City of Jackson v. Presley
| Decision Date | 16 November 2006 |
| Docket Number | No. 2004-CA-02284-SCT.,2004-CA-02284-SCT. |
| Citation | 942 So.2d 777 |
| Parties | CITY OF JACKSON v. Lynda Key PRESLEY. |
| Court | Mississippi Supreme Court |
Michelle Lynn McKenzie, Donna Brown Jacobs, Leann W. Nealey, Jackson, Pieter John Teeuwissen, Ridgeland, attorneys for appellant.
Robert P. Myers, Jr., Joe Sam Owen, Gulfport, attorneys for appellee.
Before SMITH, C.J., CARLSON and RANDOLPH, JJ.
¶ 1. Prior to the commencement of a bench trial conducted pursuant to the Mississippi Tort Claims Act, the trial judge, without any request from the plaintiff's counsel, sua sponte entered a default judgment as to liability against the City of Jackson and proceeded to conduct a hearing as to damages only. At the conclusion of the one-day bench trial of this personal injury action, the trial judge entered a final judgment against the City of Jackson and in favor of Lynda Key Presley, awarding Presley damages in the sum of $219,763.63. From this final judgment, the City of Jackson has appealed to us. Finding that the trial judge abused her discretion and committed reversible error in sua sponte entering a default judgment as to liability on the day of trial, we reverse the trial court's final judgment and remand this case to the Circuit Court for the First Judicial District of Hinds County for a new trial consistent with this opinion.
¶ 2. On May 8, 1998, Lynda Key Presley, of Saucier, Harrison County, Mississippi, was involved in an automobile accident on Highway 15 south of New Albany, in Union County. Fortunately, Presley's personal injuries were relatively minor, as was the property damage to her vehicle.1
¶ 3. However, unfortunately for Presley, she was involved in yet another vehicular accident only twelve days later, on May 20, 1998, while traveling on the city streets of Jackson. As Presley traveled in the left-hand (southern-most) west-bound lane of Woodrow Wilson Boulevard, she entered the intersection at Livingston Road, having the right-of-way due to a green light.2 Traveling beside Presley's pickup truck in the same direction in the right-hand lane was a larger truck, and suddenly, a City of Jackson police car driven by officer Miranda Morton collided with Presley's vehicle, causing her vehicle to roll over several times.3 This time Presley's injuries were much more severe, and the damages she suffered unquestionably much greater than those suffered due to the first accident only twelve days earlier in Union County.
¶ 4. As a result of this second accident, Presley commenced her lawsuit under the Mississippi Tort Claims Act (MTCA), Miss.Code Ann. §§ 11-46-1 et seq., on May 19, 1999, by filing a complaint against the City of Jackson and officer Miranda Morton in the Circuit Court for the First Judicial District of Hinds County.4 The City timely responded to Presley's complaint by denying the material allegations of the complaint and by asserting numerous affirmative defenses. On June 16, 2000, the trial court entered an agreed order granting Presley leave to file an amended complaint, and a few days later, the amended complaint was filed. The only difference between the complaint and the amended complaint was an additional sentence asserting a claim for property damage. The City unquestionably failed to timely respond to this properly filed amended complaint; however, all parties continued on the course of discovery for over four years after the filing of the amended complaint. The trial court sua sponte entered an order referring this case to mediation.
¶ 5. With mediation eventually proving unsuccessful, the parties continued discovery and worked toward an eventual trial date of August 25, 2004. As the trial date drew closer, the City, on August 5, 2004 (and over four years late), suddenly filed an answer and affirmative defenses to the amended complaint. By the day of trial, there were various outstanding motions, and the trial court entered a pretrial order which had been jointly submitted by Presley and the City. This pretrial order provided, inter alia, that "[t]he pleadings are amended to conform to this pretrial order." One of the outstanding motions was Presley's motion to strike, as untimely filed, the City's answer and affirmative defenses to the amended complaint. This motion contained no request for relief from the trial court other than striking the late answer as untimely filed. After hearing arguments on this motion, the trial judge granted Presley's motion to strike this untimely filed answer and, without any request from Presley, the trial court likewise, sua sponte, entered a default judgment as to liability and announced to the parties that it would conduct a bench trial only on the issue of damages. At the conclusion of the bench trial, the trial judge took this matter under advisement, and on October, 26, 2004, the trial judge entered an eight-page memorandum opinion. On November 4, 2004, the trial judge entered a final judgment consistent with the memorandum opinion awarding Presley the sum of $219,763.63 against the City of Jackson, as well as legal interest and costs.5 The City of Jackson timely appealed to us from the entry of the final judgment.
¶ 6. The City of Jackson raises four main issues on appeal, along with numerous sub-issues. We restate these main issues to be: (1) Whether the trial court abused its discretion in striking the City's untimely answer to the amended complaint; (2) Whether the trial court abused its discretion when it entered a default judgment as to liability on the day of trial due to the City's untimely answer to the amended complaint; (3) Whether the trial court abused its discretion by denying the City an opportunity to pursue discovery concerning Presley's damages incurred due to the first vehicular accident occurring only twelve days before the subject accident; and, (4) Whether the trial court committed reversible errors during the bench trial on the issue of damages. Finding the first two issues dispositive, we will combine these issues and restate the issue for the sake of clarity in our discussion.
¶ 7. On the day of trial, the trial court was confronted with several motions, including Presley's motion to strike the City's undeniably late answer and affirmative defenses to Presley's amended complaint. The deadlines for the filing of various pleadings and motions in civil cases are governed, inter alia, by our rules of civil procedure, uniform rules, statutes, and trial court orders, such as the pre-trial order entered in this case. Also, we have stated:
Our trial judges are afforded considerable discretion in managing the pre-trial discovery process in their courts, including the entry of scheduling orders setting out various deadlines to assure orderly pre-trial preparation resulting in timely disposition of the cases. Our trial judges also have a right to expect compliance with their orders, and when parties and/or attorneys fail to adhere to the provisions of these orders, they should be prepared to do so at their own peril.
Bowie v. Montfort Jones Mem'l Hosp., 861 So.2d 1037, 1042 (Miss.2003). Thus, we will review the trial judge's striking of the City's four-year late answer and affirmative defenses to the amended complaint applying an abuse of discretion standard. On the other hand, the trial judge, after striking this responsive pleading, sua sponte entered a default judgment as to liability, which is akin to a summary judgment since the City was expressly foreclosed from presenting liability evidence at the trial of this case. We thus apply a de novo standard of review as to the trial court's entry of the default judgment as to liability against the City. Stallworth v. Sanford, 921 So.2d 340, 341 (Miss.2006) (citing Davis v. Hoss, 869 So.2d 397, 401 (Miss. 2004)); Bowie, 861 So.2d at 1040 (citing Hudson v. Courtesy Motors, Inc., 794 So.2d 999, 1002 (Miss.2001)).
¶ 8. This case is fact-intensive and it is critical here to provide a time-line of the relevant filings in this civil litigation:
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