Ferguson v. Ram Enterprises, Inc.

• Citation: 900 S.W.2d 19
• Parties: Charles FERGUSON, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. RAM ENTERPRISES, INC. and John Doe, Defendants-Appellants.
• Decision Date: 30 May 1995
• Court: Supreme Court of Tennessee

Page 19

900 S.W.2d 19

Charles FERGUSON, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. RAM ENTERPRISES, INC. and John Doe, Defendants-Appellants.

Supreme Court of Tennessee,

at Jackson.

May 30, 1995.

Wayne VanDeveer, Memphis, for plaintiff-appellee.

Monique A. Nassar, Baker, Donelson, Bearman & Caldwell, Memphis, for defendant-appellant Ram Enterprises, Inc.

OPINION

DROWOTA, Justice.

The issue presented in this Rule 9, Tenn.R.App.P. interlocutory appeal is whether our decision in Five Star Express, Inc. v. Davis, 866 S.W.2d 944 (Tenn.1993) mandates that venue for worker's compensation cases be determined solely by Tenn.Code Ann. § 50-6-225(c)(1)--the worker's compensation venue statute--or whether, in some circumstances, venue may be determined by the general venue statute for transitory actions--Tenn.Code Ann. § 20-4-101(a)?

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

The facts pertinent to this appeal are not disputed. The plaintiff Charles Ferguson, a resident of Montgomery, Alabama, was hired by Ram Enterprises, a Tennessee corporation whose principal place of business is in Memphis, to transport Ram's product by truck to various locations across the country. While engaged in a delivery for Ram in California, Ferguson suffered an injury. In November 1993 Ferguson filed a worker's compensation claim in the Shelby County Circuit Court, seeking benefits for that injury. In January 1994, Ram filed a motion to dismiss the case for lack of proper venue, arguing that because Five Star Express established that venue in worker's compensation cases is only proper in (1) the county in which the petitioner resides; or (2) the county in which the alleged accident occurred, venue was therefore not proper in Shelby County. Although the trial court acknowledged the holding of Five Star, and found that Ferguson was a resident of Alabama, that the accident had occurred in California, and that Ram was a Tennessee corporation it nevertheless denied the defendant's motion to dismiss. Ram applied to this Court, pursuant to Rule 9, Tenn.R.App.P., for permission to appeal from the trial court's ruling. We granted the application, and in June 1994 issued an order reversing, on the basis of Five Star, the trial court's ruling. Ferguson then filed a petition for rehearing, which we granted.

ANALYSIS

Because the resolution of this case depends in large part upon our recent decision in Five Star, we begin with a discussion of that case. In Five Star Ray Davis, a resident of Dyer County, Tennessee, was employed as a truck driver with Five Star Express (FSE), a Tennessee corporation whose principal place of business was in Nashville. Davis sustained a work-related injury in New York, and after FSE's worker's compensation insurance carrier had paid temporary total disability benefits to Davis, FSE filed a worker's compensation petition in the Davidson County Circuit Court, asking the court to declare its liability to Davis. The trial court dismissed the case for lack of proper venue, holding that because Davis was not servable with process in Davidson County, the action could not be maintained in that county. We granted FSE's application for permission to appeal to address the law of venue in worker's compensation cases, an area which had engendered considerable confusion among the bench and bar for several years. ¹

We began our analysis by noting the straightforward language in Tenn.Code Ann. § 50-6-225(c)(1), which provides, in pertinent part, that a worker's compensation petition may be filed in either "the county in which petitioner resides or in which the alleged accident happens ...". We also noted that one of the general venue statutes, Tenn.Code Ann. § 20-4-101(a), provides that "[i]n all civil actions of a transitory nature, unless venue is otherwise provided for, the action may be brought in the county where the cause of action arose or in the county where the defendant resides or is found" (emphasis added), thus clearly illustrating that the Legislature did not intend to limit venue of all transitory actions to the options set forth in § 20-4-101(a). Therefore, we indicated that a straightforward reading of the pertinent statutes would suggest that the trial court had erred in holding that venue was improper in Davidson County--the county of the petitioner's residence.

But we also acknowledged the accuracy of the trial court's reading of the pertinent cases: both this Court and the Court of Appeals had indeed held, on several occasions, that the defendant had to be servable with process in the county in which the action was filed to establish proper venue in worker's compensation actions--even though this requirement frequently had the effect of negating the first option in the worker's compensation venue statute. Thus, we were confronted with a conundrum: why did longstanding Tennessee caselaw impose a requirement in worker's compensation venue that often negated the explicit language of the controlling venue statute?

We found the answer to the puzzle in Chambers v. Sanford & Treadway, 154 Tenn. 134, 289 S.W. 533 (1926), the seminal decision in the area of worker's compensation venue. In Chambers this Court was confronted with the issue of whether an employee could bring a worker's compensation action in Washington County, the county in which in the employer-corporation maintained an office, when that county was neither the county of the employee's residence, nor the county where the accident occurred. ² Although the worker's compensation venue statute read exactly the same in 1926 as it does today, the Chambers court nevertheless held that venue was proper in Washington County.

The Chambers court reached this apparently anomalous result because of the existence of statutes that "localized" transitory actions to the county in which the defendant was servable with process. The court was particularly concerned with §§ 4516 and 4542 of the Shannon's Code, which effectively provided that a corporation could only be sued in counties in which it maintained an office or director. This general venue requirement was extremely problematic, because if the worker's compensation venue statute were strictly construed, and if an employer corporation had no office or director in either the county in which the plaintiff-petitioner resided or the county where the accident occurred, the plaintiff would be deprived of a forum in which to assert its rights under the worker's compensation law. The Chambers court sought to avoid this problem, and therefore it concluded that:

If the other statutes regulating venue forbid the service of process required to bring the employer before the court of the petitioner's residence, or before the court where the accident occurred, it would follow that the petitioner could go to the locality where the employer could be served with process, and where the rights assured under the Compensation Act could be adjudicated.

Chambers, 154 Tenn. at 139-140, 289 S.W. at 535.

Having identified the origins of the fusion of the worker's compensation venue statute and the general venue requirements, we sought in Five Star to illustrate that the rationale underlying Chambers was no longer valid. We first noted that the legislature had directly abrogated the Chambers rule in certain contexts by changing the venue and service of process rules applicable to worker's compensation insurance carriers and self-insured employers. More importantly, we pointed out that the rules of service of process with regard to corporations generally had been greatly liberalized, so that a plaintiff is now not limited to bringing an action in the county in which the corporation maintains an officer or director. Having illustrated the extent to which subsequent developments in the rules of service of process and venue had undermined the Chambers rule, we concluded that:

In view of the foregoing, it is clear that the Chambers rationale, which has consistently undergirded this Court's opinions on this issue for over sixty years, is no longer viable. While the principle of stare decisis demands that our prior cases not be overruled in an arbitrary or cavalier manner, that principle does not demand adherence to decisions that have become obsolete because of changes in the law or other legitimate considerations. Therefore, we now hold that venue in worker's compensation actions is to be determined solely by the worker's compensation venue statute--s 50-6-225(c)(1)--and any other authority indicating otherwise is hereby expressly overruled.

Five Star, 866 S.W.2d at 949-950 (emphasis added) (citations omitted).

In his petition to rehear, Ferguson does not dispute the soundness of the Five Star rationale. He concedes that the specific concerns which led the Chambers court to hold as it did are no longer viable and that...