Sanchez v. Lujan

MARTIN SANCHEZ, Individually and as Personal Representative for the ESTATE OFCLIFFORD SANCHEZ; PHIL SANCHEZ; and STEVEN SANCHEZ, Individually, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. JOSE LUJAN, Defendant-Appellee,andGILBERT SANCHEZ; ESSENTIA INSURANCE COMPANY;and HAGERTY INSURANCE AGENCY, LLC, Defendants,andCENTRAL MUTUAL INSURANCE COMPANY, Plaintiff-In-Intervention, v. JOSE LUJAN; GILBERT SANCHEZ; MARTIN SANCHEZ, Individually and as

the Personal Representative for the ESTATE OF CLIFFORD SANCHEZ;

PHIL SANCHEZ; and STEVEN SANCHEZ, Defendants.

No. A-1-CA-35721

COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO

August 22, 2019

This decision of the New Mexico Court of Appeals was not selected for publication in the New Mexico Appellate Reports. Refer to Rule 12-405 NMRA for restrictions on the citation of unpublished decisions. Electronic decisions may contain computer-generated errors or other deviations from the official version filed by the Court of Appeals.

APPEAL FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF TAOS COUNTY

Francis J. Mathew, District Judge

Atler Law Firm, P.C.

Timothy J. Atler

Albuquerque, NM

Cruz Law Office, LLC

Ernestina R. Cruz

Taos, NM

Sanchez Law Firm

Dennis T. Sanchez

Taos, NM

for Appellants

Allen, Shepherd, Lewis and Syra, P.A.

E.W. Shepherd

Courtney A. Schumacher

Tiffany A. Owens

Albuquerque, NM

for Appellee

MEMORANDUM OPINION

IVES, Judge.

{1} Plaintiffs Martin Sanchez, Phil Sanchez, and Steven Sanchez sued Defendant Jose Lujan for the wrongful death of Clifford Sanchez (Decedent) on a negligence theory. The district court granted Defendant's motion for summary judgment. On appeal, Plaintiffs argue that the district court erroneously entered summary judgment as a sanction. We reject this argument, concluding that the district court granted summary judgment on the merits. In the alternative, Plaintiffs argue that if the district court entered summary judgment on the merits, it erred in various ways, including by not giving Plaintiffs more time to respond to the summary judgment motion with the benefit of discovery.¹ We agree and reverse.

BACKGROUND

{2} Plaintiffs' claims against Defendant and others arose from a tragic hunting accident. Plaintiffs allege in their complaint that Defendant and Gilbert Sanchez (Gilbert) were using Defendant's pick-up truck to hunt for elk together. According to Plaintiffs' complaint, with Defendant behind the wheel, Gilbert spotted an elk, directed Defendant to stop, and either fired his gun from inside Defendant's truck or took a few steps from the truck before firing. Instead of shooting an elk, Gilbert shot Decedent, killing him.

{3} Less than four months after Plaintiffs filed their complaint, Defendant moved for summary judgment, relying exclusively on his own affidavit to establish the following facts, which he contended were undisputed. At the time of the incident that caused Decedent's death, Defendant did not possess a hunting permit, was not hunting, and did not intend to hunt. Defendant accompanied Gilbert solely to spend time with him because they were friends. Gilbert chose the route of travel throughout the excursion. While spotting elk, Gilbert would direct Defendant to stop the vehicle. At the time of the incident, Gilbert indicated to Defendant that he thought he had spotted an elk and directed Defendant to stop the vehicle. Gilbert left the vehicle and "disappeared from Defendant['s] sight into brush." When Gilbert shot Decedent, Defendant was inside his vehicle, unable to see or communicate with Gilbert. These facts, Defendant argued, entitled him to summary judgment as a matter of law because: (1) Defendant neither participated in nor facilitated the shooting of Decedent; (2) Defendant had no duty to control Gilbert; and (3) Defendant was not jointly and severally liable for Gilbert's actions because the two men did not share a common purpose. Based on these facts, Defendant argued that Plaintiffs' negligence claim failed because he owed no duty to the Decedent or Plaintiffs, and that Plaintiffs' vicarious liability theory failed as a matter of law.

