Nichols v. First Union Nat. Bank, 04-CV-1576.

• Decision Date: 17 August 2006
• Docket Number: No. 04-CV-1576.,04-CV-1576.
• Citation: 905 A.2d 268
• Parties: Timothy NICHOLS, Appellant, v. FIRST UNION NATIONAL BANK, Michael D. Lang, Appellees.
• Court: D.C. Court of Appeals

905 A.2d 268

Timothy NICHOLS, Appellant, v. FIRST UNION NATIONAL BANK, Michael D. Lang, Appellees.

No. 04-CV-1576.

District of Columbia Court of Appeals.

Argued June 27, 2006.

Decided August 17, 2006.

Timothy Nichols, pro se.

Daniel S. Fiore, Arlington, VA, for appellees.

Before RUIZ and KRAMER, Associate Judges, and NEBEKER, Senior Judge.

RUIZ, Associate Judge:

The claims in this appeal arise out of disputed financial transactions between appellant, Timothy Nichols, and First Union National Bank and its employee, Michael D. Lang.¹ We see no reason to disturb the trial court's grant of summary judgment, or its denial of appellant's "motion for reconsideration," which we deem to be a Superior Court Civil Rule 60 motion. We reverse, however, the trial court's erroneous grant of costs to First Union, the party that prevailed in the litigation, under Superior Court Civil Rule 68.

I.

The parties agree that appellant signed a promissory note for a $10,000 loan with First Union, which he paid off early. The two main allegations disputed below were whether appellant also purchased a $10,000 certificate of deposit from First Union and whether he overpaid in repaying the loan.

Appellant, who was represented by counsel throughout most of the Superior Court proceedings, ran afoul of several court orders and court rules. Finding appellant "completely uncooperative in facilitating the production of" materials necessary to deposing his proffered expert witnesses—a handwriting expert and medical expert who were proffered to establish check forgery and medical symptoms resulting from appellee's alleged intentional infliction of emotional distress, respectively—the trial court ruled that both experts were prohibited from testifying. Appellant's repeated "flouting of the Court's November 26, 2003 order" by failing to make himself available for deposition led to his own testimony being barred. While the trial court recognized these were "stern remed[ies]," it "conclude[d] that it ha[d] no other recourse." Appellant also failed to comply with court orders that he produce the original document—one he claimed to possess—to prove that he owned the disputed certificate of deposit.

Based on appellant's failure to turn over the certificate of deposit documentation and his inability to present witnesses to establish his claims, the trial court granted First Union's motion for summary judgment, dismissing appellant's case, in a written order docketed May 18, 2004. Appellant did not appeal from that order, but filed a "Motion to Reconsider, Reinstate, and Permit Filing of Opposition" on May 28, 2004. On November 24, 2004, the trial court denied this motion, and in the same order awarded costs to First Union pursuant to Superior Court Civil Rule 68. Appellant filed a timely notice of appeal from this order on December 21, 2004.

II.

This court may exercise jurisdiction over appeals from all final orders and judgments of the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. D.C.Code § 11-721 (2002). However, "This court lacks jurisdiction to consider an appeal filed more than thirty days after the entry of the order being appealed." Bratcher v. United States, 604 A.2d 858, 859 (D.C.1992) (citing D.C.App. R. 4(b)(1)).

We have previously held, under this court's Rule 4 in effect prior to 2004, that "[a]lthough a timely filed Rule 59 motion tolls the thirty-day period for filing a notice of appeal from a court's final order, a Rule 60(b) motion does not." Turcios v. U.S. Servs. Indus., 680 A.2d 1023, 1025 (D.C.1996); see D.C.App. R. 4(b)(1) (2003); see also Vincent v. Anderson, 621 A.2d 367, 370 (D.C.1993). Under that rule, if appellant filed a Rule 60 motion, we would not have jurisdiction to consider any of the rulings leading up to the grant of summary judgment, which was entered more than 30 days before Mr. Nichols filed his notice of appeal.

To further our policy in favor of decisions on the merits, our cases interpreted the old Rule 4 such that "[a] motion that is `proper under either rule [59 or 60]' will ordinarily be treated as a Rule 59(e) motion, if timely filed," within ten days. Wallace v. Warehouse Employees Union # 730, 482 A.2d 801, 805 (D.C.1984). Even so, if appellant "did not base his claim for relief on an error of law; [but] alleged an additional circumstance not available to the trial court when it granted [ ] judgment," then because "[t]his is a ground for relief under Rule 60(b)(1), ... [the] motion properly should be treated as a motion under that rule." Nuyen v. Luna, 884 A.2d 650, 655 (D.C.2005). Because jurisdiction to hear an appeal depended on the nature of the post-judgment motion filed in the trial court, the appellate court was required to preliminarily engage in assessing the content of the motion before it could decide whether it had jurisdiction to hear the case.

