An investigative documentary comparison of the June 21, 2024 three-day notice — its DocuSign authorship by Anna Ly, the structural relationship between the served instrument and the commercial template published in submitting counsel's forms library, the absence of any residential template in that library, and counsel's own published cure-window guidance.
A three-day notice to pay rent or quit was served on the tenant on June 21, 2024 by way of a DocuSign envelope. The transmitting and originating party identified by the DocuSign envelope is Anna Ly, an active California real estate licensee who is the daughter of the named landlord and who is not the broker of record for the subject property. The same instrument was thereafter attached to the Complaint for Unlawful Detainer filed July 3, 2024 by Steven D. Silverstein (CA Bar #86466) as counsel of record for plaintiff.
This page is investigative documentation. It does not adjudicate. It documents (a) the DocuSign record of authorship; (b) the actual contents of submitting counsel's publicly available forms library — what is published in that library, and what is conspicuously absent from it; (c) the points at which the served instrument mirrors the published commercial template (the loops of similarity); (d) the points at which the served instrument departs from any published form into language crafted by another hand; and (e) the relationship between counsel's published cure-window guidance and the conduct documented in the case record.
The DocuSign envelope is itself documentary evidence of authorship. The platform records the identity of the party who creates the envelope and the party who sends it. Both fields, on the envelope at issue, identify the same individual: Anna Ly. The instrument was not authored or transmitted by an attorney. The instrument was authored and transmitted by a real estate salesperson holding a license that does not authorize the unauthorized practice of law and who is not the broker of record for the subject property.
Submitting counsel maintains a publicly available "Forms Library" on his firm's website. The contents of that library, as the library presents itself, can be inventoried directly from the firm's site (preservation captured 2026). The inventory below distinguishes between forms that are published and forms that are not.
The absence of a residential three-day template is, in itself, an investigative datum. Counsel publicly identifies as a long-standing unlawful detainer practitioner. The library publicly attributes to him a commercial template for the same statutory device. Whatever the explanation for the absence of the residential counterpart, that absence forecloses the inference that the residential notice served on the tenant in this matter was generated from a published template authored by counsel. It was generated from somewhere else — or by someone else.
Although the published commercial template is not on its face the instrument that was served, three structural paragraphs of the served residential notice mirror the commercial template closely enough to indicate that the served notice was prepared by a hand with access to, and familiarity with, the published commercial template's architecture. The three structural mirrors are:
YOU ARE HEREBY NOTIFIED that the rent on the premises hereinafter described, of which you now hold possession, is now due, owing and unpaid…
[Substantively identical opening cadence and field structure, with residential adaptations to address fields.]
WITHIN THREE (3) DAYS… or your right to possession of the premises will be terminated and forfeiture of the lease will be declared…
[Forfeiture clause carried forward with the same operative cadence; residential lease language substituted.]
DELIVER TO (Individual): _______________ at _______________
DELIVER RENT TO: WELLS FARGO BANK · [account number] · [bank-branch address]
The structural loops establish that the served instrument was prepared by a person with access to counsel's published commercial template and who used its architecture as a starting point. Loops 1 and 2 carry the boilerplate forward with minor residential adaptations. Loop 3 carries the payee directive's structural shell forward but, as discussed in the next section, fills it with crafted content that departs from the template's design.
Where the served instrument departs from the published commercial template, those departures are not mechanical adaptations of commercial language to residential context. They are crafted insertions or deletions that change the operative effect of the instrument. The departures are concentrated in fields that govern the instrument's facial validity.
The published commercial template's payee field is structured to receive the name of an individual. The served residential notice substitutes a bank ("WELLS FARGO BANK") in that position, accompanied by a personal account number in the name of the named landlord (Wells Fargo account #1005959166) and the bank-branch street address. The lease, however, specifies a different payee account (Hanson Le, account #3312943297). The departure from the template's "(Individual)" instruction was not necessitated by the residential context. It was a choice.
The published commercial template includes a service-date and notice-expiration paragraph identifying when service was effected and when the cure window closes. The served residential notice does not contain this paragraph. The deletion is not a residential adaptation; the cure-window mechanism is the same in both contexts.
The published commercial template's disposition language preserves the statutory "PAY OR QUIT" alternative. The served residential notice drops the "OR QUIT" alternative. The omission is not a residential adaptation; the statutory alternative is identical in both contexts.
The published commercial template provides for a signature. The served residential notice was transmitted via DocuSign envelope but bears no signature in the signature position of the document itself. A DocuSign envelope can carry a signed document; this envelope did not.
The published commercial template's landlord contact field carries the landlord's address and telephone for tendering payment and inquiries. The served residential notice substitutes the bank branch's address and telephone. A tenant attempting to comply with, or to inquire concerning, the notice was directed to a bank, not to the landlord.
The pattern of the crafted departures is not random. Each departure either removes a compliance feature present in the template or substitutes a non-compliant content into a structurally retained field. The instrument's structural architecture remained recognizable — that is the loop fingerprint of Section IV — but the operative content within that architecture was re-authored.
Counsel's Evictions Procedures for Unlawful Detainers document, published in the Forms Library, contains owner-facing instructions concerning the conduct expected of an owner during the three-day cure window after a notice has been served. Two of those instructions are directly pertinent here:
Counsel's published procedures instruct the owner to refrain from informal direct contact with the tenant during the cure window. The stated purpose is to preserve the integrity of the notice and to avoid issues of waiver, modification, or estoppel.
Counsel's published procedures further instruct the owner not to accept partial payments, payments tendered in the wrong form, or payments tendered to a payee other than the one specified in the notice. The stated purpose is to preserve the unconditional character of the three-day demand.
The investigative posture of this page is open. The following questions are presented for review and have been or will be referenced in the agency submissions identified at the foot of this page.
Where the DocuSign envelope identifies the originator and sender of the served three-day notice as a real estate salesperson who is not the broker of record for the subject property and who is the daughter of the named landlord, and where the served notice bears structural loops indicating preparation with reference to a commercial template published by submitting counsel: who authored the served residential instrument, and under whose supervision was it prepared?
Where submitting counsel's publicly available Forms Library contains a commercial three-day template but no residential three-day template, what inference, if any, attaches to the relationship between the published library and the served residential instrument for purposes of agency review?
Where the served instrument retains the structural shell of the published commercial template but replaces or deletes content in the very fields that govern facial validity (payee identity, signature, service date, "OR QUIT" disposition, landlord contact), what review framework applies to the act of submitting that instrument to the Court as the predicate for the unlawful detainer cause of action?
Where the same firm publishes owner-facing cure-window guidance instructing against (i) informal contact with the tenant and (ii) acceptance of payment outside the form and manner of the notice, and where the documented conduct in the case record reflects both, what bearing does that comparison have on the review of the instrument and its submission?
Whether the investigative scope properly extends to (i) the DocuSign sender history of the transmitting party in connection with prior tenancies at the subject property, and (ii) any distribution of the instrument template to related parties for use at other properties — both being documentary inquiries obtainable on subpoena from the DocuSign platform and from the corporate filings identified in Section VII.