Beaver v. John Q. Hammons Hotels, L.P.

• Decision Date: 11 December 2003
• Docket Number: No. 03-470.,03-470.
• Citation: 138 S.W.3d 664,355 Ark. 359
• Parties: Judy BEAVER and Jimmy Beaver v. JOHN Q. HAMMONS HOTELS, L.P.; John Q. Hammons Hotels, Inc.
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

138 S.W.3d 664

355 Ark. 359

Judy BEAVER and Jimmy Beaver v. JOHN Q. HAMMONS HOTELS, L.P.; John Q. Hammons Hotels, Inc.

No. 03-470.

Supreme Court of Arkansas.

December 11, 2003.

Petition for review from the Court of Appeals, Larry D. Vaught, J.

Daily & Woods, P.L.L.C., by: Jerry L. Canfield, Fort Smith, for appellants.

Jones & Harper, by: Niki T. Cung and Charles R. Garner, Jr., Fort Smith, for appellees.

ANNABELLE CLINTON IMBER, Justice.

This appeal arises from an accident in which Appellant Judy Beaver was allegedly injured when she slipped on a wet floor at a restaurant in a hotel owned by Appellees John Q. Hammons Hotels, L.P., and John Q. Hammons Hotels, Inc. (collectively, the Hotel). The trial court determined that Ms. Beaver was collaterally estopped from bringing her claim and granted summary judgment in favor of the Hotel. On appeal, Ms. Beaver contends that she was not collaterally estopped from bringing her claim and the trial court erred in granting summary judgment. We agree that summary judgment was not appropriate; therefore, we reverse and remand.

The facts that led up to this case are as follows. On April 28, 1997, Ms. Beaver was in Fort Smith, Arkansas, attending a work-related seminar as required by her employer, the Benton County Child Support Enforcement Unit. The seminar was held at the Holiday Inn Convention Center, which was owned by the appellees. While on her lunch break, Ms. Beaver slipped and fell on a wet floor at the buffet in the Hotel's restaurant. As a result of the fall, she twisted her back and injured her knee. Her physicians later determined that Ms. Beaver herniated a disc in the fall. Ms. Beaver filed a workers' compensation claim against her employer, and the administrative law judge determined that the injury occurred "at work" and that she had sustained an injury that entitled her to temporary total disability benefits.

The Benton County Child Support Enforcement Unit appealed to the Arkansas Workers' Compensation Commission, which reversed the ALJ on two grounds: (1) Ms. Beaver was not performing employment services at the time of the fall; and (2) Ms. Beaver had not proven that the fall caused her injuries because she waited over a month after the fall before seeking medical treatment. Ms. Beaver appealed the Commission's decision to the Arkansas Court of Appeals, challenging both of the Commission's rulings. The court of appeals affirmed the Commission on the first issue, holding that Ms. Beaver was not performing employment services at the time she was injured because she was on a lunch break. See Beaver v. Benton County Child Supp. Unit, 66 Ark.App. 153, 991 S.W.2d 618 (1999). However, because it affirmed on the first issue, the court of appeals specifically declined to address the second issue on appeal regarding proof of causation of her injury. Id.

After the court of appeals affirmed the Commission, Ms. Beaver filed a personal-injury claim against the Hotel in which she asserted negligence in the slip-and-fall incident. The Hotel moved for summary judgment, contending that Ms. Beaver's claims were barred by collateral estoppel because the Commission's decision conclusively determined she had not proven her injuries were caused in the slip-and-fall incident. The trial court agreed and granted summary judgment to the Hotel, citing as its authority Brown v. Dow Chemical Co., 875 F.2d 197 (8th Cir.1989).

Ms. Beaver appealed to the Arkansas Court of Appeals, asserting that the personal-injury claim was not collaterally estopped because the court of appeals had not reached the issue of causation when it affirmed the Commission's decision. Noting that this was an issue of first impression, the court of appeals agreed with Ms. Beaver and reversed the summary judgment, holding that where an appellate court sustains one of two alternative determinations of the trial court and refuses to reach the other, the judgment is conclusive only as to the first determination. See Beaver v. John Q. Hammons Hotels, Inc., 81 Ark.App. 413, 102 S.W.3d 903 (2003).

