Zadnik v. Ambinder

• Decision Date: 23 May 2023
• Docket Number: 803-2022
• Parties: THOMAS ZADNIK v. RICHARD F. AMBINDER, M.D., ET AL
• Court: Court of Special Appeals of Maryland

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THOMAS ZADNIK v. RICHARD F. AMBINDER, M.D., ET AL

No. 803-2022

Court of Special Appeals of Maryland^[**]

May 23, 2023

Circuit Court for Baltimore City Case No. 24-C-21-000851

Leahy Beachley, Moylan, Charles E., Jr. (Senior Judge, Specially Assigned), JJ. ^[*]

OPINION

Beachley, J. Appellant Thomas Zadnik filed a wrongful death action in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City against appellees Dr. Richard F. Ambinder and Johns Hopkins Medicine. In his complaint, Mr. Zadnik alleged that the decedent, Margaret Conway, was his wife under Pennsylvania common law. Dr. Ambinder filed a motion to dismiss and/or for summary judgment, alleging that Mr. Zadnik did not have standing to bring a wrongful death action because he and Ms. Conway were not legally married. The court dismissed the complaint for lack of standing, concluding that Mr. Zadnik did not present sufficient evidence to generate a genuine issue of material fact as to his purported common law marriage. ^[1] Mr. Zadnik appeals, and presents two questions for our review,^[2] which we have consolidated and rephrased as:

Did the circuit court err in dismissing the case for lack of standing? For the reasons that follow, we reverse the judgment of the circuit court.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND^[3]

Ms. Conway died on April 12, 2017, due to colon cancer. In February 2021, Mr. Zadnik filed a wrongful death complaint against Dr. Ambinder and Johns Hopkins Medicine, Dr. Ambinder's employer. The complaint alleged that Dr. Ambinder, who treated Ms. Conway from October 2010 to April 2013, committed medical negligence in his treatment of Ms. Conway. Integral to this appeal, Mr. Zadnik also alleged that he and Ms. Conway were married.

Dr. Ambinder filed a motion to dismiss and/or for summary judgment based on lack of standing. A Maryland wrongful death action may generally only be brought by a spouse, child, or parent of the decedent. Md. Code (1974, Repl. Vol. 2020), § 3-904(a)(1) of the Courts and Judicial Proceedings Article ("CJP"). Dr. Ambinder argued that because Mr. Zadnik was not married to Ms. Conway, he lacked standing to bring a wrongful death action.

Nearly two hundred pages of documents were attached to Dr. Ambinder's motion, including medical documents, newspaper articles, affidavits, and deposition transcripts. Mr. Zadnik's Response to Requests for Admissions and Answers to Interrogatories were also attached to the motion. In both of these discovery responses, Mr. Zadnik asserts that he and Ms. Conway exchanged vows privately in their home in Pennsylvania, and became common law spouses under Pennsylvania law. In his Answers to Interrogatories, Mr. Zadnik provided a detailed description of the private ceremony:

On July 3, 1998, . . . Ms. Conway said to Mr. Zadnik, let's get married. Mr. Zadnik responded that they could not get married because they were both divorced Catholics. She told Mr. Zadnik that Pennsylvania has common law marriage. He told her that he wanted to be married. She told him to repeat after me, and she said:

I, Margaret Ann Conway, take thee, Thomas John Zadnik, as my husband.

Mr. Zadnik then said:

I, Thomas John Zadnik, take thee, Margaret Ann Conway, as my wife.

Then Margaret said, "We are married."

However, Mr. Zadnik admitted in his Response to Requests for Admissions and at deposition that he and Ms. Conway did not tell most of their friends, family, and neighbors about the marriage, nor did they identify themselves as married in any tax documents.

Dr. Ambinder also attached to his motion numerous medical reports that identified Ms. Conway's marital status as "divorced," and her death certificate, which likewise characterized her marital status as "divorced." However, several summaries of Ms. Conway's appointments dictated by her doctors include references to Mr. Zadnik as her "husband" (e.g., "She comes in accompanied by her husband."). Affidavits from three of Ms. Conway's sisters indicate that they were unaware of the purported marriage, and a sister who served as the executrix of Ms. Conway's estate confirmed that Mr. Zadnik never made a claim against the estate. Ms. Conway's obituary described Mr. Zadnik as her "life partner." Two newspaper articles were attached to the motion, one from 2010, which described Ms. Conway as Mr. Zadnik's "wife," and the other from 2012, which described Ms. Conway as his "partner." The deed to the house Mr. Zadnik and Ms. Conway owned together was titled as a joint tenancy with right of survivorship.

