of Appeal was unusually explicit about the boundaries of its ruling, and those express reservations deserve their own analysis. The court stated that it was not deciding whether Government Code section 12952 or Labor Code section 432.7 applies to California residents working remotely for employers that have no California offices. That population presents a materially different factual profile, and the court left that question open. The court also assumed without deciding that the Pearson exception to ordinary arbitration deference extends to Labor Code section 432.7 claims; whether that exception applies to section 432.7 remains unresolved. Third, the court expressly declined to decide whether deliberately relocating California-based decision makers out of state to avoid the statutes' reach would nonetheless establish a sufficient California connection. Because there was no evidence that Alation's use of Illinois-based decision makers was strategic or anomalous, that question remains open.

The court also declined to establish a single location test applicable across all California employment statutes. The opinion's statute-by-statute methodology was not merely an organizational choice; it reflected a substantive position that extraterritoriality analysis must be conducted separately for each provision, with attention to that provision's own text, scheme, and aims. A holding about section 12952 does not automatically resolve a question about a different Labor Code section, a different FEHA provision, or a wage-and-hour statute with its own territorial language. Practitioners should resist the temptation to treat Saberin as a general-purpose extraterritoriality answer.

Implications for Evidence and Record Development

Because the court's analysis was so closely tied to the specific facts in the record, the opinion has significant implications for how parties should develop evidence in cases involving multi-state employment relationships. For employees seeking to invoke California's protective statutes, the record should document every California-connected fact with precision: where work was actually performed on a day-to-day basis, where supervisory decisions were made and communicated, where HR processes were administered, where employment agreements were negotiated and signed, and where the employer's decision-making authority was actually exercised rather than merely nominally located.

For employers defending against extraterritorial application, the record should be equally precise in the opposite direction, establishing the out-of-state character of the work situs, the decision makers, and the events giving rise to the claim. The court's treatment of California HR input as insufficient — but not categorically irrelevant — suggests that a more substantial California HR role, or a record showing that California personnel exercised actual decision-making authority rather than advisory input, could yield a different result. Neither side should assume the outcome before the record is built.

Practical Takeaways for Remote-Work Employment Relationships

The remote-work era has created employment relationships that do not fit neatly into the territorial assumptions embedded in most state employment statutes. Saberin illustrates both the difficulty of those cases and the importance of careful, statute-specific legal analysis. Several practical points emerge from the opinion.

• Governing-law clauses are not dispositive. The employment agreements here included California governing-law language, yet the court's extraterritoriality analysis proceeded independently of that contractual choice. Parties should not assume that a California choice-of-law provision automatically imports every California employment statute into a relationship centered outside the state.
• Arbitration posture shapes the review standard. The FEHA exception to ordinary arbitration deference is narrow. Employees who anticipate extraterritoriality disputes may wish to consider whether arbitration agreements adequately preserve their ability to seek judicial review of threshold legal errors.
• Each statute requires its own analysis. The court analyzed sections 12952 and 432.7 separately. Counsel handling multi-statute claims in multi-state employment relationships should conduct the same statute-by-statute inquiry rather than assuming that one extraterritoriality conclusion controls all claims.
• The California-resident remote worker question remains open. Employees who live in California and work remotely for California employers occupy a different legal position than the plaintiff in Saberin, and the court expressly declined to resolve their rights. That question is likely to generate further litigation.

If you are navigating an employment dispute that involves multi-state work arrangements, California statutory protections, or arbitration agreements, the attorneys at Mishra X Trial Lawyers' employment litigation practice can help you evaluate your options. You can also explore additional case analyses and legal resources in our case library.

The full opinion is available through the public court record on Justia. Nothing in this analysis constitutes legal advice, and the outcome of any individual matter will depend on its own facts and applicable law.

Questions About Remote Worker Rights and California Employment Law

Does a California employer's headquarters location automatically make California employment statutes apply to out-of-state employees?

Not automatically, and Saberin illustrates why. The court found that headquarters location, standing alone alongside California HR input, was insufficient to bring a Utah-based employee within the reach of Government Code section 12952 or Labor Code section 432.7. The analysis is fact-specific and statute-specific, and a different combination of facts — such as California-based decision makers or a California work situs — could support a different conclusion. No single factor is automatically dispositive under the court's framework.

What happens to California employment law claims when they go through arbitration?

Arbitration awards are subject to very limited judicial review under California law, and arbitrators are generally permitted to make legal errors without those errors warranting vacatur. For the Government Code section 12952 FEHA claim, the Court of Appeal in Saberin held that the Pearson exception applied because the arbitrator's ruling had deprived Saberin of a merits hearing. For the Labor Code section 432.7 claim, the court assumed without deciding that the same exception was available. It reviewed the extraterritoriality question de novo. On that review, however, the court found no legal error: the arbitrator's extraterritoriality ruling was correct. The standard for overturning an adverse award remains demanding.

Does Saberin resolve the rights of California residents who work remotely for employers with no California offices?

No. The court expressly declined to decide whether Government Code section 12952 or Labor Code section 432.7 applies to California residents who work remotely for employers with no California offices. The plaintiff in Saberin lived and worked in Utah, and the holding is tied to that factual profile. California-resident remote workers present materially different facts that the court left for future cases.