This case is before us on the Hotel's petition for review from the Arkansas Court of Appeals; therefore, we have jurisdiction pursuant to Ark. Sup.Ct. R. 1-2(e). When we grant review following a decision by the court of appeals, we review the case as though it was originally filed with this court. Edens v. Superior Marble & Glass, 346 Ark. 487, 58 S.W.3d 369 (2001); Freeman v. Con-Agra Frozen Foods, 344 Ark. 296, 40 S.W.3d 760 (2001). Summary judgment should be granted only when it is clear that there are no genuine issues of material fact to be litigated, and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Laird v. Shelnut, 348 Ark. 632, 74 S.W.3d 206 (2002). The purpose of summary judgment is not to try the issues, but to determine whether there are any issues to be tried. Id.; Flentje v. First Nat'l Bank of Wynne, 340 Ark. 563, 11 S.W.3d 531 (2000).

Relying on Brown v. Dow Chemical Co., 875 F.2d 197 (8th Cir.1989), the trial court applied collateral estoppel to the issue of whether the fall caused Ms. Beaver's injury. With the causation issue thus precluded, the Hotel was entitled to judgment as a matter of law because Ms. Beaver could not possibly prove her negligence claim if she could not prove the causal connection between the fall and the injury. The trial court's reliance on Brown v. Dow Chemical was misplaced, however, because while that case involved a similar situation, it is distinguishable from the case at bar.

In Brown v. Dow Chemical, the Workers' Compensation Commission denied Brown's claim for benefits. The only basis for the Commission's decision was that Brown had failed to prove his injuries were caused by the chemicals with which he worked on the job, and the Arkansas Court of Appeals affirmed the decision on that one ground. Therefore, when Brown brought a products-liability suit against the chemical manufacturer, Dow Chemical, the federal district court granted summary judgment to Dow Chemical by applying collateral estoppel. The Eighth Circuit then affirmed the district court, holding that the Commission's finding that Brown had not proved the chemicals injured him was final and determinative for purposes of collateral estoppel on the causation issue. Because the Eighth Circuit's decision in Brown was based on only one ground that was affirmed, it is inapposite. Here, the Commission's decision rested on two alternative, independent grounds, and the court of appeals affirmed solely on the ground not at issue in this case.

The doctrine of collateral estoppel, or issue preclusion, bars the relitigation of issues of law or fact actually litigated by the parties in the first suit, provided that the party against whom the earlier decision is being asserted had a full and fair opportunity to litigate the issue in question and that issue was essential to the judgment. Zinger v. Terrell, 336 Ark. 423, 985 S.W.2d 737 (1999). Arkansas law provides that the following elements must be present in order to establish collateral estoppel: (1) the issue sought to be precluded must be the same as that involved in the prior litigation; (2) the issue must have been actually litigated; (3) the issue must have been determined by a final and valid judgment; and (4) the issue must have been essential to the judgment. See Looney v. Looney, 336 Ark. 542, 986 S.W.2d 858 (1999); Fisher v. Jones, 311 Ark. 450, 844 S.W.2d 954 (1993).

Ms. Beaver asserts that the fourth element of collateral estoppel, the issue to be precluded must have been essential to the judgment, was not met in her case. She asserts that the second point on which the Commission based its decision, failure to prove causation of her injury, could not have been essential to the Commission's judgment because (1) failure to prove causation was not the only basis for the Commission's decision, and (2) the court of appeals declined to address the issue of causation when it affirmed the Commission's decision.

The Hotel counters by citing John Cheeseman Trucking, Inc. v. Pinson, 313 Ark. 632, 855 S.W.2d 941 (1993), a case in which a determination of liability in one case caused the issue of liability to be collaterally estopped in a second case involving most of the same parties. In Pinson, a multi-vehicle accident resulted in two lawsuits, one in Lonoke County in which Pinson was a plaintiff suing the other people involved in the accident, and a second lawsuit in Pulaski County in which another accident victim was the plaintiff and Pinson was one of the defendants. Id. The Pulaski County suit came to trial first, and a jury found two truck drivers were liable for the accident, and evenly apportioned fault between the two. All the other defendants, including Pinson, were found faultless. Therefore, when Pinson's Lonoke County suit came to trial, the Lonoke County court applied the doctrine of collateral estoppel to the issue of liability, dismissing all the defendants except the two truck drivers who had been found liable in the earlier suit and finding those two drivers liable as a matter of law. Id. We affirmed the trial court, holding that the determination of liability was essential to the Pulaski County judgment; therefore, the issue of liability was precluded from further litigation. Id.

The Hotel, citing our decision in Pinson, asserts that a determination of liability or compensability was essential to the issues before the Commission and, because proof of a causal connection is an issue in virtually every claim involving compensability of injury, the causal connection is itself essential. This argument is a non sequitur. Causation is an element of liability and only becomes essential if liability is found, as was the case in Pinson. In other words, when the ALJ awarded benefits to Ms. Beaver, both issues — performance of employment services and causation — were essential to the ALJ's finding of liability. Therefore, if the...