Supreme Court of Florida

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No. SC19-1336

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WILSONART, LLC, et al.,

Petitioners,

vs.

MIGUEL LOPEZ, etc.,

Respondent.

December 31, 2020

MUÑIZ, J.

In the decision under review, the Fifth District Court of Appeal certified to 

this Court a question of great public importance involving Florida’s summary 

judgment standard. Lopez v. Wilsonart, LLC, 275 So. 3d 831 (Fla. 5th DCA 2019). 

We have jurisdiction. Art. V, § 3(b)(4), Fla. Const.

The certified question is as follows:

Should there be an exception to the present summary judgment 

standards that are applied by state courts in Florida that would allow 

for the entry of final summary judgment in favor of the moving party 

when the movant’s video evidence completely negates or refutes any 

conflicting evidence presented by the non-moving party in opposition 

to the summary judgment motion and there is no evidence or 

suggestion that the videotape evidence has been altered or doctored?
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Lopez, 275 So. 3d at 834. Our answer is no.

BACKGROUND

This case involves a fatal rear-end car crash. The estate of the decedent sued 

the front-car driver and the driver’s employer. The trial court granted summary 

judgment for the defendants, relying on video evidence from the front car’s 

forward-facing dashboard camera that appeared to refute the plaintiff’s version of 

events. The Fifth District acknowledged that “the video evidence showing [the 

front driver’s] driving pattern is both compelling that Appellees were not negligent 

and directly contradictory to the Estate’s evidence in opposition to the summary 

judgment.” Id. (footnote omitted). Nonetheless, the Fifth District reversed the 

summary judgment. It reasoned that, notwithstanding the strength of the video 

evidence, “the trial court improperly weighed competing evidence on material 

facts.” Id.

After accepting jurisdiction in this case, we sua sponte asked the parties to 

brief the following questions:

Should Florida adopt the summary judgment standard articulated by 

the United States Supreme Court in Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 

317 (1986); Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242 (1986); 

and Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U.S. 574 

(1986)? If so, must Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.510 be 

amended to reflect any change in the summary judgment standard?

Wilsonart, LLC v. Lopez, No. SC19-1336, 2019 WL 5188546, at *1 (Fla. Oct. 15, 

2019).
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ANALYSIS

The Fifth District held that it was “compelled” under “Florida’s current 

summary judgment standard” to reverse the trial court’s grant of summary 

judgment. Lopez, 275 So. 3d at 832. And the court understood that standard to 

mean that summary judgment is unwarranted “if the record raises the slightest 

doubt that material issues could be present.” Id. at 833 (emphasis added) (quoting 

Jones v. Dirs. Guild of Am., Inc., 584 So. 2d 1057, 1059 (Fla. 1st DCA 1991)).

The Fifth District contrasted Florida’s summary judgment standard (so 

understood) with the federal summary judgment standard, particularly as applied 

by the Supreme Court in Scott v. Harris, 550 U.S. 372 (2007). As here, Harris

was a case where the record contained a “videotape capturing the events in 

question,” and there were “no allegations or indications that [the] videotape was 

doctored or altered in any way.” Id. at 378. The Supreme Court restated the 

familiar federal summary judgment standard that “[w]here the record taken as a 

whole could not lead a rational trier of fact to find for the nonmoving party, there is 

no ‘genuine issue for trial.’ ” Id. at 380 (quoting Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co. v. 

Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U.S. 574, 586-87 (1986)). And the Court went on to hold 

that: “When opposing parties tell two different stories, one of which is blatantly 

contradicted by the record, so that no reasonable jury could believe it, a court 
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should not adopt that version of the facts for purposes of a ruling on a motion for 

summary judgment.” Id.

Read against the backdrop of the Supreme Court’s decision in Harris, the 

Fifth District’s certified question is understandable. The Fifth District premised its 

certified question on the indisputable observation that “technological 

advancements in our society” will “increase the likelihood of video and digital 

evidence being more frequently used in both trial and pretrial proceedings.” 

Lopez, 275 So. 3d at 834. Implicitly the question asks whether Florida’s existing 

summary judgment standard needs to be rethought—perhaps along the lines of the 

more commonsense approach reflected in Harris. Hence this Court’s request that 

the parties brief the question whether Florida should adopt the federal summary 

judgment standard.

For the reasons we explain in In re Amendments to Florida Rule of Civil 

Procedure 1.510, No. SC20-1490 (Fla. Dec. 31, 2020), which issues today with 

this opinion, we are persuaded that Florida should adopt the federal summary 

judgment standard. But the right way to enact that change is through a prospective 

rule amendment. We cannot say that the jurisprudence underlying Florida’s 

existing summary judgment standard is clearly erroneous, so we will not recede 

from that jurisprudence or “reinterpret” it here. See State v. Poole, 297 So. 3d 487, 

507 (Fla. 2020).
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As to the Fifth District’s certified question, we do not see a principled basis 

for engrafting onto Florida’s existing summary judgment standard a special 

interpretive rule for cases involving video evidence. To the extent that the Fifth 

District’s question points to a deeper flaw in Florida’s existing summary judgment 

standard—specifically, its unreasonable definition of what constitutes a “genuine 

issue” in need of resolution by a jury—this problem is better addressed through our 

prospective rule amendment. In any event, we see no reason to adopt an ad hoc 

video evidence exception to the existing summary judgment standard on the eve of 

that amendment.

