IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF TENNESSEE

AT NASHVILLE

Assigned on Briefs February 2, 2021

VERA ELAINE CLARK V. CITY OF MOUNT JULIET 

Appeal from the Circuit Court for Wilson County

No. 2019-CV-377 Clara W. Byrd, Judge

No. M2020-00293-COA-R3-CV

The plaintiff commenced this action by alleging that the City of Mount Juliet failed to 

adequately light a public park and neglected to make the park safe for walking at night, 

conditions which caused her to fall and sustain severe personal injuries. The City responded 

by filing a Tenn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(6) motion to dismiss, claiming it was immune from suit 

under the Governmental Tort Liability Act. Following numerous filings by the plaintiff in 

opposition to the motion and after a hearing, the court granted the motion on the basis that 

the complaint did not plead facts sufficient to remove immunity from the City. Therefore, 

the court dismissed all claims. This appeal followed. We affirm. 

Tenn. R. App. P. 3 Appeal as of Right; Judgment of the Circuit Court Affirmed

FRANK G. CLEMENT JR., P.J., M.S., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which JOHN W.

MCCLARTY and ARNOLD B. GOLDIN, JJ., joined.

Vera Elaine Clark, Gallatin, Tennessee, appellant, pro se. 

Sarah Mae Matthews, Brentwood, Tennessee, for the appellee, City of Mt. Juliet, 

Tennessee. 

MEMORANDUM OPINION1

Vera Elaine Clark (“Plaintiff”) timely commenced this action by filing a pro se 

complaint against the City of Mount Juliet. The complaint alleged, in pertinent part, that 

 

1 Tenn. Ct. App. R. 10 states:

This Court, with the concurrence of all judges participating in the case, may affirm, reverse 

or modify the actions of the trial court by memorandum opinion when a formal opinion 

would have no precedential value. When a case is decided by memorandum opinion it shall 

be designated “MEMORANDUM OPINION,” shall not be published, and shall not be 

cited or relied on for any reason in any unrelated case.

03/10/2021
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the City’s “dangerously negligent property management” caused Plaintiff to suffer 

physical, financial, and mental injuries:

The severe physical injury occurred at the Charlie Daniel’s Park in Mount 

Juliet, TN on June 29, 2018, between the hours of 8:00 and 9:00 p.m.

. . .

Defendant[] fail[ed] to adequately and safely light the property on which the 

Plaintiff’s injury occurred. Defendant knowingly neglected to make all areas 

of the park safely a[cc]essible and travers[able] at night [and f]ailed to post 

any warnings or indicate hazardous terrain and structures in any way. All of 

which directly cause[d] Plaintiff a personal physical injury that require[d] an 

ambulance and emergency room, a seriously invasive and potentially lifethreatening hip surgery, months of physical rehabilitation, towing and 

impounding of plaintiff’s vehicle, extreme burdensome medical expenses 

and extremely egregious emotional distress. As such, Plaintiff now has 

titanium metal rods from her hip to knee, and from the left hip to left hip 

socket.

The City responded to the complaint by filing a Tenn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(6) motion to 

dismiss Plaintiff’s claims for failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted. 

Specifically, the City contended that dismissal was warranted because “the City [was]

immune from the plaintiff’s negligence claims, as claims for negligence against a 

governmental entity, must be brought pursuant to the Governmental Tort Liability Act 

(“GTLA”).”2 The motion was supported by a memorandum of law in which it asserted, 

inter alia, that Plaintiff failed to plead facts sufficient to show immunity from suit had been 

removed.

Following a hearing on January 3, 2020, the trial court ruled as follows: “The motion 

to Dismiss claim for failure to remove immunity under the GTLA was GRANTED on the 

basis that the Plaintiff did not plead facts sufficient within the complaint to remove 

immunity form the City of Mt. Juliet.” This appeal followed.

Plaintiff raises several issues on appeal; however, we have determined the 

dispositive issue is whether the trial court erred in dismissing the complaint pursuant to 

Tenn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(6) for failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted.3

 

2 The City also alleged that the action was time barred under Tenn. Code Ann. § 29-20-305(b). The 

trial court ruled that the complaint was timely filed and the City does not challenge that ruling on appeal.