Attached to Mr. Zadnik's response to Dr. Ambinder's motion was an affidavit from Mr. Zadnik, wherein he described the highlights of his relationship with Ms. Conway, including his recounting of the private marriage ceremony. Mr. Zadnik also attached to his response an additional summary of a doctor's appointment wherein the doctor refers to Mr. Zadnik as Ms. Conway's spouse.

After a hearing on May 2, 2022, the circuit court granted Dr. Ambinder's motion to dismiss, providing the following analysis from the bench:

If Mr. Zadnik had to establish both recognition generally in the community as to the couple holding themselves out to the public as husband and wife, if he did, to the extent he does today, the evidence before the [c]ourt, in that regard, is I -- to be very clear and candid, is insufficient.

Moreover, the purported wedding ceremony was one which was witnessed by no one and to which the other purported party is deceased and, obviously, had not previously to having become deceased, offered any documentary evidence in the form of any sworn statement attesting to her belief that (indiscernible[]) "ceremony" was her wedding ceremony to Mr. Zadnik.

Moreover, Mr. Zadnik was, from the evidence, the only other person in the room when the purported common law wedding ceremony occurred. There was no officiant.

Perhaps I said that too quickly. Let me repeat that. There was no officiant. There were no other witnesses; whether they be follow [sic] employees of either Mr. Zadnik or Ms. [Conway]; no neighbors; no friends; no siblings of Ms. [Conway]; no anyone.

While it is clear to the [c]ourt that Mr. Zadnik has established that the parties lived together and cohabited, that is not tantamount to meeting the heavy burden, by clear and convincing evidence, required to establish the existence of a common law marriage.

The court then noted that the house Mr. Zadnik and Ms. Conway owned together was titled as joint tenants and not as tenants by the entirety. The court continued:

Mr. Zadnik argues that there is evidence of [an exchange of words indicating a present intent to be married,] but there is evidence of the intent by only one of the parties to the marriage and the question is whether . . . the testimony of one party alone is insufficient to confirm the existence of a valid and lawful marriage.

[Mr. Zadnik] argues, and quite correctly, with regard to other cases, unrelated to this case, that it could be determined based upon an even higher burden of proof based upon one eyewitness and [Mr. Zadnik] argues, as an example, a criminal case where the State's burden of proof is to prove that the named defendant committed each and every different single legal element of the offense or offenses charged beyond a reasonable doubt to a moral certainty and [Mr. Zadnik] argues that (indiscernible[)] have resulted based upon lone eyewitness testimony in that regard.

And that is so and that is undisputed.

The issue here is, however, whether understanding that as the evidence itself suggests that Mr. Zadnik and Ms. [Conway] cohabited for a period of years in Pennsylvania, whether, in doing so, they held themselves out to the public, generally, as husband and wife.

And, on the record, as it presently exists, there definitely is insufficient evidence to establish that . . . Mr. Zadnik and Ms. [Conway] held themselves out to the public as husband and wife.

In the view of the [c]ourt, there is no genuine, based on the evidence before the [c]ourt now, there is no genuine dispute of a material fact with regard to the existence of a common law marriage that were (indiscernible[)] existed [which would] give Mr. Zadnik standing to sue here.

After some discussion about whether the dismissal should be with or without prejudice, the court concluded that it had "no alternative but under the law to dismiss the case with prejudice." The court explained that it was dismissing the case rather than granting summary judgment because "standing is a threshold issue in every case," and "on the evidence before the [c]ourt that standing is not established." The written order, entered on May 4, 2022, dismissed the complaint as to both Dr. Ambinder and Johns Hopkins Medicine.

Mr. Zadnik filed a motion for reconsideration on May 16, 2022, which the court denied on June 13, 2022. Mr. Zadnik then noted this appeal.^[4]

DISCUSSION

Mr. Zadnik's Testimony Was Sufficient Evidence of Common Law Marriage for Purposes of Summary Judgment

A. Standard of Review

Because the court dismissed the complaint after reviewing material outside of the pleadings, we must first determine the appropriate standard of review. Rule 2-322(c) provides:

If, on a motion to dismiss for failure of the pleading 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 and disposed of as provided in Rule 2-501, and all parties shall be given reasonable opportunity to present all material made pertinent to such a motion by Rule 2-501.

Here the motion to dismiss was based on Mr. Zadnik's lack of standing to file a wrongful death action. Both this Court and the Supreme Court of Maryland^[5] have relied on the language of ...