Hoblyn v. Johnson

• Decision Date: 09 October 2002
• Docket Number: No. 01-169.,01-169.
• Citation: 55 P.3d 1219,2002 WY 152
• Parties: Gary HOBLYN and Michelle Hoblyn, Appellants (Plaintiffs), v. Margurette JOHNSON, Chuck Johnson, Matthew Wayne Davis, Loucin Port Davis, Officer Crumpton, Greg Bybee, Ken Peterson, the Laramie County Sheriff's Department and the State of Wyoming, Appellees (Defendants).
• Court: Wyoming Supreme Court

55 P.3d 1219

2002 WY 152

Gary HOBLYN and Michelle Hoblyn, Appellants (Plaintiffs), v. Margurette JOHNSON, Chuck Johnson, Matthew Wayne Davis, Loucin Port Davis, Officer Crumpton, Greg Bybee, Ken Peterson, the Laramie County Sheriff's Department and the State of Wyoming, Appellees (Defendants).

No. 01-169.

Supreme Court of Wyoming.

October 9, 2002.

Rehearing Denied November 5, 2002.

Bernard Q. Phelan of Phelan-Watson Law Office, Cheyenne, Wyoming, Representing Appellants.

Misha E. Westby and Ryan T. Schelhaas of Hirst & Applegate, P.C., Cheyenne, Wyoming, Representing Appellees Johnson.

Curtis B. Buchhammer and Loretta R. Green of Buchhammer & Kehl, P.C., Cheyenne, Wyoming, Representing Appellees Davis.

Hoke MacMillan, Attorney General; John W. Renneisen, Deputy Attorney General; and John D. Rossetti, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Representing Appellees Crumpton, Bybee, and State of Wyoming.

Before HILL, C.J., and GOLDEN, LEHMAN,¹ KITE, and VOIGT, JJ.

KITE, Justice.

[¶ 1] The teenage daughter of Appellants Gary and Michelle Hoblyn (the parents) accused her father of abuse. While the charges were being investigated, the parents took the daughter to stay temporarily with her grandparents in Nebraska but would not permit her to take her horse. The daughter undertook efforts, with the assistance of a state brand inspector, to obtain possession of her horse. Though the father was later found not guilty of abuse, the daughter did not return home. The parents sued the grandparents, the neighbors, the brand inspector, the Laramie County sheriff's department, and others for various conspiracy and individual claims including tortious interference with the parent-child relationship, deprivation of constitutional rights under color of state law, intentional infliction of emotional distress, larceny, trespass, harassment, and defamation. The district court dismissed the tortuous interference claim against the grandparents for lack of jurisdiction, and it dismissed the remainder of the claims by summary judgment. We affirm.

ISSUES

[¶ 2] We rephrase the issues as follows:

I. Under the facts of this case, should Wyoming adopt the cause of action for intentional interference with the parental relationship?

II. Did the district court err in granting the grandparents' motion to dismiss the parents' claim of intentional interference with the parental relationship for lack of in personam jurisdiction?

III. Did the state brand inspector, assisted by deputies of the Laramie County sheriff's department, violate the parents' Fourth Amendment rights by entering their property without a warrant to inspect and transfer the daughter's horse to a new owner?

IV. Must a person seek psychological care or submit expert testimony to prove severe emotional distress?

V. May a tort action be premised on statutory criminal larceny?

VI. In Wyoming, is a civil action for harassment provided by statute?

VII. How is the jurisdictional amount in controversy to be determined?

VIII. Was the neighbor's comment, reported by the newspaper, that the parents were "not nice people" sufficient by itself to establish a prima facie case of defamation?

FACTS

[¶ 3] Pursuant to our standard of review for summary judgments, we consider the facts from the vantage point most favorable to the parents, as the party opposing the motions, awarding them all the favorable inferences which may be drawn from those facts. S & G Investors, LLC v. Blackley, 994 P.2d 941, 943 (Wyo.2000).

[¶ 4] In October 1998, the sixteen-year-old daughter accused her father of physical abuse. The Department of Family Services (DFS) suggested a "cooling off" period, and the parents took the daughter from Cheyenne to North Platte, Nebraska, to stay approximately one month with her paternal grandmother, Margurette Johnson, and step-grandfather, Chuck Johnson (the grandparents). The grandmother asked the parents to allow the daughter to have her horse while she stayed in Nebraska. They refused though the daughter was the horse's legal owner. The daughter contacted Matthew Davis, her neighbor from Cheyenne, for advice. Mr. Davis spoke with Greg Bybee, a state brand inspector, who apparently later contacted the daughter. On November 13, 1998, the grandparents drove the daughter to a truck stop near Burns, Wyoming, so she could meet with the brand inspector. Although the grandparents and Mr. Davis and his wife (the neighbors) were present at the truck stop, the daughter met with the brand inspector alone at a separate table. During the meeting, the daughter signed papers transferring ownership of her horse to Ken Peterson.

