“A plaintiff’s failure to mitigate or ameliorate the injuries caused by a defendant is a defense not to the defendant’s liability but to the amount of damages for which the defendant is liable. As a general rule, a plaintiff may not recover damages that could have been avoided if reasonable and appropriate mitigation efforts within the plaintiff’s means had been taken. Thus, successful invocation of the failure to mitigate defense will reduce but not necessarily eliminate the plaintiff’s recovery of damages.”
[California Affirmative Defenses [certain citations omitted]]
