Title: SISK v. J.B. HUNT TRANSPORT, INC.
Citation: 2003 OK 69, 81 P.3d 55
Docket Number: 
State: Oklahoma
Issuer: Oklahoma Supreme Court
Date: July 8, 2003

SISK v. J.B. HUNT TRANSPORT, INC. Annotate this Case SISK v. J.B. HUNT TRANSPORT, INC. 2003 OK 69 81 P.3d 55 Case Number: 94288 Decided: 07/08/2003 THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA ALFRED WILLIAM SISK, Plaintiff/Appellee v. J. B. HUNT TRANSPORT, INC., Defendant/Appellant. ORDER Rehearing is granted. The opinion of the Court issued on February 5, 2002 is withdrawn and the opinion filed today is substituted therefor. The vote below is on the grant of rehearing only. The vote on the substituted opinion is shown thereon. DONE BY ORDER OF THE SUPREME COURT IN CONFERENCE THIS 3RD DAY OF JULY, 2003. /S/CHIEF JUSTICE WATT, C.J., OPALA, V.C.J., LAVENDER, KAUGER, SUMMERS, BOUDREAU, JJ. - concur. HODGES, HARGRAVE, WINCHESTER, JJ. - dissent. ALFRED WILLIAM SISK, Plaintiff/Appellee, v. J.B. HUNT TRANSPORT, INC., Defendant/Appellant. ON CERTIORARI TO THE COURT OF CIVIL APPEALS, DIV. II ¶0 In a negligence action brought under the doctrine of respondeat superior against employer and employee, plaintiff - before trial - dismissed defendant/employee "without prejudice." The trial court entered a dismissal "with prejudice" because the action had earlier been dismissed and refiled by invoking the terms of THE COURT OF CIVIL APPEALS' OPINION IS VACATED AND JUDGMENT OF THE TRIAL COURT AFFIRMED. James C. Daniel, Daniel, Baker & Howard, Tulsa, Oklahoma, for Appellant, J.B. Hunt Transport, Inc. Tim Maxcey, Stipe Law Firm, McAlester, Oklahoma, attorney for Appellee, Alfred William Sisk. OPALA, V.C.J. ¶1 Today's controversy presses for our decision but a single question: Whether a plaintiff's second dismissal of a time-barred claim against a co-defendant's servant operates, in fact and in law, to release the defendant/master by operation of the common-law rule that a servant's dismissal by the act of a plaintiff also operates to release the master's liability and to extinguish the tort claim where the claim is advanced on servant's negligence alone? We answer in the affirmative and give today's pronouncement purely prospective application - one that will apply solely to claims arising after the effective date of today's opinion. I. THE ANATOMY OF THE LITIGATION ¶2 William Alfred Sisk (plaintiff or Sisk) was injured in a vehicle/pedestrian collision on 10 November 1994 when he was struck by a tractor-trailer vehicle owned by J.B. Hunt Transport (defendant, master or Hunt) and operated by the latter's employee, Aristille Courville, Jr. (defendant, servant or Courville). Sisk brought a negligence action against Courville and Hunt for damages from bodily injuries allegedly occasioned by Courville's negligence. Sisk averred no independent negligence by Hunt. Suit against the latter rests solely on the theory of respondeat superior. On 26 August 1997 Sisk dismissed his action without prejudice and then refiled it by invoking the provisions of ¶3 Immediately before trial the plaintiff once again dismissed Courville "without prejudice." Because this was a second § 100 dismissal ¶4 The Court of Civil Appeals (COCA), Division II, affirmed the nisi prius denial of Hunt's motions. It noted that extant jurisprudence teaches that where master and servant are proceeded against jointly, and the master's liability rests solely on respondeat superior, a servant's dismissal without prejudice does not bar the action against the master II. THE PARTIES'S RESPECTIVE POSITIONS ON CERTIORARI ¶5 Hunt contends that, although COCA was correct in characterizing Sisk's second dismissal as one "with prejudice," ¶6 Sisk asserts that COCA's characterization of his dismissal as "with prejudice" is erroneous. This is so because Sisk's dismissal expressly states it is "without prejudice," and his motion rests upon the provisions of III. THE COMMON-LAW RULE - THAT RELEASE OF THE SERVANT RELEASES THE VICARIOUSLY LIABLE MASTER - OPERATES HERE. PLAINTIFF'S AFFIRMATIVE ACT TRIGGERED THE PROVISIONS OF § 100 AND EXTINGUISHED HIS CLAIM AGAINST THE SERVANT. ¶7 The answer to the question posed by today's certiorari must rest on the common-law doctrine of respondeat superior. When a claim alleges, and presses for imposition, a master's vicarious liability (based solely on a servant's negligence) - i.e., one from which master's negligence is absent - the claim is one predicated on master's vicarious liability known to the Anglo-American legal system as respondeat superior.15 This common-law doctrine teaches that an effective release of the servant operates to release the master.16 ¶8 The release requirement manifests itself here in somewhat unusual circumstances. The master's release results from the plaintiff's second dismissal of the claim against the servant after limitations have run. Simply put, the dispositive question in today's controversy is whether the ex lege bar from the plaintiff's second dismissal operates by force of law as an effective release of the claim against the servant. We hold that it does. ¶9 The early common-law release concept included the notion that a "release" flows from the abandonment or extinguishment of a claim, and that following the release of one tortfeasor, there is no residual claim to be sued upon against another.17 Whether Sisk's second dismissal was labeled "with" or "without prejudice" is immaterial here.18 The legal consequence of plaintiff's second dismissal must be considered against the