California, United States of America
The following excerpt is from Diatchkova v. Nat'l Bank of Cal., B268331 (Cal. App. 2017):
"The omission of the defendant's identity in the original complaint must be real and not merely a subterfuge for avoiding the requirements of section 474. [Citation.] Furthermore, if the identity ignorance requirement of section 474 is not met, a new defendant may not be added after the statute of limitations has expired even if the new defendant cannot establish prejudice resulting from the
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delay. (Hazel v. Hewlett, supra, [201 Cal.App.3d] at p. 1466.)" (Woo, supra, 75 Cal.App.4th at p. 177.)
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