Corley v. Wyo. Rents

547 P.3d 333

2024 WY 51

James CORLEY, as Wrongful Death Personal Representative of Logan Corley, deceased, Appellant (Plaintiff),

v.WYOMING RENTS, LLC, Appellee (Defendant).

S-22-0291

Supreme Court of Wyoming.

May 2, 2024

Appeal from the District Court of Sheridan County, The Honorable Darci A.V. Phillips, Judge

Representing Appellant: Bernard Q. Phelan, Cheyenne, Wyoming.

Representing Appellee: Beau B. Bump, Cline, Williams, Wright, Johnson and, Oldfather, LLP, Fort Collins, Colorado.

Before FOX, C.J., and ^*KAUTZ, BOOMGAARDEN, GRAY, and CAUSEY, D.J.

CAUSEY, District Judge.

[¶1] Following the death of his son in a work-related accident, James Corley, as the appointed representative of his son’s beneficiaries, filed a wrongful death action against Wyoming Rents, LLC. At the time of the son’s death, the son was operating a manlift his employer had rented from Wyoming Rents, LLC. After Mr. Corley’s counsel missed several deadlines to file an amended complaint, continued to pursue claims against another party that the district court had dismissed from the action, and attempted to engage in discovery even though no amended complaint had been properly filed, among other things, the district court ultimately granted Wyoming Rents’ motion to dismiss the action with prejudice. Mr. Corley appealed, arguing a lesser sanction was more appropriate. Finding no abuse of discretion in the district court’s decision, we affirm.

ISSUE

[¶2] The sole issue on appeal, as rephrased by this Court, is whether the district court abused its discretion by involuntarily dismissing Mr. Corley’s wrongful death action with prejudice pursuant to Rule 41(b)(1) of the Wyoming Rules of Civil Procedure.

FACTS

[¶3] On December 18, 2020, Mr. Corley filed a wrongful death action against Wyoming Rents, LLC (Wyoming Rents), and Wyoming Machinery Company (WMC). In his two-page complaint, Mr. Corley—who had petitioned the court to become the wrongful death representative but had not yet been appointed—alleged that almost two years earlier his son, Logan Corley, was operating a manlift rented from Wyoming Rents to trim trees when the lift "fell as a result of a malfunction caused by the negligence of the defendants, killing the decedent." He claimed "[t]he defendant owed a duty of care to the plaintiff's decedent to provide to him machinery in good working order and free of defects" and that, as a result of defects in the machine "caused by defendants’ negligent maintenance or some other breach of duty of the care to be developed during discovery, the machine failed to operate properly and fell with the decedent strapped into the cage[.]" Mr. Corley also asserted the defendants were "strictly liable to the plaintiff's decedent."

[¶4] On February 16, 2021, before serving his original complaint, Mr. Corley filed his First Amended Complaint. In that amended complaint, Mr. Corley confirmed he had been appointed the wrongful death representative of Logan Corley. He also removed the prayer for relief found at the end of the original complaint, but the amendment did not otherwise change any substantive claim.

[¶5] After being served with the amended complaint, Wyoming Rents and WMC timely moved to dismiss it under Rule 12(b)(6) of the Wyoming Rules of Civil Procedure. They argued Mr. Corley had failed to state a wrongful death claim, failed to show any entitlement to relief against WMC in any way, improperly asserted a strict liability claim against Wyoming Rents as a rental company, failed to show the grounds for the district court’s jurisdiction over the matter, and failed to make a proper demand for relief. They asked the district court to dismiss the claims with prejudice.

[¶6] Additionally, Wyoming Rents filed a third-party complaint against Quality Hedge and Tree, Incorporated (Quality Hedge). Wyoming Rents claimed that Mr. Corley, as registered agent for Quality Hedge, signed the rental agreement for the manlift and that such agreement provided, among other things, the equipment would only be used by trained operators. Wyoming Rents asserted that Quality Hedge permitted its worker, Logan Corley, to operate the manlift without adequate training, which led to the young man’s death, and that Quality Hedge was required to indemnify Wyoming Rents per the terms of the rental agreement for any liability arising from that death.

[¶7] Over 30 days after filing and service of the motion to dismiss and third-party complaint, on April 27, 2021, Mr. Corley both responded to the motion and answered the third-party complaint. However, when Wyoming Rents filed its First Amended Third-Party Complaint against Quality Hedge on May 11, 2021, Mr. Corley did not answer or otherwise defend.