Rule 4 has been revised and no longer requires this case-by-case evaluation of the nature of a motion—i.e., whether properly characterized as a Rule 59 or Rule 60 motion—in order to determine whether an appeal is timely,² in favor of a bright line rule based on the timing of the filing of a Rule 60 motion for relief from judgment. Under the current Rule 4, in civil cases "the time to file an appeal runs for all parties from the entry of the order disposing of ... [a] motion ... (iii) to vacate, alter, or amend the order or judgment; ... or (v) for relief from a judgment or order if the motion is filed no later than 10 days (computed using Superior Court Rule of Civil Procedure 6(a)) after the judgment is entered." D.C.App. R. 4(a)(4)(A)(iii) & (v) (2006).³ Thus, both Rule 59 motions (which must be filed within 10 days of entry of judgment), see Super Ct. Civ. R.59(b),⁴ and Rule 60 motions that are filed within such 10 days toll the time to appeal. Rule 4 was changed as part of an overall revision of the D.C. Appellate Rules adopted by the court on December 2, 2003, to become effective January 2, 2004, and is applicable to "[a]ll notices of appeal, petitions for review, and petitions for extraordinary writs, as described in Title IV of the revised rules, filed on or after such date, and all proceedings resulting from such filings...." See Order of District of Columbia Court of Appeals, December 2, 2003. As the notice of appeal in this case was filed on December 21, 2004, the new Rule 4 governs this appeal, and appellant's "motion to reconsider"—even if a Rule 60 motion—tolled the time to appeal because it was filed within 10 days of the entry of summary judgment.⁵ His challenge to the discovery-related rulings that led to the grant of summary judgment, as well as the denial of the "motion to reconsider," are therefore properly before us. We now turn to consider the merits of his appeal.

III.

Appellant contends that the trial court erred in entering orders prohibiting him and his expert witness (Katherine Kopphenhaver) from testifying, and, as a result, in granting summary judgment to appellees. We disagree.

Pretrial discovery is intended to operate via the parties' voluntary cooperation with a minimum of judicial oversight, and consequently, it is vulnerable to parties who choose to employ obstructive tactics in bad faith. The subversion of the discovery process by such means seriously harms the administration of justice. When discovery abuses come to the attention of the judge, the judge has a duty to take proportionate and effective countermeasures. For that purpose, Super. Ct. Civ. R. 37 permits the trial court to select from a range of sanctions, including the award of attorney's fees and expenses, the preclusion of claims or defenses, and the dismissal of an action or the entry of a judgment of default. The decision to impose discovery sanctions is left to the broad discretion of the trial court, and this court will reverse only if the trial court abuses its discretion by imposing a penalty too strict or unnecessary under the circumstances.

Jung v. Jung, 791 A.2d 46, 48-49 (D.C. 2002). Regarding Ms. Koppenhaver, appellant's counsel failed to attend her scheduled deposition or produce documents as ordered, then failed to produce the documents before the close of discovery. Regarding his own testimony, appellant failed to attend the first two scheduled deposition dates in defiance of court orders, showed up to the third scheduled deposition date unable to testify,⁶ and failed to comply with the court's subsequent order to provide dates on which he could complete his deposition before the close of discovery. Judge Burgess precluded the witnesses from testifying only after "plaintiff's irresponsible and unexplained conduct," left the trial court with "no other recourse." Accordingly, we find no abuse of discretion in the judge's imposition of discovery sanctions.

The grant of summary judgment arises inexorably from the trial court's prior orders barring the aforementioned witnesses and appellant's expert medical witness. Without those witnesses, and given appellant's continued refusal to produce the original certificate of deposit that was at the center of his suit,⁷ appellant lacked vital evidence on each count of his complaint—a defect that appellant has failed to address both before the Superior Court and on appeal. "[A]n adverse party [to a motion for summary judgment] may not rest upon the mere allegations or denials of the adverse party's pleading, but the adverse party's response, by affidavits or as otherwise provided in this Rule, must set forth specific facts showing that there is a genuine issue for trial." Super. Ct. Civ. R. 56(e) (1991). We perceive no error in the grant of summary judgment for appellees.

IV.

We also have jurisdiction to review, for abuse of discretion, see Puckrein v. Jenkins, 884 A.2d 46, 60 (D.C.2005), the trial court's denial of appellant's Rule 60 motion claiming fraud and mistake. Appellant bears the consequences of his counsel's failures to comply with the court rules and orders, and must...