Opinion ID: 1110288
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Federal Due Process Challenge

Text: In its brief to this Court, Travelers avers that the Court of Appeal erred in reviewing its claim of excessiveness for abuse of discretion rather than de novo, as required by Cooper. However, because Travelers failed to raise a constitutional due process challenge to the excessiveness of the exemplary damage award below, we find that any error with regard to the review of a federal constitutional claim was waived. The longstanding jurisprudential rule of law in Louisiana is that litigants must raise constitutional attacks in the trial court, not the appellate courts, and that the constitutional challenge must be specially pleaded and the grounds for the claim particularized. Vallo v. Gayle Oil Company, Inc., 94-1238 (La.11/30/94), 646 So.2d 859, 864. [2] Further, appellate courts generally will not consider issues raised for the first time on appeal. Segura v. Frank, 93-1271 (La. 1/14/94), 630 So.2d 714, 725. [3] Admittedly, this case presents a unique procedural posture in that Travelers was dismissed from this suit at the beginning of trial on a motion for summary judgment. That summary judgment was based on an earlier trial court ruling determining that the rejection of UM coverage on the policy issued by Stonewall to Frank's Casing Crew & Rental Tools, Inc. was invalid, and therefore Stonewall's policy provided the first layer of coverage for the Mosings' damages. Because the Mosings stipulated that their damages would not exceed $1,000,000.00 (the limits of Stonewall's policy), Travelers was dismissed from the case, which went to trial without any defendant, as Domas failed to appear. Following the rendition of judgment, the Mosings appealed the summary judgment finding that Frank's Casing Crew & Rental Tools, Inc. had not made a valid rejection of UM coverage in the Stonewall policy. Travelers also appealed, although it was not required to do so in order to respond to the Mosings' appeal. [4] In that appeal, Travelers assigned the following errors: (1) the lower court erred in finding that Travelers' policy provided coverage for punitive damages; (2) plaintiffs failed to introduce any evidence of the uninsured/underinsured status of the tortfeasor, Kirk Domas, as required for the recovery of damages; and (3) the award for punitive damages is grossly excessive. Significantly, in the argument section of its brief, Travelers failed to advance a constitutional due process excessiveness argument with respect to the amount of the exemplary damage award. It confined itself solely to arguing that the amount of the exemplary damage award in this case is excessive when compared to the amounts awarded in previous cases in Louisiana. [5] The case was submitted to the Court of Appeal on the foregoing arguments. Thereafter, a decision was handed down in which the Court of Appeal reversed the trial court's determination that Frank's Casing Crew & Rental Tools, Inc.'s rejection of UM coverage in the Stonewall policy was invalid and affirmed the amount of the exemplary damage award. In a rehearing application filed in the Court of Appeal, Travelers raised its constitutional due process attack on the amount of the exemplary damage award for the first time. It also argued, for the first time, that legal interest on the punitive damage award should run from date of judgment rather than from date of judicial demand. These arguments came too late. See Gladney v. Sneed, 32,107 (La.App. 2 Cir. 8/18/99), 742 So.2d 642, writ denied, 99-2930 (La.1/14/00), 753 So.2d 215; Degrasse v. Elevating Boats, Inc., 98-1406 (La.App. 4 Cir. 3/10/99), 740 So.2d 660, writ denied, 99-1807 (La.10/15/99), 748 So.2d 1147; American Motorist Ins. Co. v. American Rent-All, Inc., 617 So.2d 944 (La.App. 5 Cir.1993) (As a general rule, the courts of appeal will not consider issues raised for the first time on application for rehearing.). While, under the facts of this particular case, Travelers was not required to appeal in order to defend the judgment of the trial court, it did, and in doing so, it sought affirmative relief: a reduction in the amount of the exemplary damage award. [6] Having appealed, Travelers was required to raise all perceived errors in connection with the exemplary damage award (especially errors of alleged constitutional magnitude) before the Court of Appeal in order to preserve those errors for review. See Boudreaux v. State, DOTD, XXXX-XXXX (La.2/26/02), 815 So.2d 7, 9 (Except for the declinatory exception of lack of subject matter jurisdiction and the peremptory exceptions, two of which, prescription and res judicata, must be specially pleaded, we cannot consider contentions raised for the first time in this Court which were not pleaded in the court below and which the district court has not addressed.). Such a rule, while seemingly harsh, preserves the proper allocation of functions between the lower appellate courts and the Supreme Court by consigning the first appellate review to the court of appeal and preserving to this court discretionary review upon the litigant's petition for certiorari. See Buckbee v. United Gas Pipe Line Co., 561 So.2d 76, 86 (La. 1990). The purpose of the rule is thwarted when a litigant, such as Travelers, raises some, but not all, of its arguments on appeal and then, after a less than favorable result, urges the arguments it omitted on certiorari to this court. Accordingly, while Travelers was not a party to the case at trial, and thus was not in a position to raise the constitutional challenge in the district court, it did appeal and in doing so, failed to assign as error the federal due process excessiveness claim it belatedly raises in this court. We cannot consider this claim, which was waived by the failure of Travelers to assert it timely in the court below. Boudreaux v. State, DOTD, supra; Geiger v. State ex rel. Dept. of Health, 2001-2206 (La.4/12/02), 815 So.2d 80, 86. [7]