The Petitioners invite us to quash the Fifth District’s decision in Lopez on 

the ground that it is wrong under Florida’s existing summary judgment standard, 

even without any video evidence exception. But having answered the certified 

question, we decline to take up that issue. We do so without endorsing the Fifth 

District’s “slightest doubt” formulation of the “genuine issue” test for summary 

judgment under existing Florida law. See Mobley v. Homestead Hospital, Inc., 291 

So. 3d 987, 992-95 (Fla. 3d DCA 2019) (Logue, J., concurring) (questioning the

continued validity of this formulation). And without reaching any conclusion 

about the application of the Supreme Court’s decision in Harris to the record in 

this case.
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CONCLUSION

We answer no to the certified question and approve the result in the Fifth 

District Court of Appeal. Our decision is without prejudice to the Petitioners’

ability to seek summary judgment under Florida’s new summary judgment 

standard, once our rule amendment takes effect.

It is so ordered.

CANADY, C.J., and POLSTON, LAWSON, COURIEL, and GROSSHANS, JJ., 

concur.

LABARGA, J., concurs in part and dissents in part with an opinion.

NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO FILE REHEARING MOTION AND, 

IF FILED, DETERMINED.

LABARGA, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part.

I concur in the result, which leaves intact the decision reached by the Fifth 

District Court of Appeal. However, as discussed in my dissenting opinion in In re 

Amendments to Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.510, No. SC20-1490 (Fla. 

Dec. 31, 2020), I strongly dissent to the majority’s conclusion that this case 

warrants reconsideration of Florida’s summary judgment standard, and further, to 

the majority’s decision to prospectively amend Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 

1.510 and adopt the federal summary judgment standard.

Application for Review of the Decision of the District Court of Appeal – Certified 

Great Public Importance 

Fifth District - Case No. 5D18-2907
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(Osceola County)

Sean M. McDonough, Jacqueline M. Bertelsen, and Gary Spahn of Wilson Elser

Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker LLP, Orlando, Florida,

for Petitioners

Tony Bennett of Hicks & Motto, P.A., Palm Beach Gardens, Florida; and Bryan S. 

Gowdy and Meredith A. Ross of Creed & Gowdy, P.A., Jacksonville, Florida,

for Respondent

George N. Meros, Jr., Kevin W. Cox, Tiffany A. Roddenberry, and Tara R. Price

of Holland & Knight, LLP, Tallahassee, Florida,

for Amici Curiae Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America 

and Florida Chamber of Commerce

Edward G. Guedes and Eric S. Kay of Weiss Serota Helfman Cole & Bierman, 

P.L. Coral Gables, Florida; and William W. Large of Florida Justice Reform 

Institute, Tallahassee, Florida,

for Amici Curiae Florida Justice Reform Institute and Florida Trucking 

Association

Kansas R. Gooden of Boyd & Jenerette, PA, Miami, Florida; and Elaine D. Walter

of Boyd Richard Parker & Colonnelli, P.L, Miami, Florida,

for Amicus Curiae Florida Defense Lawyers Association

Wendy F. Lumish, Alina Alonso Rodriguez, and Daniel A. Rock of Bowman and 

Brooke LLP, Coral Gables, Florida,

for Amicus Curiae Product Liability Advisory Council, Inc.

Angela C. Flowers of Kubicki Draper, Ocala, Florida,

for Amicus Curiae Federation for Defense & Corporate Counsel
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Jason Gonzalez, Daniel Nordby, Benjamin Gibson, Amber Stoner Nunnally, and 

Rachel Procaccini, Tallahassee, Florida, and Julissa Rodriguez of Shutts & Bowen 

LLP, Miami, Florida,

for Amici Curiae Florida Health Care Association and Associated Industries 

of Florida

Manuel Farach of McGlinchey Stafford, PLLC, Fort Lauderdale, Florida; and 

Joseph S. Van de Bogart of Van de Bogart Law, P.A., Fort Lauderdale, Florida,

for Amicus Curiae Business Law Section of The Florida Bar

Michael M. Brownlee of The Brownlee Law Firm, P.A., Orlando, Florida,

for Amicus Curiae American Board of Trial Advocates

Maegen Peek Luka of Newsome Melton, Orlando, Florida,

for Amicus Curiae Retired Florida Circuit Court Judges

Jeffrey R. White, Washington, District of Columbia; and Andrew A. Harris of 

Burlington & Rockenbach, P.A., West Palm Beach, Florida,

for Amici Curiae American Association for Justice and Florida Justice 

Association