Case Title: Andrew Baugus et al. v. City of Florence, Alabama

Citation: 

Docket Number: 1051593

State: alabama

Court: Alabama Supreme Court

Date: 2007-01-12T00:00:00Z

Document:
REL: 01/12/07 Baugus v. City of Florence
Notice: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the advance
sheets of Southern Reporter.  Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions,
Alabama Appellate Courts, 300 Dexter Avenue, Montgomery, Alabama 36104-3741 ((334)
242-4621), of any typographical or other errors, in order that corrections may be made
before the opinion is printed in Southern Reporter.
SUPREME COURT OF ALABAMA
 OCTOBER TERM, 2006-2007
_________________________
1051593
_________________________
Andrew Baugus et al.
v.
City of Florence
Appeal from Lauderdale Circuit Court
(CV-03-30)
LYONS, Justice.
Andrew Baugus and other landowners appeal from a summary
judgment entered in favor of the City of Florence ("the City")
in the Lauderdale Circuit Court. We remand the case to the
1051593
2
trial court for further proceedings because the judgment
appealed from is not a final judgment. 
I. Facts and Procedural Background
The City operated and maintained a sanitary landfill in
Florence. The landfill abuts and/or includes portions of
Baugus's property, as well as the property of 12 other named
plaintiffs in the case (collectively referred to as "the
residents"). The Alabama Department of Public Health initially
issued a permit for the operation of the landfill, but the
City later operated the landfill pursuant to a permit issued
by the Alabama Department of Environmental Management. The
City claims that the landfill was closed in 1988 and that it
has not disposed of garbage there since that time. The
residents contend that the City was still dumping waste at the
landfill as late as 2005.
The City continues to maintain the landfill in what it
calls a "post-closure care monitoring period." The City
concedes that when depressions in the soil appear, it dumps
"clean fill," or unregulated inorganic solid waste, in those
depressions. The City also has been monitoring the perimeter
of the landfill site for the presence of methane gas since
1051593
3
1991.  This monitoring entails the installation of monitoring
wells, which are two-inch diameter PVC pipe buried six feet
into the ground, in the property at the perimeter of the
landfill. The residents claim that the methane gas generated
by the landfill migrates onto their properties and creates the
possibility of explosion when present in high quantities. The
residents have produced evidence indicating that methane gas
has been detected on their properties as late as 2005,
sometimes at explosive levels.
The residents sued the City, stating a nuisance claim and
an "unlawful-taking" claim. The City filed a motion to dismiss
or for a more definite statement, and the residents filed a
first 
amended 
complaint, 
restating 
the 
"unlawful-taking" 
claim
as an inverse-condemnation claim. The City filed an answer to
the first amended complaint, setting forth its affirmative
defenses. The City then filed a motion for a summary judgment
on the grounds that the claims listed in the first amended
complaint were barred by the statute of limitations and, in
the alternative, even if the claims were not barred by the
statute of limitations that the residents failed to present
sufficient evidence to support those claims. After the City
1051593
4
filed its summary-judgment motion, the residents filed a
second 
amended 
complaint, which added claims alleging
trespass, 
continuing 
trespass, 
strict 
liability, 
and
negligence. The City filed a motion to strike the second
amended complaint on the ground that it was filed three days
after the date the court had set as the deadline for
dispositive motions. The City never filed an answer to the
second amended complaint, nor did it amend its summary-
judgment motion to include the four additional claims asserted
in the second amended complaint. The court never ruled on the
City's motion to strike, but, after a hearing at which an
untranscribed oral argument took place, the court entered a
summary judgment in favor of the City. 
II. Nonfinal Judgment
An appeal will not lie from a nonfinal judgment.
Robinson v. Computer Servicenters, Inc., 360 So. 2d 299, 302
(Ala. 1978).  "A ruling that disposes of fewer than all claims
or relates to fewer than all parties in an action is generally