[¶ 5] At seven o'clock the next morning, the brand inspector and Deputies Fanning and Crumpton from the Laramie County sheriff's department went to the parents' Cheyenne home. The brand inspector had requested assistance from the sheriff's department, and the deputies were sent in response. Mr. Peterson also went to the parents' home with a pickup truck and a horse trailer. While everyone else waited on the county road off the property, Deputy Fanning knocked on the front door of the residence. No one answered, and Deputy Fanning joined the others on the county road to wait and see if anyone would appear. After approximately twenty to thirty minutes, the brand inspector entered the property from behind the residence and went to a fenced area with some outbuildings. He opened a wire gate, entered an enclosure, and identified a horse he found there as being the same horse the daughter had transferred to Mr. Peterson the night before. The brand inspector led the horse off the property and loaded it into the horse trailer, and Mr. Peterson drove away. Later that day, the brand inspector met Mr. Peterson at a welding shop and completed the paperwork transferring ownership of the horse back to the daughter. The neighbors then took the horse to the daughter in Nebraska.

[¶ 6] The father was criminally charged for allegedly hitting the daughter and found not guilty after a March 1999 jury trial.² The neighbors kept in contact with the daughter and grandparents through personal visits, letters, and telephone calls. The grandparents brought the daughter to Cheyenne on several occasions to visit the neighbors and did not advise the parents. The daughter bought a truck from the neighbors, and the grandparents helped her purchase a horse trailer.

[¶ 7] The grandparents started temporary guardianship proceedings in Nebraska as required by the school district where the daughter was enrolled. The parents reportedly did not show up at the hearing, and the matter was not pursued further.

[¶ 8] At the time of the father's trial, the mother gave the daughter a necklace as a birthday gift which the daughter returned to her after the trial. A short time later, the grandmother and the daughter obtained protective orders from the District Court of Lincoln County, Nebraska to preclude all contact by the parents. Instead of returning home, the daughter remained with her grandparents, completed high school, and obtained a job as a horse trainer.

[¶ 9] From the record, it appears the parents never reported the daughter's horse was stolen nor made any larceny or trespass complaints. Further, they filed no legal action in either Nebraska or Wyoming to regain custody of their daughter from the grandparents, nor did they appear in the Nebraska district court to contest the protective orders.

[¶ 10] In January 2000, the parents filed a civil complaint, subsequently amended, alleging various causes of action against the grandparents, the neighbors, Deputy Crumpton, the brand inspector, Ken Peterson, and the Laramie County sheriff's department. The combined damages were alleged to be "in excess of $500,000.00 plus punitive damages in an amount sufficient to deter the defendants and others."³ The parents appeal the district court's order by which all the causes of action were dismissed.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

[¶ 11]

The standard of review applied by this Court in reviewing the granting of summary judgment is well-settled. "When a motion for summary judgment is before the supreme court, we have exactly the same duty as the district judge; and, if there is a complete record before us, we have exactly the same material as did he. We must follow the same standards. The propriety of granting a motion for summary judgment depends upon the correctness of a court's dual findings that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the prevailing party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. This court looks at the record from the viewpoint most favorable to the party opposing the motion, giving to him all favorable inferences to be drawn from the facts contained in affidavits, depositions and other proper material appearing in the record. We separate the formal and pretended from the genuine and substantial so only the latter may be considered in eliminating the burden of a formal trial if only questions of law are left to decide; there must be no issue of material fact to decide. A material fact, expressed in various ways, is one having legal significance which would in a given case control the legal relations of the parties; one upon which the outcome of the litigation depends in whole or in part; one on which the controversy may be determined; one which will affect the result or outcome of the case depending upon its resolution; or one which constitutes a part of the plaintiff's cause of action or the defendant's defense. Summary judgment affords an opportunity for prompt disposition of a lawsuit in its early stages, permitting an end to unfounded claims and avoiding the expense of a full-fledged trial to both litigants and the state's judicial machinery." Reno Livestock Corp. v. Sun Oil Co. (Delaware), 638 P.2d 147, 150-51 (Wyo.1981) [(citations omitted)].

McLean v. Hyland Enterprises, Inc., 2001 WY 111, ¶ 14, 34 P.3d 1262, ¶ 14 (Wyo.2001). If we can uphold summary judgment on the...