Troester v. Sisters of Mercy Health Corp.

• Citation: 328 N.W.2d 308
• Decision Date: 22 December 1982
• Docket Number: No. 67000,67000
• Parties: Bernice TROESTER, Administrator of the Estate of Larry A. Troester, deceased, Appellant, v. SISTERS OF MERCY HEALTH CORPORATION a/k/a Mercy Health Center, a/k/a Mercy Medical Center a/k/a St. Joseph's Mercy Hospital of Dubuque a/k/a St. Joseph's Unit of Mercy Medical Center; Dubuque County, Iowa and Medical Associates, a partnership, Appellees.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

Page 308

328 N.W.2d 308

Bernice TROESTER, Administrator of the Estate of Larry A. Troester, deceased, Appellant, v. SISTERS OF MERCY HEALTH CORPORATION a/k/a Mercy Health Center, a/k/a Mercy Medical Center a/k/a St. Joseph's Mercy Hospital of Dubuque a/k/a St. Joseph's Unit of Mercy Medical Center; Dubuque County, Iowa and Medical Associates, a partnership, Appellees.

No. 67000.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Dec. 22, 1982.

Joseph P. Zwack, Dubuque, for appellant.

Alfred E. Hughes of Hughes, Trannel & Jacobs, Dubuque, for appellee Sisters of Mercy Health Corp.

Michael J. Coyle of Fuerste, Carew, Coyle, Juergens & Sudmeier, Dubuque, for appellee Dubuque County.

Robert M. Bertsch and Richard K. Whitty of O'Connor, Thomas, Hammer, Bertsch & Norby, Dubuque, for appellee Medical Associates.

Considered by REYNOLDSON, C.J., and HARRIS, LARSON, SCHULTZ, and CARTER, JJ.

SCHULTZ, Justice.

This appeal results from the trial court's sustension of defendants' motions to dismiss the wrongful death action that plaintiff, Bernice Troester, brought as administrator of the estate of her husband against Sisters of Mercy Health Corporation, Dubuque County, and Medical Associates. These motions were filed after the pleadings were completed, but before trial was to begin. They did not challenge deficiencies contained in the pleadings, but raised a question of subject matter jurisdiction based on postpleading events. We treat these identical motions as a single motion to dismiss and find it has no merit. Consequently, we reverse and remand for further proceedings.

Although plaintiff raises several issues, we need consider only a procedural question and a substantive matter. Plaintiff contends that the trial court erred procedurally by relying on matters beyond the pleadings in ruling on a prohibited "speaking motion." Plaintiff also contends that the court erred in ruling that when the decedent's estate was closed and the plaintiff discharged as administrator, plaintiff's authority to proceed with the wrongful death action terminated. Defendants argue that the closing of the estate and the discharge of the administrator terminated the trial court's subject matter jurisdiction over the wrongful death action. They further argue that they can raise, and the district court can rule upon, a question of subject matter jurisdiction at any time. We hold, as did the trial court, that when a question of capacity to sue is raised under an agreed set of facts, the court may consider these facts in deciding that question. We further conclude that the motion to dismiss should not have been granted; the mere closing of the estate and discharge of the administrator did not extinguish the cause of action for wrongful death.

On November 27, 1978, plaintiff brought a timely action for the wrongful death of the decedent. In their answers defendants admitted plaintiff was acting as administrator. The case was assigned for jury trial, but a few weeks before the trial was to begin the defendants filed a motion to dismiss. This motion alleged that decedent's estate had been closed and that plaintiff had been discharged as administrator. The defendants argued that the court no longer had subject matter jurisdiction over the wrongful death action, and that the action should be dismissed.

Plaintiff filed a resistance to this motion. She contended that decedent's estate had been reopened and that she had been reappointed as administrator pursuant to Iowa Code section 633.489 (1981). She attached to the resistance a copy of the court order from the probate proceedings. This order approved the application to reopen the estate and to reappoint plaintiff as administrator. Plaintiff also urged in the resistance that defendants' motion to dismiss was a prohibited speaking motion and that, at most, the proper remedy would be a substitution of the proper party in interest, rather than a dismissal of the cause of action.

The motion was set for hearing. Apparently, the district court heard the arguments of counsel; however, we have no record that evidence was produced or heard. The court did sustain the motion to dismiss, although it questioned the procedure by which the issue was presented. Nonetheless, it concluded "that in the interest of cost and time to the parties that it should be ruled on at this time."

