Title: Harvell v. IRELAND ELEC. CO.

State: alabama

Issuer: Alabama Supreme Court

Document:

444 So. 2d 852 (1984)
Dan HARVELL, as Administrator of the Estate of Stanley Dan Harvell, deceased
v.
IRELAND ELECTRIC COMPANY, et al.
82-832.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
January 20, 1984.
Francis H. Hare, Jr. and James J. Thompson, Jr. for Hare, Wynn, Newell & Newton, Birmingham, for appellant.
Michael B. Maddox of Clark & Maddox, Birmingham, for appellees.
FAULKNER, Justice.
This is a wrongful death case. On November 1, 1979, Stanley Dan Harvell died as a result of injuries that he received while employed by the Georgia-Pacific Corporation. Mr. Harvell was decapitated when he attempted to repair a "bark-shredder" that had malfunctioned.
*853 On August 18, 1981, plaintiff Dan Harvell, as administrator of the estate of Stanley Dan Harvell, filed suit against certain named and various fictitious defendants. When the original complaint was filed, plaintiff did not know, among others, the name of the general electrical contractor, or the identity of the entity responsible for installing the "bark-shredder." In the caption of the original complaint, the plaintiff included, inter alia, a designation of the following fictitious defendant:
Also, the body of plaintiff's original complaint contained the following averments (emphasis added):
Plaintiff's interrogatories to one of the named defendants included the following question:
Answers to these interrogatories were filed on February 5, 1982, and included the following response:
Five days later, on February 10, 1982, the plaintiff amended his complaint to substitute "IRELAND ELECTRIC COMPANY, Augusta, Georgia" in lieu of fictitious defendant "L".
On March 10, 1983, Ireland filed a motion for summary judgment, which asserted, in part:
The trial court entered a final order on April 27, 1983, according to A.R.Civ.P. 54(b), granting Ireland's motion for summary judgment. The plaintiff proceeded to file his notice of appeal to this court.
The issue to be decided on appeal is as follows: Whether the use of the word "defendants" in the averments of plaintiff's original complaint is sufficient to state a legal cause of action against the fictitious parties named in the caption of the complaint *854 as "L....," in accordance with A.R. Civ.P., Rule 9(h), so that the amendment to the complaint naming Ireland Electric Company as a defendant will relate back to the date of filing of the original complaint in accordance with A.R.Civ.P., Rule 15(c). We are of the opinion that it is sufficient.
The caption of plaintiff's complaint names every known defendant and describes several fictitious defendants in accordance with A.R.Civ.P., Rule 9(h). Plaintiff then proceeds to allege several causes of action against "the defendants." From the structure of the complaint, it is obvious that plaintiff intended to, and did, assert each and every cause of action against each and every defendant, named or fictitious.
Ireland contends that the averment in the body of the original complaint charging the "defendants" does not constitute an adequate reference to a fictitious defendant. Ireland insists that in cases against fictitious parties, the plaintiff must do something which is not necessary in cases against named defendants; viz., the plaintiff must specifically repeat in the body of the original complaint the names and description of the fictitious defendants designated in the caption of the complaint in order to state a cause of action against those fictitious defendants. Such a practice is not required by, and was not contemplated by, the Alabama Rules of Civil Procedure. It is not consistent with the intent and purpose of A.R.Civ.P., Rule 9(h).
The proper test is not the degree of particularity with which fictitious parties are described in the body of the complaint, but whether the complaint alleges any wrongful conduct by the fictitious party sufficient to constitute a cause of action against it. Columbia Engineering International v. Espey, 429 So. 2d 955, 959 (Ala. 1983).
Furthermore, this court has stated:
Columbia Engineering, supra, at 960. See also Moorer v. Doster Construction Company, Inc., 442 So. 2d 97 (Ala.1983), and Denney v. Serio, 446 So. 2d 7 (Ala. 1984).
A different legal issue is presented by those cases in which the plaintiff had to amend his complaint to aver additional facts and/or new and different theories of liability which were not contained in the body of the original complaint in order to state a good cause of action against the fictitious defendant. See, e.g., Columbia Engineering, supra, Fowlkes v. Liberty Mutual Insurance Company, 392 So. 2d 803 (Ala.1980); Minton v. Whisenant, 402 So. 2d 971 (Ala.1981); Walden v. Mineral Equipment Co., 406 So. 2d 385 (Ala.1981).
Ireland has not questioned the sufficiency of the causes of action stated against the named defendants, and the court is of the opinion that the use of the phrase "the defendants" in each paragraph of plaintiff's complaint is sufficient to incorporate by reference all the named defendants and all the fictitious defendants who are described in the caption of the complaint. Plaintiff was not required to repeat the description of the fictitious party in the body of the complaint in order to state a cause of action against it in this case.
Since Ireland does not contend that it was improperly substituted as the entity described as fictitious party "L," and for the foregoing reasons, we hold that the complaint sufficiently states a cause of action against Ireland. Thus, summary judgment was improper in this case. The decision of the trial court is hereby reversed and the case remanded for proceedings consistent with this opinion.
REVERSED AND REMANDED.
TORBERT, C.J., and ALMON, SHORES and ADAMS, JJ., concur.