3 One of the issues raised by Plaintiff is whether: “The trial court erred in awarding City of Mount 

Juliet ‘immunity’ based on ‘Sovereign Immunity.’”
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STANDARD OF REVIEW

This appeal concerns the trial court’s decision to dismiss the complaint pursuant to 

Tenn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(6). A trial court’s decision to grant a Rule 12.02(6) motion to 

dismiss is a question of law that we review de novo with no presumption of correctness.

See Webb v. Nashville Area Habitat for Humanity, Inc., 346 S.W.3d 422, 426 (Tenn. 2011). 

We will uphold the decision “only when it appears that the plaintiff can prove no set of 

facts in support of a claim that will entitle him or her to relief.” Smith v. Benihana Nat'l 

Corp., 592 S.W.3d 864, 870 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2019) (citing Young v. Barrow, 130 S.W.3d 

59, 63 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2003)).

When making our determination, “we are limited to an examination of the complaint 

alone.” Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. v. Dorris, 556 S.W.3d 745, 756 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2017) 

(citing Wolcotts Fin. Serv., Inc. v. McReynolds, 807 S.W.2d 708, 710 (Tenn. Ct. App. 

1990)). Moreover, we “do not consider the strength of the plaintiff’s evidence; thus, all 

factual allegations in the complaint are accepted as true and construed in favor of the 

plaintiff.” Myers v. AMISUB (SFH), Inc., 382 S.W.3d 300, 308 (Tenn. 2012). As we 

recently explained in Lawson v. Maryville City Schools:

“To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must not be entirely devoid of 

factual allegations.” Webb, 346 S.W.3d at 426. Our courts have interpreted 

Tenn. R. Civ. P. 8.01 as requiring “a plaintiff to state ‘the facts upon which 

a claim for relief is founded.’” Id. (quoting Smith v. Lincoln Brass Works,

Inc., 712 S.W.2d 470, 471 (Tenn. 1986)). While “[a] complaint ‘need not 

contain detailed allegations of all the facts giving rise to the claim,’ . . . it 

‘must contain sufficient factual allegations to articulate a claim for relief.’” 

Id. (quoting Abshure v. Methodist Healthcare-Memphis Hosps., 325 S.W.3d 

98, 103 (Tenn. 2010)). “The facts pleaded, and the inferences reasonably 

drawn from these facts, must raise the pleader’s right to relief beyond the 

speculative level.” Id. (quoting Abshure, 325 S.W.3d at 104). Thus, “[w]hile 

a complaint in a tort action need not contain in minute detail the facts that 

give rise to the claim, it must contain direct allegations on every material 

point necessary to sustain a recovery on any legal theory, even though it may 

not be the theory suggested . . . by the pleader, or contain allegations from 

which an inference may fairly be drawn that evidence on these material 

points will be introduced at trial.” Id. (emphasis in original) (quoting Leach 

v. Taylor, 124 S.W.3d 87, 92 (Tenn. 2004)).

No. E2019-02194-COA-R3-CV, 2020 WL 7391151, at *3 (Tenn. Ct. App. Dec. 14, 2020).
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ANALYSIS

We begin our analysis by acknowledging that Plaintiff represented herself in the 

trial court and is pro se in this appeal. While we will be lenient concerning non-substantive 

matters of form, pro se litigants must comply with the same substantive and procedural 

rules as parties who are represented by lawyers:

Parties who decide to represent themselves are entitled to fair and equal 

treatment by the courts. The courts should take into account that many pro se 

litigants have no legal training and little familiarity with the judicial system. 

However, the courts must also be mindful of the boundary between fairness 

to a pro se litigant and unfairness to the pro se litigant’s adversary. Thus, the 

courts must not excuse pro se litigants from complying with the same 

substantive and procedural rules that represented parties are expected to 

observe. 

Watson v. City of Jackson, 448 S.W.3d 919, 926 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2014) (citations omitted).

