Opinion ID: 1828308
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: whether judicial estoppel should bar southaven's annexation of the paa.

Text: ¶ 17. Judicial estoppel is a doctrine of law applied by a trial court to a situation where a party asserts one position in a prior action or pleading but then seeks to take a contrary position to the detriment of the party opposite. Mississippi Power & Light Co. v. Cook, 832 So.2d 474, 482 (Miss.2002); Mauck v. Columbus Hotel Co., 741 So.2d 259, 264 (Miss.1999); Skipworth v. Rabun, 704 So.2d 1008, 1015 (Miss.1996). As we have stated: [T]he doctrine is based on expedition of litigation between the same parties by requiring orderliness and regularity in pleadings. [J]udicial estoppel will be applied in civil cases where there is multiple litigation between the same parties and one party knowingly `assert(s) a position inconsistent with the position in the prior' litigation. However, ... where the first position asserted was taken as a result of mistake, judicial estoppel should not be invoked. Mauck, 741 So.2d at 264-65 (citations omitted). ¶ 18. Horn Lake argues that Southaven is judicially estopped from annexing the PAA because of the Agreement. Horn Lake alleges that the Agreement was entered in Cause No. 95-10-1199 in the Chancery Court of DeSoto County, but a review of the record does not support this claim. No copy of the Agreement included in the record has the style of a case or a civil action number. The copies of the Agreement included in the record show only the signatures of representatives from Southaven and Horn Lake and do not show the signature of a judicial officer. Southaven does not address this issue. ¶ 19. For the sake of argument, consent decrees cannot ordinarily be modified without agreement by all sides. Weeast v. Borough of Wind Gap, 153 Pa. Cmwlth. 330, 621 A.2d 1074 (1993). Nevertheless, municipalities that unilaterally request to be let out of an old consent decree may be given special consideration on the ground that an earlier city administration cannot bind succeeding administrations. Evans v. City of Chicago, 10 F.3d 474 (7th Cir.1993). Rule 60(b)(5) of the Mississippi Rules of Civil Procedure allows for relief from a judgment or order where it is no longer equitable that the judgment should have prospective application. Evans includes a worthwhile discussion of consent decrees and governmental entities and will be reproduced here at length: Although the decree purports to last for all timeand the district court's decision refusing to vacate the decree ... reflects a belief that the commitments ought to run perpetuallydemocracy does not permit public officials to bind the polity forever. What one City Council enacts, another may repeal; what one mayor decrees during his four-year term, another may revoke. Today's lawmakers have just as much power to set public policy as did their predecessors. Chicago speaks through its elected representatives, and the people are free to upset even the most enlightened policies of earlier times. The current mayor wants to be free of his predecessor's commitment, concluding that more flexibility over budgets will promote the public welfare. People of good will could be on either side of this disagreement; each mayor may have correctly perceived the needs of the moment. Governments are in this respect unlike corporations or other contracting parties. A corporate board of directors may enter into commitments that continue after new directors take office; a legislature may not. True, governments may form contracts (for example, to build a new road or repay a loan) and must keep these commitments by virtue of the contract clause of the Constitution, Art. I, § 19, cl. 1. But temporary officeholders may not contract away the basic powers of government to enact lawsor in this case to adopt budgets in the same way natural persons may make enduring promises about their own future behavior.... 10 F.3d at 478. ¶ 20. Because Horn Lake has failed to show that the Agreement was ever entered as a consent decree in a cause of action, judicial estoppel does not apply. Furthermore, had the Agreement been entered in a cause of action, Southaven could have filed a motion for relief from judgment pursuant to M.R.C.P. 60(b)(6), which, under the above precedent, would probably have been granted. This claim is without merit.