not final as to any of the parties or any of the claims. See
Rule 54(b), Ala. R. Civ. P." Wilson v. Wilson, 736 So. 2d 633,
634 (Ala. Civ. App. 1999). The absence of a final judgment is
1051593
5
a jurisdictional defect that cannot be waived by the parties.
McGowin Inv. Co. v. Johnstone, 291 Ala. 714, 715, 287 So. 2d
835, 836 (1973).  When an action involves multiple claims or
parties, Rule 54(b), Ala. R. Civ. P., gives the trial court
the discretion to "direct the entry of a final judgment as to
one or more but fewer than all of the claims or parties." If
a trial court certifies a judgment as final pursuant to Rule
54(b), an appeal will generally lie from that judgment. 
Neither 
the 
City 
nor 
the 
residents 
moved 
for
certification under Rule 54(b).   However, "if it is clear and
obvious from the language used by the trial court in its order
that the court intended to enter a final order pursuant to
Rule 54(b), then we will treat the order as a final judgment
...." Schneider Nat'l Carriers, Inc. v. Tinney, 776 So. 2d
753, 755 (Ala. 2000) (summarizing the holding in Sho-Me Motor
Lodges, Inc. v. Jehle-Slauson Constr. Co., 466 So. 2d 83, 87
(Ala. 1985)). In Sho-Me Motor Lodges, the trial court's order
clearly indicated that the court intended to enter an order
pursuant to Rule 54(b) because the order, clearly quoting Rule
54(b), stated: "'The Court further finds there is no just
reason for delay in the entry of said final judgment.'" 466
1051593
6
So. 2d at 87.  And in Schneider National Carriers, Inc., we
recognized the existence of a Rule 54(b) certification based
on the fact that the trial court specifically cited Rule
54(b).  
In the instant case, however, the trial court's summary-
judgment order states that "[i]t appears from the record that
there are no disputed issues of material fact and that the
defendant is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law."  The
order neither mentions Rule 54(b) nor does it quote Rule
54(b). Accordingly, we cannot say that the trial court clearly
intended to certify its order as final under Rule 54(b), nor
can we overlook the absence of a final judgment, a matter
affecting this Court's jurisdiction.  
Further, although the trial court's summary-judgment
order in favor of the City, on its face, appeared to dismiss
all claims in favor of the City, the City's motion for a
summary judgment moved only for a summary judgment on the
nuisance 
claim 
and 
the 
inverse-condemnation 
claim.
Consequently, only those claims were properly before the trial
court on the summary-judgment motion. See Robinson v. JMIC
Life Ins. Co., 697 So. 2d 461, 461 (Ala. 1997) ("At the
1051593
The City notes in its brief to this Court that its motion
1
to strike the second amended complaint remains outstanding,
with no ruling from the trial court.
7
outset, we note that the trial court's judgments adjudicated
all of Robinson's claims. This was error, because the
defendants had sought summary judgments only as to the
fraudulent suppression claim."). See also Parr v. Goodyear
Tire & Rubber Co., 641 So. 2d 769, 772 (Ala. 1994); Henson v.
Mobile Infirmary Ass'n, 646 So. 2d 559, 562 (Ala. 1994);
Sexton v. St. Clair Fed. Sav. Bank, 653 So. 2d 959, 962 (Ala.
1995); and Bibbs v. MedCenter Inns of Alabama, Inc., 669 So.
2d 143, 144 (Ala. 1995).
The City never completely abandoned its motion to strike
before the trial court or before this Court.  When the
1
residents discussed the additional claims from the second
amended complaint in their response to the City's motion for
a summary judgment, the City stated in a footnote to its brief
in reply that it 
"has 
filed 
a 
separate 
motion 
to 
strike 
the
plaintiffs' Second Amended Complaint, which the
plaintiffs filed ... two weeks after the City filed
its summary judgment motion. In the event that the
Court allow the plaintiffs' amendment, the City
requests an opportunity to present evidence and
argument in support of summary judgment as the
additional 
claims 
in 
the 
plaintiffs' 
belated
1051593
8
pleadings. This memorandum addresses only the claims
made the subject of the City's Motion for Summary
Judgment."   
As indicated by the footnote, the City intended to preserve
its motion to strike as to the negligence, trespass,
continuing trespass, and strict-liability claims.  We treat
this footnote as sufficient indication that the City had not
waived at this juncture its motion to strike the second
amended complaint. 
After the hearing on the motion for a summary judgment,
the trial court entered an order inviting response to its
concern as to whether evidence of the City's violation of
certain regulatory or statutory obligations satisfied the
sufficiency-of-the-evidence requirement in light of this
Court's decisions in Byrd v. City of Citronelle, 937 So. 2d
515 (Ala. 2006), and Burge v. Jefferson County, 409 So. 2d 800
(Ala. 1982).  In its supplemental brief submitted after the
hearing, the City discussed those two cases but addressed for
the first time the effect of those cases upon the negligence
claim, a claim asserted only in the second amended complaint.
In their response to the City's supplemental brief, the
residents also addressed the negligence claim in light of Byrd
1051593
9
and Burge, and concluded with a cursory discussion of the
remaining claims in the second amended complaint, namely,
trespass, continuing trespass, and strict liability, noting
the presence of factual issues.
Arguably, the City waived its motion to strike the second
amended complaint as to the residents' negligence claim by
injecting a discussion of negligence into its posthearing
supplemental brief.  However, we need not resolve that issue
because it is clear that the City did not inject the other
three claims asserted in the second amended complaint --
trespass, continuing trespass, and strict liability –- in any
submission to the trial court before its ruling on the
summary-judgment motion.  We do not find any basis for the
City's waiver of its motion to strike as to those claims
arising from its failure to object to the residents' cursory
reference to trespass, continuing trespass, and strict
liability in their posthearing brief because such discussion
is entirely consistent with an acknowledgment by the residents
as to the necessity for further proceedings in the event the
trial court granted the City's motion as to the first amended
1051593
10
complaint and subsequently denied the motion to strike the
second amended complaint. 
Because the City has not waived its motion to strike as
to at least three of the claims asserted in the second amended
complaint and the trial court has not ruled on such motion,
those claims remain pending. A partial summary judgment is not
a final, appealable judgment. See Homes of Legend, Inc. v.
McCollough, 776 So. 2d 741, 748 n.11 (Ala. 2000) (citing
Precision American Corp. v. Leasing Serv. Corp., 505 So. 2d
380, 382 (Ala. 1987)).
III. Remand
Neither party has challenged the summary-judgment order
as nonfinal. However, inaction of the parties cannot cure a
jurisdictional defect.  Cf. McGowin Inv. Co. v. Johnstone,
supra.  We have the option of dismissing the appeal or
remanding the case to the trial court for the opportunity to
cure the defect, as set forth below:
"When it appears from the record that the appeal was
taken from an order which was not final, but which
could have been made final by a Rule 54(b)
certification, we will remand the case to the trial
court for a determination as to whether it chooses
to certify the order as final, pursuant to Rule
54(b), and, if it so chooses, to enter such an order
and to supplement the record to reflect that
1051593
11
certification.  The judgment will be taken as final
as of the date the 54(b) certification is entered.
...
"... [I]f this Court remands the case to the
trial court for the opportunity of making such a
certification, the trial court will have the limited
jurisdiction to enter a 54(b) certification if, in
its discretion, it decides the entry of such a
certification is appropriate."
Foster v. Greer & Sons, Inc., 446 So. 2d 605, 609-10 (Ala.
1984)(overruled on other grounds, Ex parte Andrews, 520 So. 2d
507, 510 (Ala. 1987)).
We remand this case for the trial court either (a) to
grant the City's motion to strike the second amended complaint
and thereafter enter a final judgment or (b) to certify the
summary-judgment order heretofore entered as to the first
amended complaint as a final judgment under Rule 54(b). A
supplemental record reflecting the trial court's action should
be prepared and forwarded to this Court.  The judgment will be
considered final as of the date any new order is entered. If
no such supplemental record is forwarded to this Court within
14 days of the date of release of this opinion, this appeal
will be dismissed. 
REMANDED WITH INSTRUCTIONS.
Nabers, C.J., and Woodall, Smith, and Parker, JJ., concur.