Davis v. Group
| Decision Date | 28 September 2017 |
| Docket Number | No. M2016-02239-COA-R3-CV,M2016-02239-COA-R3-CV |
| Parties | ANNIE DAVIS, ET AL. v. GRANGE MUTUAL CASUALTY GROUP, ET AL. |
| Court | Tennessee Court of Appeals |
Appeal from the Circuit Court for Davidson County
This case involves the interplay between the statute of limitations, Rule 3 of the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure, and Tennessee Code Annotated section 56-7-1206(d), allowing direct actions against uninsured motorist insurance carriers. The trial court granted the defendant uninsured motorist insurance carrier's motion to dismiss. Discerning no error, we affirm.
J. STEVEN STAFFORD, P.J.,W.S., delivered the opinion of the court, in which FRANK G. CLEMENT, JR., P.J.,M.S., and RICHARD H. DINKINS, J., joined.
Jonathan E. Richardson and Karl E. Pulley, Nashville, Tennessee, for the appellants, Annie Davis and William Davis.
C. Benton Patton and Jennifer P. Ogletree, Nashville, Tennessee, for the appellee, Grange Mutual Casualty Group and Steven G. Hobock.
OPINIONPlaintiffs/Appellants Annie and William Davis ("Appellants") filed a complaint on March 20, 2015, alleging that they suffered injuries in a motor vehicle accident that occurred on March 21, 2014. In their complaint, the Appellants name Steven G. Hobock, and their purported uninsured/underinsured motorist insurance carrier, Grange Mutual Casualty Group ("Grange"), as defendants.
Prior to filing their complaint, Appellants had contact with Grange regarding a possible settlement.1 After filing the complaint, however, the case languished with no activity for over a year. Indeed, it is undisputed that Appellants' did not cause a summons to issue to either defendant until April 19, 2016. On April 21, 2016, the summons issued to Mr. Hobock at his last known address was eventually returned by the Davidson County Sheriff stating that "Steven Hoback [sic] is not to be found in my county."
On April 25, 2016, the trial court sua sponte dismissed the action for failure to prosecute. Appellants then filed a "Motion to Set Aside Final Order/Reinstatement of Cause of Action"2 on May 24, 2016. The same day, the Commissioner of Insurance returned the April 19, 2016 summons issued to Grange unserved. Appellants caused another summons to be issued to Grange on June 6, 2016, to be served by certified mail. A second summons was also caused to be issued to Mr. Hobock on June 7, 2016. Mr. Hobock's summons was returned unserved on June 14, 2016, indicating that Mr. Hobock died in early 2015. The trial court granted the Appellants' motion to set aside the order of dismissal on July 12, 2016.
On July 7, 2016, Trustgard Insurance Company ("Appellee") filed a notice of limited/special appearance asserting that Appellants incorrectly identified Grange as Appellants' uninsured motorist carrier and that Appellee was instead the appropriate entity.3 Appellee then filed a motion to dismiss the subject action for insufficient service of process and for failure to comply with Rule 3 of the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure. Appellee argued that because Appellants did not issue any summons to any defendant until April 19, 2016, they could not rely on the original filing date to toll the one-year statute of limitations applicable to claims for personal injuries. Appellee also asserted that because the statute of limitations had expired against Mr. Hobock, thealleged tortfeasor, the action against it as Appellants' uninsured motorist insurance carrier was also barred.
The trial court granted Appellee's motion to dismiss on September 22, 2016. Specifically, the trial court found that it is undisputed that Appellants did not issue summonses to Appellee or Mr. Hobock until April 19, 2016, more than one year after the filing of the complaint; therefore, Appellants could not rely on the original filing date of their complaint to toll the one-year statute of limitations applicable to this action. Accordingly, the trial court dismissed the case against Mr. Hobock for failure to comply with Rule 3 and additionally dismissed the case against Appellee because Appellants failed to establish liability against the alleged tortfeasor as required by Tennessee law. Appellants thereafter filed a motion to reconsider, which the trial court denied.
The sole issue, as we perceive it, is whether the trial court erred in dismissing the case for failure to timely issue service of process, resulting in the expiration of the statute of limitations.