{4} Rather than responding to Defendant's motion on its merits, Plaintiffs filed a separate motion pursuant to Rule 1-056(F) NMRA within the time prescribed for responding to a summary judgment motion. In their motion, Plaintiffs requested leave to conduct discovery regarding the factual assertions in Defendant's affidavit. Plaintiffs informed the district court that they needed to "tender written discovery" and "take depositions to more fully flesh out the facts at issue." They therefore asked the district court to "stay a ruling" on the summary judgment motion "until such time as the requested discovery is complete" and asked for "sufficient time" to file a response brief. In response to Plaintiffs' Rule 1-056(F) motion, Defendant explained that he did not oppose the motion "in principle" and indicated that he would not have opposed a request to depose Defendant and "allow limited written discovery" within a reasonable period of time, such as sixty days. Defendant stated, however, that an unlimited amount of time for discovery on the motion was neither appropriate nor warranted. The parties completed briefing on the Rule 1-056(F) motion on July 29, 2014.

{5} On October 21, 2014, Defendant filed a notice of completion of briefing on his summary judgment motion, indicating that Plaintiffs had not responded. On November 4, 2014, Plaintiffs served interrogatories and requests for production on Defendant through his counsel. Plaintiffs served additional requests for production on Defendant on December 18, 2014. Although Defendant did not respond to any of these discoveryrequests, Plaintiffs did not move to compel responses before the summary judgment hearing four months later.

{6} On April 16, 2015, the district court held a hearing on Defendant's motion for summary judgment. During the hearing, Defendant argued that Plaintiffs had not disputed the material facts in Defendant's summary judgment motion and that Plaintiffs had not cited any law to justify denying the motion. Defendant argued that Plaintiffs had had a reasonable time to complete discovery and that the court should grant the motion because there were no issues of material fact. For their part, Plaintiffs argued that they had responded to the motion for summary judgment by moving for discovery and additional time to file a response under Rule 1-056(F). Plaintiffs informed the court that they had served written discovery on Defendant, who had failed to respond, and that they wished to depose Defendant and Sanchez.

{7} The district court noted that Plaintiffs had not disputed the material facts in Defendant's motion by responding to the motion for summary judgment, and that nine months should have been enough time to complete the needed discovery. After further argument, the district court granted the motion, stating that Defendant "made a prima facie showing for purposes of summary judgment."

{8} Plaintiffs moved to reconsider, reiterating that the summary judgment motion was premature because discovery was necessary to properly respond to the motion on the merits and that Defendant had failed to respond to Plaintiffs' discovery requests. Plaintiffs argued that the court had granted the motion as a sanction for their failure to respond and suggested that a lesser sanction might be appropriate because they had responded to the motion by requesting discovery, rather than "outright ignor[ing]" it. They accordingly asked the court to reinstate the matter, enter a scheduling order setting a discovery deadline, and stay ruling on the summary judgment motion until the conclusion of all discovery, or at least until the completion of discovery pertinent to the summary judgment motion.

{9} At the hearing on Plaintiffs' motion, Defendant argued, among other things, that he had "made a prima facie showing of summary judgment." The court agreed: "Defendant made a prima facie case. The Plaintiff[s] failed to file a response[ or] take appropriate action for the purpose of pursuing discovery for purposes of the motion." The court denied the motion to reconsider. Plaintiffs appealed.

DISCUSSION

I. The District Court Did Not Enter Summary Judgment as a Sanction

{10} Plaintiffs argue that the district court incorrectly granted summary judgment for Defendant as a sanction for abusive litigation tactics. We disagree with Plaintiffs' interpretation of the district court's ruling. Viewing the district court's remarks about its rulings in light of our summary judgment jurisprudence and parlance, we conclude that the court granted Defendant's motion on the merits. Accordingly, we reject Plaintiffs'arguments that (1) the district court failed to consider the requisite factors for sanctions; (2) the court did not make findings of fact and conclusions of law sufficient to warrant dismissal without prejudice as a sanction; and (3) the facts did not warrant the severe sanction of dismissal with prejudice.

{11} Rule 1-056 governs summary judgment. Rule 1-056(B) provides: "A party against whom a claim, counterclaim or cross-claim is asserted or a declaratory judgment is sought may move with or without supporting affidavits for a summary judgment as to all or any part thereof." Rule 1-056(C) sets the standard for granting summary judgment on the merits:

The judgment sought shall be rendered forthwith if the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any, show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law.

"To obtain summary judgment, the moving party must meet an initial burden of establishing a prima facie case." Freeman v. Fairchild, 2018-NMSC-023, ¶ 16, 416 P.3d 264 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). The moving party makes a "prima facie case" or "prima facie showing" by establishing that "there is no dispute about the facts and that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter...