Gong v. Chevron Corporation
- Jacquelyn Corley
- 3:24-cv-08641
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 3
In Gong v. Chevron, Judge Corley dismissed the self-represented plaintiff’s second amended complaint for failing to state a claim under the Trafficking Victims Protection and Reauthorization Act.
The ruling affects Cun Gong Zhang’s claim against Chevron Corporation and the other defendants because the court dismissed his second amended complaint without leave to amend.
What happened
Cun Gong Zhang, representing himself, sued Chevron Corporation and related entities, alleging that labor practices involving the Chuandongbei Gas Project violated the Trafficking Victims Protection and Reauthorization Act. He alleged that workers were transferred between employers without new employment contracts and that Chinese labor laws were misused.
The court said the allegations did not show that the defendants used or threatened to use a law or legal process to pressure Zhang into providing labor, as required for his claim. The court had already given him two opportunities to amend his complaint, but his second amended complaint did not fix the problem.
Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley dismissed the second amended complaint for failure to state a claim under the court’s required screening process and denied further leave to amend because amendment would be futile. The court stated that it would enter a separate judgment.
The detailed version
- Gong v. Chevron Corporation · No. 3:24-cv-08641
- Jacquelyn Corley
- Sept. 15, 2025
Background
Cun Gong Zhang, who represented himself, alleged that Chevron Corporation, Unocal East China Sea Co. Ltd., Worley, and associated entities violated the Trafficking Victims Protection and Reauthorization Act while he worked on the Chuandongbei Gas Project between 2011 and 2015. He alleged that employees were hired by one employer and then transferred to another without new employment contracts, in violation of Chinese law.
The second amended complaint asserted one claim under 18 U.S.C. § 1589(a)(3). That provision allows a civil action for damages when a person knowingly obtains labor or services through abuse or threatened abuse of law or legal process.
Court’s Analysis
The court explained that a claim under Section 1589(a)(3) requires allegations that the defendants: (1) used a law or legal process for a purpose for which it was not designed; (2) did so to pressure the plaintiff to provide labor; and (3) obtained the labor because of that pressure.
The court had previously dismissed Zhang’s claim because his allegations that his original employer delivered him to another employer without signing a new employment contract did not state a claim under Section 1589(a)(3). The second amended complaint continued to rely on allegations that the defendants abused Chinese labor-contract laws in connection with a false services contract.
The court concluded that alleged violations of Chinese labor laws, without allegations that the defendants used or threatened to use those laws to pressure Zhang into providing labor, were insufficient to state a claim under Section 1589(a)(3). The opinion’s text includes an apparent transcription or formatting error near the end of this analysis, but the court’s conclusion is clear.
Disposition
The court dismissed the second amended complaint under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2) for failure to state a claim. This statute requires the court to screen certain complaints and dismiss them when they fail to state a legally sufficient claim. Because the court had twice allowed Zhang to amend and determined that he had not cured the deficiencies, it concluded that further amendment would be futile. The court dismissed the complaint without leave to amend and stated that it would enter a separate judgment.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.