Because this case is centered on service of process and statute of limitations issues, we will discuss the applicable standards of review in turn. Considering an appeal from a trial court's grant of a motion to dismiss for insufficiency of service of process, we view all factual allegations in the complaint as true and review the trial court's conclusions of law de novo with no presumption of correctness. Tenn. R. App. P. 13(d); Fisher v. Ankton, No. W2016-02089-COA-R3-CV, 2017 WL 3611035, at *3 (Tenn. Ct. App. June 27, 2017) (citing Mid-South Indus., Inc. v. Martin Mach. & Tool, Inc., 342 S.W.3d 19 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2010)).
Motions to dismiss are governed by Rule 12.02 of the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure and may include motions based upon insufficient service of process or failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted. According to Rule 12.02: "If, on a motion asserting the defense [of] failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted, matters outside the pleading are presented to and not excluded by the court, the motion shall be treated as one for summary judgment[.]" Tenn. R. Civ. P. 12.02. However, "even though the trial court consider[s] matters outside the pleading, the motion [is] still properly treated as a motion to dismiss since in involves [the] issue[] of service of process." Milton v. Etezadi, No. E2012-00777-COA-R3-CV, 2013 WL 1870052 . In other words, when ruling on motions to dismiss regarding service of process, "a trial court may properly consider matters outside the pleadings without converting the motion to one for summary judgment." Fisher, 2017 WL 3611035 at *3 (citing Milton, 2013 WL 1970052, at *3-*4).
The same is not true of motions to dismiss predicated on the expiration of the statute of limitations as they may be properly raised as a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted. See Young ex rel. Young v. Kennedy
, 429 S.W.3d 536, 549 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2013) (citing Tenn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(6)) ( that a motion to dismiss based upon the expiration of the statute of limitations is properly brought as a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted). As such, motions to dismiss raising this defense may be converted to motions for summary judgment where the trial court considers matters outside the pleadings. Determining whether to grant or deny a motion for summary judgment is a matter of law, therefore, the standard of review is de novo, with no presumption of correctness. Rye v. Women's Care Center of Memphis, MPLLC, 477 S.W.3d 235, 250 (Tenn. 2015). Thus, we must make "make a fresh determination of whether the requirements of Rule 56 of the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure have been satisfied." Rye, 477 S.W.3d at 250 (citing Estate of Brown, 402 S.W.3d 193, 198 (Tenn. 2013)).
Summary judgment is generally granted "only when the moving party can demonstrate that there is no genuine issue of material fact and that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Tenn. R. Civ. P. 56.04; Cohen v. Didier, No. M2013-01370-COA-R3-CV, 2014 WL 4102380 (Tenn. Ct. App. Aug. 19, 2014) (citing Hannan v. Alltel Publ'g Co., 270 S.W.3d 1, 5 (Tenn. 2008)). Further, a summary judgment motion is granted when "the facts and reasonable inferences from those facts would permit a reasonable person to reach only one conclusion." Cohen, 2014 WL 4102380, at *4 (citing Dick Broad. Co. of Tenn. V. Oak Ridge FM., Inc., 395 S.W.3d 653, 671 (Tenn. 2013)). Although the trial court considered this case only through the lens of Appellee's motion to dismiss, we conclude that under either standard, the undisputed facts establish that the trial court did not err in dismissing Appellants' cause of action against both Appellee and Mr. Hobock.
The subject case focuses on the overlap among the service of process requirements under Rule 3 of the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure, the applicable statutes of limitations involving a motor vehicle accident where one party is an underinsured/uninsured motorist, and Tennessee Code Annotated section 56-7-1206, the uninsured/underinsured motorist direct action statute. We will begin by discussing the applicable statutes of limitations.
Under Tennessee law, a personal injury action must be commenced within one year of the date the plaintiff's cause of action accrued. Tenn. Code Ann. § 28-3-104(a)(1)(A). However, actions on contracts that have not been expressly provided for are afforded a six-year statute of limitations. See Tenn. Code Ann. § 28-3-109(a)(3);Bates v. Greene, No. W2016-01868-COA-R3-CV, 2017 WL 3206599, at *2 (Tenn. Ct. App. July 27, 2017). In Bates, this Court reaffirmed the holding that a suit against an uninsured motorist insurance carrier is ultimately an action in contract, giving rise to a six-year statute of limitations rather than the one-year statute applicable to the claims for personal injury against the tortfeasor. See generally Bates
, 2017 WL 3206599, at *2 () ("'[D]espite the necessity that the insured establish that a tort was committed by the uninsured motorist, and that injury resulted, the action is nevertheless one based upon the insurance contract, on...
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