Although the parties have raised matters subsequent to the court's ruling, we shall on this appeal consider only those motions and facts which were available to the trial court at the time it made its ruling. We will therefore confine our examination to the rulings on the speaking motion and the lack of subject matter jurisdiction.

I. "Speaking motion." A motion to dismiss is generally based on the claim that the pleader has failed to state a claim upon which any relief may be granted. Iowa R.Civ.P. 104(b). The thrust of the motion to dismiss is directed at the pleadings and, consequently, facts not contained in the pleadings will not be considered. Berger v. General United Group, Inc., 268 N.W.2d 630, 634 (Iowa 1978).

Plaintiff points out that the undisputed pleadings show she is the acting administrator and she argues that the court should have looked no further. She claims that despite our rule the district court considered the factual allegations of the motion to dismiss and the resistance, or else took judicial notice of the probate proceedings in decedent's estate. She contends that either of these actions constitutes reversible error.

Turning first to the matters contained in the probate file, we conclude that it was improper for the district court to consider or to take judicial notice of the records of the same court in a different proceeding, without an agreement of the parties. McCarthy v. McCarthy, 162 N.W.2d 444, 447 (Iowa 1968); Bales v. Iowa State Highway Commission, 249 Iowa 57, 63, 86 N.W.2d 244, 248 (1957). The parties have had no opportunity to present their respective positions through an evidentiary hearing on matters contained in the probate file. It is possible that some of these matters, such as the propriety or legality of either the closing or the reopening of the estate, could affect the outcome of this case. Whether consideration of the probate file is reversible error, however, depends on the sufficiency of other admissible facts before the court.

Both parties have admitted that subsequent to the pleadings decedent's estate was closed and then reopened. Thus, without agreeing to the legality of the acts, it is undisputed that the plaintiff was discharged as administrator by the court and was subsequently reappointed. We conclude that these undisputed facts were before the court and it was proper for the court to have considered them in ruling on the motion to dismiss. Moreover, these facts are relevant to the issue contained in the motion.

Although we do not decide whether the thrust of the motion was based on subject matter jurisdiction or on capacity to sue, we do conclude that the court may decide either issue at any time in an action when it has the necessary facts in the record before it. We have indicated that questions of subject matter jurisdiction may be raised at any time. In re Estate of Dull, 303 N.W.2d 402, 406 (Iowa 1981); Lloyd v. State, 251 N.W.2d 551, 556-57 (Iowa 1977); Green v. Sherman, 173 N.W.2d 843, 846 (Iowa 1970). We stated in Walles v. International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, 252 N.W.2d 701, 710 (Iowa 1977), that:

Every court has inherent power to determine whether it has jurisdiction over the subject matter of the proceedings before it. It makes no difference how the question comes to its attention. Once raised, the question must be disposed of, no matter in what manner of form or stage presented. The court on its own motion will examine grounds of its jurisdiction before proceeding further.

We have also indicated that it is proper to challenge a plaintiff's capacity to sue by a motion to dismiss based on facts that occurred subsequent to the filing of the petition. Dumbaugh v. Cascade Manufacturing Co., 264 N.W.2d 763, 765 (Iowa 1978).

These holdings are sensible and we find it reasonable to adopt procedures that will avoid the time and cost of a trial on the merits when either the trial court or a party lacks authority to proceed. We also suggest that, in those cases where evidence is required on these questions, it is a better practice to utilize in the pretrial stage of the case our summary judgment procedure. Iowa R.Civ.P. 237-240. In the present case the motion to dismiss is not directed at deficiencies in the pleadings pursuant to Iowa R.Civ.P. 104. Instead, it is founded on facts that arose after the pleadings had been filed. In this limited situation we find it reasonable to follow the lead of one commentator who suggests that, in motions to dismiss "where matters outside the pleadings are relied upon in support of the motion, the proper procedure is to treat the motion as one for summary judgment." A. Vestal & P. Willson, Iowa Practice § 1506(1) (1974).

We emphasize that our approval here of the reliance by the district court on admitted facts not contained in the pleadings has a narrow and limited application. We still do not approve of "speaking motions" directed to deficiencies in the pleadings. However, as capacity to sue became an issue subsequent to the pleadings and was raised in a motion to dismiss, we find that it was proper for the court to consider undisputed facts in ruling on the motion.

II. Capacity to sue. In sustaining the motion to dismiss, the district court concluded that the relief for wrongful death is vested exclusively in the personal representative of the estate of the deceased. It further determined that the representative must maintain a capacity to sue and, in this case, that the authority of the personal representative to proceed with this action terminated upon the closing of the estate. The court finally concluded that the cause of action...