Case Title: REX ADAMS v. BETTY WALTON, M.D.

Citation: 

Docket Number: S-10-0109

State: wyoming

Court: Wyoming Supreme Court

Date: 2011-03-31T00:00:00Z

Document:
REX ADAMS v. BETTY WALTON, M.D.2011 WY 58Case Number: No. S-10-0109Decided: 03/31/2011NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in Pacific Reporter Third. Readers are requested to notify the Clerk of the Supreme Court, Supreme Court Building, Cheyenne, Wyoming 82002, of any typographical or other formal errors so correction may be made before final publication in the permanent volume.
OCTOBER 
TERM, A.D. 2010

 
 

REX 
ADAMS,Appellant (Plaintiff),v.BETTY WALTON, 
M.D.,Appellee (Defendant).

 
 
Appeal 
from the District Court of Sweetwater County

 
 
 
 

Representing 
Appellant:

V. 
Anthony Vehar of Vehar Law Offices, P.C., Evanston, Wyoming; Clark Newhall of 
Law Office of Clark Newhall, MD, JD, LC, Salt Lake City, Utah.  Argument by Mr. 
Vehar.

 
 

Representing 
Appellee:

Stephenson 
D. Emery of Williams, Porter, Day & Neville, P.C., Casper, 
Wyoming

 
 
Before 
KITE, C.J., and GOLDEN, HILL, VOIGT, and BURKE, 
JJ.

 
 

GOLDEN, 
Justice.

 
 
[¶1]      Rex Adams 
allegedly received negligent medical treatment from Dr. Betty Walton.  Adams brought a medical malpractice 
claim against Dr. Walton, but filed the legal action after the applicable 
statute of limitations had run.  
Adams alleged the statute of limitations was tolled because Dr. Walton 
had left the state and he could not find her to effectuate service of 
process.  The district court 
disagreed and granted summary judgment to Dr. Walton based on the running of the 
limitation period.  We 
affirm.

 
 
ISSUE

 
 
[¶2]      The issue as 
presented is whether the district court properly granted summary judgment based 
on the statute of limitations when Dr. Walton departed the state and Adams had 
no knowledge of her whereabouts.  

 
 
FACTS

 
 
[¶3]      On August 3, 
2005, Adams received medical treatment from Dr. Mark Lea.  On August 11, 2005, Adams was treated by 
Dr. Kent Katz for complications associated with Dr. Lea's treatment.  On August 16, 2005, Adams was sent to 
the emergency room of Memorial Hospital of Sweetwater County by his primary care 
physician because of worsening in his condition.  He was treated by Dr. Walton.  While he was in the emergency room he 
suffered a cardiac arrest.  Adams 
was subsequently transferred to a hospital in Utah.  

 
 
[¶4]      Adams' attorney 
reviewed the medical records of Drs. Lea, Katz and Walton.  He determined there was no evidence of 
negligent medical treatment on the part of Dr. Walton.  Consequently, on October 19, 2006, Adams 
filed a medical malpractice suit against only Drs. Lea and Katz.  

 
 
[¶5]      On March 21, 
2008, Dr. Katz filed a designation of expert witnesses.  On the list was an expert in emergency 
medicine.  The expert was scheduled 
to testify that Dr. Walton was negligent in her treatment of Adams, proximately 
causing his complained of injuries.  
Adams' attorney disagreed with the expert's conclusions 
but:

 
 
Because 
Drs. Lea and Katz will apparently attempt to allocate fault to Dr. Walton, I 
determined that the proper legal action for my client was to amend the complaint 
and name Dr. Walton as a defendant, regardless of my personal opinion of her 
culpability.    

 
 
[¶6]      Shortly after 
Adams received Dr. Katz's designation, Adams began looking for Dr. Walton.  He discovered she was a locum tenens 
physician who was not resident in Wyoming.  
At some point after August 16, 2005, the date of the alleged malpractice, 
she had left the state to practice elsewhere.  Her whereabouts were relatively easy to 
determine and eventually, on August 21, 2008, Adams filed an "Amended Complaint" 
adding Dr. Walton as a defendant.  

 
 
[¶7]      Dr. Walton moved 
for summary judgment on the grounds the claim was filed outside the statute of 
limitations.  Adams responded that 
the statute of limitations had been tolled because Dr. Walton had left the state 
after the cause of action accrued and he had been unable to locate her.  The district court granted the motion 
for summary judgment.

 
 
DISCUSSION

 
 
[¶8]      We review a grant 
of summary judgment de novo, applying the same test as the district court.  Summary judgment is appropriately 
granted when there is no genuine issue of material fact and, with all reasonable 
inferences drawn in favor of the non-moving party, the moving party is entitled 
to a judgment as a matter of law.  
W.R.C.P. 56(c).  Rivers v. Moore, Myers & Garland, 
LLC, 2010 WY 102, ¶ 9, 236 P.3d 284, 290 (Wyo. 2010); Boyer-Gladden v. Hill, 2010 WY 12, ¶ 5, 
224 P.3d 21, 24 (Wyo. 2010); Hall v. 
Perry, 2009 WY 83, ¶ 8, 211 P.3d 489, 492 (Wyo. 2009).