[¶8] The district court heard the motion to dismiss on May 21, 2021. On May 25, 2021, the court issued its Order Granting Motion to Dismiss In Part and Order Granting Leave to Amend. In that order, the court dismissed WMC as a party because there were no claims presented against it, dismissed Mr. Corley’s strict liability claim because there were no facts pled to support such liability, and dismissed the First Amended Complaint as a whole because of numerous deficiencies in the pleading, So as not to preclude the possibility of presenting a valid claim, the court granted Mr. Corley leave to file a second amended complaint within 15 days from the date of the court’s order, or in other words by June 9, 2021, provided that such complaint complied with the specific directives the court gave in its order.

[¶9] In spite of the district court’s directives, Mr. Corley did not file any revised amended complaint by June 9, 2021. Instead, he filed a Second Amended Complaint on June 14, and he served Wyoming Rents the same day. Although the court had dismissed WMC from the action without prejudice, Corley included WMC in the Second Amended Complaint’s caption and noted his claims were against "the defendants" throughout the pleading. He did not specify how WMC was involved in the claims as the court specifically directed, however.

[¶10] On June 28, 2021, Wyoming Rents moved to strike Mr. Corley’s Second Amended Complaint as untimely and improperly brought against WMC in violation of the court’s previous order. Again, the district court considered that and other motions—including Wyoming Rents’ application for entry of default for Mr. Corley’s failure to answer the First Amended Third-Party Complaint—during a hearing on September 1, 2021.

[¶11] On September 10, 2021, the district court issued its Order Granting Motion to Strike Second Amended Complaint and Order Granting Leave to Amend and Order Denying Motion to Set Aside Default. In the order, the court explained that Wyoming Rents had moved to strike the Second Amended Complaint "because it was untimely and did not comply with th[e] Court’s orders." In response to the motion, "[a]t the hearing, counsel for [Mr. Corley] did not offer any explanation for the untimely filing or failure to remove [the unsupported claims against WMC]." Accordingly, the court found it should grant Wyoming Rents’ motion to strike and "that [Mr. Corley] should be given one more chance to file an amended complaint." The court ordered "that [Mr. Corley] is granted leave to amend his complaint, and he shall file a third amended complaint within fifteen (15) days from the date of this order," or by September 25, 2021.

[¶12] Additionally, the court considered the question of default against Quality Hedge for failing to answer the amended third-party complaint. Mr. Corley’s counsel explained he failed to answer the First Amended Third-Party Complaint "because he was mistaken about the rules surrounding amendment of pleadings" which had been in place since a rule change on March 1, 2017. The district court found that Quality Hedge had "failed to show good cause or excusable neglect, and the motion to set aside the default should be denied."

[¶13] In spite of the court’s second order, Mr. Corley did not file an amended complaint by the deadline of September 25, 2021. Rather than wait for Mr. Corley or his counsel to belatedly file, on October 4, 2021, Wyoming Rents filed its W.R.C.P. 41(b) Motion to Dismiss, citing Mr. Corley’s failure to file any pleading by the district court’s deadline. In response to that motion, on Sunday, October 10, 2021, Mr. Corley’s counsel emailed Wyoming Rents’ counsel to request that Wyoming Rents "stipulate that the attached complaint may be late filed" because counsel "just did not see the time limitation on the Court’s Order." The complaint attached to the email in essence was the Second Amended Complaint that the district court had previously stricken for failure to comply with the court’s first order, with perhaps a few small changes. Wyoming Rents’ counsel responded the next day that Wyoming Rents would not stipulate to filing that complaint.

[¶14] In spite of opposing counsel’s response, Mr. Corley through counsel filed his Third Amended Complaint on October 15, 2021. This last iteration of the complaint removed WMC from the case caption but otherwise did not change any allegations against "the defendants." Mr. Corley then filed a motion for leave to file the Third Amended Complaint on October 18, 2021. In that motion, Mr. Corley’s counsel conceded "he did not see the time limitation placed in the order." Further, counsel wrote a letter, filed with the district court clerk on October 20, 2021, conceding he did not notice the time limitation in the Court’s Second Order until he received Wyoming Rents’ W.R.C.P. 41(b) Motion to Dismiss. Even so, counsel argued he did not believe he needed to seek leave of the court to belatedly file his Third-Amended Complaint because, "since leave was granted [previously by order of the district court to file an amended complaint by September 25, 2021], the defendant should file a motion to strike the pleading after being late filed if he feels there has been some prejudice to his client."

[¶15] As to be expected,...