The GTLA is premised on the constitutional rule that suits against governmental 

entities “may only be brought in such manner and ‘in such courts as the Legislature may 

by law direct.’” Vaughn v. City of Tullahoma, No. M2015-02441-COAR3-CV, 2017 WL 

3149602, at *1 (Tenn. Ct. App. July 21, 2017) (quoting Tenn. Const. art. I, § 17). Relevant 

to the claims asserted in this case, Tenn. Code Ann. § 29-20-201(a) provides immunity in 

the following circumstance:

Except as may be otherwise provided in this chapter, all governmental 

entities shall be immune from suit for any injury which may result from the 

activities of such governmental entities wherein such governmental entities 

are engaged in the exercise and discharge of any of their functions, 

governmental or proprietary. 

Although the complaint fails to identify any exceptions, the only exception that may 

arguably apply is found in Tenn. Code Ann. § 29-20-204, which reads:

(a) Immunity from suit of a governmental entity is removed for any injury 

caused by the dangerous or defective condition of any public building, 

structure, dam, reservoir or other public improvement owned and 

controlled by such governmental entity.

(b) Immunity is not removed for latent defective conditions, nor shall this 

section apply unless constructive and/or actual notice to the 

governmental entity of such condition be alleged.
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Thus, the exception in § 29-20-204 would apply if Plaintiff’s fall and injuries 

resulted from a defective public structure or public improvement the City owned and 

controlled that was in a dangerous and defective condition, and the City had constructive 

and/or actual notice of such condition.4 However, the complaint fails to identify the 

structure or improvement at issue; it merely identifies the park and generally references 

inadequate lighting where Plaintiff’s injury occurred. It also fails to allege that the City 

owned or managed the structure or improvement that caused her injuries, and it fails to 

allege that the City had constructive and/or actual notice of such condition. The only factual 

allegations stated in the complaint that ostensibly relate to the essential elements set forth

in § 29-20-204 are as follows:

The severe physical injury occurred at the Charlie Daniel’s Park in Mount 

Juliet, TN on June 29, 2018, between the hours of 8:00 and 9:00 p.m.

. . .

Defendant[] fail[ed] to adequately and safely light the property on which the 

Plaintiff’s injury occurred. Defendant knowingly neglected to make all areas 

of the park safely a[cc]essible and travers[able] at night. [Defendant] [f]ailed

to post any warnings or indicate hazardous terrain and structures in any way.

Although the complaint states that the City’s “dangerously negligent property 

management . . . caused Plaintiff’s personal physical injuries,” this statement is a legal 

conclusion and not an assertion of fact. 5 As noted earlier, if a complaint does not “contain 

direct allegations on every material point necessary to sustain a recovery on any legal 

theory,” or “allegations from which an inference may fairly be drawn that evidence on 

these material points will be introduced at trial,” the complaint fails to state a claim on 

which relief can be granted. See Lawson, 2020 WL 7391151, at *3 (first citing Webb, 346 

S.W.3d at 426, then quoting Leach, 124 S.W.3d at 92). As a consequence, the trial court 

correctly held the complaint did not plead facts sufficient to remove immunity from the 

City. Thus, the City’s immunity was not removed.

For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the trial court’s decision to dismiss all claims 

against the City because the complaint failed to allege sufficient facts to articulate a claim 

for relief.

 

4

In an advisory opinion, the Attorney General of Tennessee stated, “A public improvement, as 

applied to a municipality, means generally an improvement upon the property of the municipality which 

furthers its operations and interests and welfare of the public.” Tenn. Op. Atty. Gen. No. 95-024, 1995 WL 

144718, at *22 (Mar. 27, 1995).

5

“[L]egal conclusions set forth in a complaint are not required to be taken as true.” Webb, 346 

S.W.3d at 434 (quoting Riggs v. Burson, 941 S.W.2d 44 (Tenn. 1997) (citing Dobbs v. Guenther, 846 

S.W.2d 270, 273 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1992)).
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IN CONCLUSION

The judgment of the trial court is affirmed, and this matter is remanded with costs 

of appeal assessed against the appellant, Vera Elaine Clark.

________________________________

 FRANK G. CLEMENT JR., P.J., M.S.