 
 
[¶9]      According to the 
undisputed facts, Adams had no intention of bringing a medical malpractice suit 
against Dr. Walton.  It was only 
when he was informed the defense theory would be to implicate Dr. Walton that 
Adams changed his mind.  This 
occurred more than two and a half years after the date of the alleged 
malpractice.  Adams did not amend 
his complaint to add Dr. Walton as a defendant until more than three years after 
the date of the alleged malpractice.  
The statute of limitations for a medical malpractice action is two 
years.  Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 
1-3-107(a)(i) (LexisNexis 2009).1  Needless to say, the statutory 
limitation period had run.

 
 
[¶10]   This should be the end of the 
story, but Dr. Walton left the state at some point after the date the cause of 
action accrued.  Thus, Adams argues 
his action is timely under Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 1-3-116 (LexisNexis 
2009):

 
 
If 
a cause of action accrues against a person when he is out of the state, or has 
absconded or concealed himself, the period limited for the commencement of the 
action does not begin to run until he comes into the state or while he is so 
absconded or concealed. If after the cause of action accrues he departs from the 
state or absconds or conceals himself, the time of his absence or concealment is 
not computed as a part of the period within which the action shall be 
brought.

 
 
Adams 
argues that the language of this tolling statute should be taken literally, with 
no further context.  It is simply a 
matter of math.  For every day a 
person is absent from the state, the limitation period is tolled.  According to Adams, the fact that he was 
not even looking for Dr. Walton during the limitation period is 
irrelevant.

 
 
[¶11]   Adams relies heavily on 
Greenwood v. Wierdsma, 741 P.2d 1079 (Wyo. 1987).  In Greenwood, a medical malpractice case, 
Greenwood failed to serve Dr. Wierdsma before the statute of limitations expired 
because Dr. Wierdsma was out of state and Greenwood had trouble locating 
him.  The Greenwood Court held, under the clear 
language of § 1-3-116, the statute of limitations had been tolled during Dr. 
Wierdsma's absence from the state.  
Although certain language in Greenwood appears absolute, the holding 
was limited to its facts:

 
 
Indeed, 
if the record demonstrated that the plaintiff knew where to find the defendant, 
the long-arm statute, when read in pari materia with the statute of 
limitations, might operate to defeat the tolling provision, but that issue is 
not now before us and will not here be decided. Since plaintiff did not know 
defendant's whereabouts, she was unable to take advantage of the Wyoming 
long-arm statute in obtaining service of process on Dr. Wierdsma, and the 
tolling language of the statute of limitations is clearly in effect.  

 
 

Id. 
at 
1083 n.2.  

 
 
[¶12]   Other cases make clear that the 
language of § 1-3-116 is not to be construed as literally as Adams would 
wish.  For instance, in Stanbury v. Larsen, 803 P.2d 349 (Wyo. 
1990), the Stanbury Court held the 
tolling provision of § 1-3-116 did not apply when the plaintiff knew the 
location of a defendant who was not in Wyoming.  The Stanbury Court 
reasoned:

 
 
In 
Tarter v. Insco, 550 P.2d 905, 
908-09 (Wyo. 1976) (emphasis in original), this court stated the tolling 
statute applies when the defendant has "departed from the state in such manner so that he is beyond the 
reaches of the law for purposes of service." In a later case, we indicated 
that, if the plaintiff has knowledge of the nonresident defendant's location and 
that defendant is subject to this state's jurisdiction through the long arm 
statute, the statute of limitations is not tolled. Greenwood v. Wierdsma, 
741 P.2d 1079 (Wyo. 
1987).

 
 
Given 
this line of cases, the district court could reasonably find the statute of 
limitations is not tolled when the plaintiff has "knowledge" of the defendant's 
whereabouts. Thus, the district court was correct in its construction of 
controlling legal precepts when it ruled the statute of limitations was not 
tolled[.]  

 
 

Stansbury, 
803 P.2d  at 351.  In the face of 
this precedent, Adam's argument for a strictly literal reading of § 1-3-116 
fails.

 
 

CONCLUSION

 
 
[¶13]   A statute of limitations, by 
definition, limits the amount of time a potential plaintiff has to file a legal 
action.  Adams argues the language 
of § 1-3-116 allows for the two year limitation period of § 1-3-107 to be 
completely overridden should a potential defendant serendipitously be absent 
from the state.  As our precedent 
discloses, this Court has never construed the language of § 1-3-116 so 
literally.

 
 
[¶14]   Adams did not file a legal action 
against Dr. Walton until more than three years after the cause of action 
accrued.  The fact that Dr. Walton 
was out of state is not enough to invoke § 1-3-116, given the fact that Adams 
had no intention of bringing legal action against her within the limitation 
period.  Affirmed. 

 
 
 
 
FOOTNOTES

 
 
1§ 
1-3-107.  Act, error or omission in rendering professional or health 
care services.

(a) A cause of 
action arising from an act, error or omission in the rendering of licensed or 
certified professional or health care services shall be brought within the 
greater of the following times:

(i) Within 
two (2) years of the date of the alleged act, error or omission, except that a 
cause of action may be instituted not more than two (2) years after discovery of 
the alleged act, error or omission, if the claimant can establish that the 
alleged act, error or omission was:

(A) Not reasonably discoverable within a two (2) year period; 
or(B) The claimant 
failed to discover the alleged act, error or omission within the two (2) year 
period despite the exercise of due 
diligence.