Reeves v. Travelers Ins. Companies

• Decision Date: 15 October 1980
• Citation: 421 A.2d 47
• Court: Maine Supreme Court
• Parties: Shirley H. REEVES v. TRAVELERS INSURANCE COMPANIES et al.

Page 47

421 A.2d 47

Shirley H. REEVES v. TRAVELERS INSURANCE COMPANIES et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Argued Sept. 15, 1980.

Decided Oct. 15, 1980.

Abbott J. Reeves (orally), Old Orchard Beach, for plaintiff.

Preti, Flaherty & Beliveau, Jonathan S. Piper (orally), John Flaherty, Portland, for Travelers Ins. Companies.

Hunt, Thompson & Bowie, James M. Bowie (orally), Portland, for Lloyd's, London, England, Jefferson Ins. Co. and American Home Assurance Co.

Before McKUSICK, C. J., and WERNICK, GODFREY, NICHOLS and ROBERTS, JJ.

McKUSICK, Chief Justice.

Plaintiff Shirley H. Reeves ¹ appeals from the Superior Court's dismissal with prejudice of her action against four insurance companies because of her failure to comply with a pretrial order, M.R.Civ.P. 16(d). ² We find that the Superior Court acted well within the scope of its permissible discretion, and accordingly we deny the appeal.

The complaint, filed on August 1, 1975, alleging the existence of an insurance contract between plaintiff Reeves and the four defendant insurers, ³ sought to recover for damage to rental real estate at Old Orchard Beach allegedly suffered in a windstorm in May or June, 1975. As later amended, the complaint claimed damages for repair, replacement, materials, and labor in the amount of $1,940 and for loss of earnings and rent in the amount of $1,175.

On June 15, 1979, the Superior Court on its own motion dismissed the action under the two-year rule of M.R.Civ.P. 41(b)(1). At that time the docket showed no entry more recent than November 1, 1976.

On June 23, 1979, a different justice of the Superior Court, pursuant to M.R.Civ.P. 60(b), granted plaintiff's motion for relief from the Rule 41(b)(1) dismissal of June 15, 1979, and at the same time denied defendants' Rule 41(b) (2) motion to dismiss for want of prosecution and ordered that the case be brought to trial "as swiftly as practicable."

A pretrial conference before a third Superior Court justice was held on September 4, 1979. His pretrial order expressly stated that the case was not to be set on the jury trial list "until after documentation and amended pretrial memos as below. Plaintiff to supply Defendants with copies of bills within 90 days (plus some testimonial augmentations and expansions)." (Emphasis added)

Neither plaintiff nor her counsel did anything whatever to comply with the September 4, 1979, pretrial order. After a hearing held on February 7, 1980, a fourth Superior Court justice dismissed plaintiff's action with prejudice pursuant to M.R.Civ.P. 16(d). The justice found

that compliance with order of pretrial has not been had and failure thereof is not the result of excusable neglect when viewed in the light of the history of this case and upon assertion by plaintiff that "documentation" as ordered by the court is not known as to availability and may be determined only by discovery should defendants so wish to pursue that course ....

That dismissal is now before us on appeal.

The purpose of the pretrial conference is "to make the other procedures of the rules effective tools in the preparation for efficient and speedy trial of the case." 1 Field, McKusick and Wroth, Maine Civil Practice § 16.1 at 317 (2d ed. 1970). To achieve that purpose, counsel must be prepared for the pretrial conference and must act diligently to meet the obligations that result from it. Because judicial economy is such an important goal of the pretrial conference, M.R.Civ.P. 16(d) confirms the inherent power of the court "to enforce the provisions of the rule aimed at making pretrial procedure effective, including not only appearance at the conference, but also the basic requirements of the memorandum and preparation for the conference." Id., § 16.6 at 328.

Although in this case the Superior Court rested its decision to dismiss plaintiff's case with prejudice on M.R.Civ.P. 16(d), it was imposing a sanction for noncompliance with a discovery order, and its action may equally find support in M.R.Civ.P. 37(b)(2). ⁴ The discovery rules (M.R.Civ.P. 26 through 37) are informed by a philosophy of litigation similar to that governing the pretrial conference. "(P)rior to trial every party to a civil action is entitled to the disclosure of all relevant information in the possession of any person, unless the information is privileged." 8 Wright & Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2001 at 15 (1970). It is the purpose of both the discovery rules and the pretrial conference to eliminate the sporting theory of justice, Tiedman v. American Pigment Corp., 253 F.2d 803, 808 (4th Cir. 1958), and to enforce full disclosure. Meaningful pretrial conferences and liberal discovery are two of the principal devices available to effectuate the purpose of the Maine Rules of Civil Procedure "to secure the just, speedy and inexpensive determination of every action." See M.R.Civ.P. 1. Conduct of counsel or his client that frustrates the beneficent purposes of Rule 16 and of discovery orders must be appropriately penalized.

An appellate court reviews the propriety of a sanction under M.R.Civ.P. 16(d) or 37(b)(2) by an "abuse of discretion" standard. Thus, the Superior Court's dismissal of the present action must stand unless an abuse of discretion is shown or there is an error of law. Lerman v. Inhabitants of City of Portland, Me., 406 A.2d 903, 904 (1979). In the language of the United States Supreme Court, with appropriate adaptation, "(t)he question, of course, is not whether (the Law) Court ... would as an original matter have dismissed the action; it is whether the (Superior) Court abused its discretion in so doing." National Hockey League v. Met. Hockey Club, 427 U.S. 639, 642, 96 S.Ct. 2778, 2780, 49 L.Ed.2d 747 (1975).

In exercising its discretion under Rule 16(d) or 37(b)(2), the trial court must answer three questions: (1) whether to impose a sanction; (2) upon whom-party or counsel or both-to impose the sanction; and (3) what sanction to impose. The answers to those questions depend upon the circumstances of the particular case, viewed in the light of the functions intended to be served by sanctions. In addition to penalizing noncompliance with a court order and trying to remedy the effect of the noncompliance by compensating the innocent party for the costs incurred therefrom or by extracting compliance from the recalcitrant party, the sanction selected should also serve as a deterrent to similar conduct by the same offender or others. See Note, "The Emerging Deterrence Orientation in the Imposition of Discovery Sanctions," 91 Harv.L.Rev. 1033, 1034 (1978). The ultimate goal of any pretrial sanction is to promote fair and efficient litigation, both in the pending case and in the court system generally. Faced with the increasingly heavy demands upon limited judicial resources, all courts are more conscious than ever of the necessity for strict enforcement of their procedural orders. Id. at 1055. An appellate court will not lightly overrule a trial court's judgmental choice of an appropriate sanction under Rule 16(d) or 37(b)(2).

On the facts now before us, the February, 1980, dismissal clearly did not represent any abuse of discretion. On appeal, plaintiff's counsel does not question the Superior Court's statement of fact that counsel asserted at the February, 1980, hearing that he, even at that late date, did not know whether there existed documentation such as had been ordered to be...