backdrop of the effect it has on the plaintiff's capacity to refile the claim. Neither the plaintiff-worded motion for the servant's dismissal nor its effect under § 100 is to be tested in a pure vacuum. ¶10 Plaintiff's affirmative act of dismissing (for the second time) the servant from suit at once triggered the restrictive refiling opportunity afforded by the § 100 provisions. That opportunity is undeniably gone, and recommencement of this action against Courville cannot be accomplished. It is the recommencement bar, raised by plaintiff's own act of his second dismissal, that, in fact and in law, extinguishes his claim against the servant. When viewed in the light of a two-prong analysis, the release rule's operation at once becomes crystal-clear. A plaintiff's affirmative act must occur first; its required effect - one that must follow next - must be that of reprosecution's absolute bar. To destroy a servant's liability, both elements must coincide. Today's scenario is readily distinguishable from all those in which a plaintiff takes no affirmative step or no plaintiff's act extinguishes a servant's liability.19 Sisk's own act triggered the bar to reprosecution that extinguished his claim against Courville.20 A bar that arises by force of law from a plaintiff's voluntary act of dismissal is as effective as any other form of express release that would extinguish the claim against the servant. ¶11 That the servant is now beyond the reach of any suit upon Sisk's claim is the undeniable consequence of plaintiff's dismissal. The release rule must hence govern this controversy. Uninterrupted viability of the claim against a servant is the sine qua non of the master's continued liability in respondeat superior.21 Once, by an act of the plaintiff, the servant becomes impervious to legal responsibility, the master stands released. ¶12 Plaintiff's reliance on Hooper's language - that it is the servant's negligence that is imputed to the master and not the servant's liability - to support his contention that he may now proceed solely against the master is misplaced.22 Hooper neither deals with nor impacts the release rule. It employs the accepted fiction (underlying the doctrine of respondeat superior) when an action is brought solely against a master.23 Oklahoma's extant jurisprudence, expounding the common-law release rule, stands unabrogated and controls today's controversy. In short, plaintiff's dismissal operates by force of § 100 as an effective bar to the claim's reprosecution against the servant. This bar stands erected by the plaintiff's own act. The act makes the common-law rule operative. ¶13 Today's controversy is resolved by application of the time-honored rule of stare decisis.24 Only those precedents that are patently bad should be altered by judicial correction.25 Plaintiff urges the result of today's holding is unduly harsh. It will require that future litigants name every potential servant as a litigant in cases based upon the doctrine of respondeat superior. He also asserts that today's reasoning will lead to disastrous consequences where a master only is sued and the statute of limitations expires prior to trial. Plaintiff's concern for suits where the master alone stands as defendant in the case is misplaced. Today's holding neither modifies Oklahoma's extant jurisprudence nor applies to situations where no affirmative act of the plaintiff bars an action against the servant.26 ¶14 The common-law is, of course, always subject to abrogation by legislation. Generally, when a statute or rule of law appears obscure in its impact on the case at bar we will give the pronouncement prospective effect to protect those who would otherwise suffer from the law's abstruse contours.27 For the sake of affording evenhanded fairness, implicit in this state's judicial process, we give today's opinion purely prospective effect. It will govern only those claims which will arise after the effective date of this pronouncement. ¶15 We express no opinion upon the mid-trial errors re-urged by Hunt's certiorari petition. Our certiorari grant stands confined to the single issue - whether the common-law release rule governs this case.28 Neither is there any need to address Hunt's final challenge - that COCA credits as evidence statements made by Sisk's lawyer during oral argument to the appellate tribunal. Record evidence is sufficient to support COCA's decision. IV. SUMMARY ¶16 We hold today the ex lege bar from the plaintiff's voluntary act (of a second dismissal of Courville) operates at common law as an effective release of Sisk's claim against the servant. It is the § 100 recommencement bar, raised by the plaintiff's own act of dismissing the servant that, in fact and in law, also extinguishes his claim against the vicariously liable master. When a servant is effectively released, his master, whose liability is solely derivative, stands released as well. Today's pronouncement is given purely prospective effect. It shall govern only those claims which will arise after mandate has been issued herein. ¶17 On certiorari previously granted, the Court of Civil Appeals' opinion is vacated and judgment of the trial court affirmed. ¶18 OPALA, V.C.J., HODGES, LAVENDER, HARGRAVE AND WINCHESTER, JJ., CONCUR. ¶19 KAUGER and BOUDREAU, JJ., CONCUR IN PART AND DISSENT IN PART. ¶20 SUMMERS, J., CONCURS IN AFFIRMANCE OF THE JUDGMENT; DISSENTS FROM THE COURT'S OPINION ON REHEARING AND JOINS BOUDREAU, J., AND WATT, C.J., IN LARGE PART. ¶21 WATT, C.J., DISSENTS. FOOT