Opinion ID: 1891670
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: declinatory exception of improper venue

Text: The Spinosa Class Trust raised the declinatory exception of improper venue in this case, in response to Mrs. Spinosa's Third Supplemental and Amending Petition, which added the Trust as a defendant. According to the Trust, Mrs. Spinosa's claims against the Trust cannot be pursued along with her claims against Mr. Spinosa in East Baton Rouge Parish Family Court because the only proper venue for a claim against the Trust is St. Tammany Parish, the domicile of the sole trustee, Lawrence Randall Spinosa. In support of this argument, the Trust cites La. Rev.Stat. § 9:1725(5), a provision of the Louisiana Trust Code that defines proper court. The Family Court of East Baton Rouge Parish and the court of appeal both found non-meritorious this contention of the Trust's that the only proper venue for an action against the Trust is St. Tammany Parish. The decision of both of the lower courts was based primarily on their findings that La.Rev.Stat. § 9:1725(5) applies only to actions under the trust code, and that Mrs. Spinosa's action against the trust was not an action under the trust code. La.Rev.Stat. § 9:1725 at Subsection (5) defines proper court in pertinent part, as follows: Except when the context clearly indicates otherwise, as used in this Code:      (5) Proper court in the case of an inter vivos trust means the district court of the parish designated by the settlor, or if no designation is made, the district court of the parish of the trustee's domicile when only one trustee is named. . . . (Emphasis added.) According to the Trust, no parish was designated by the settlors of the Spinosa Class Trust as the proper court, and the sole trustee is Lawrence Randall Spinosa, Mr. Spinosa's brother, whose domicile is St. Tammany Parish. [9] Thus, the Trust argues, the only proper venue for a suit against the Trust, no matter what the nature of the allegations, is St. Tammany Parish. Accordingly, the Trust argues in this court that the court of appeal erred as a matter of law by affirming the family court's decision overruling the Trust's declinatory exception of improper venue. In addition to the definition of the phrase the proper court set forth in La. Rev.Stat. § 9:1725(5), the Trust seeks to support its exception of improper venue by pointing to La.Rev.Stat. § 9:1724, which states as follows: The provisions of this Code shall be accorded a liberal construction in favor of freedom of disposition. Whenever this Code is silent, resort shall be had to the Civil Code or other laws, but neither the Civil Code nor any other law shall be invoked to defeat a disposition sanctioned expressly or impliedly by this Code. The Trust asserts that Ms. Spinosa's claim falls within the actions contemplated by the trust code, and, therefore, that no law outside the trust code, including the general venue provisions, may be invoked to defeat a disposition sanctioned thereunder. La.Code of Civ. Proc. art. 41 defines venue as the parish where an action or proceeding may properly be brought and tried under the rules regulating the subject. The general rules of venue are set forth in La.Code of Civ. Proc. art. 42. However, under the express provisions of La.Code of Civ. Proc. art. 43, those general venue rules are subject to the exceptions set forth in La.Code of Civ. Proc. arts. 71 through 85 and as otherwise provided by law. This court has held that the exceptions alluded to at La.Code of Civ. Proc. art. 43 (and set forth in La.Code of Civ. Proc. arts. 71 through 85) are an extension, supplement and legal part of the general venue provisions set forth in La.Code of Civ. Proc. art. 42. Jordan v. Central Louisiana Elec. Co., Inc., 95-1270, p. 1 (La.6/23/95), 656 So.2d 988, 989, quoting Kellis v. Farber, 523 So.2d 843 (La. 1988). This court's announcement in Kellis, that the venue rules set forth in La.Code of Civ. Proc. arts. 71 through 85 are an extension, supplement, and legal part of the general venue provisions set forth in La.Code of Civ. Proc. art. 42, was a departure from previous decisions, which had held that all of the exceptions to the general venue rules, including those recognized by La.Code of Civ. Proc. Art. 43 and set forth in La.Code of Civ. Proc. arts. 71 through 85, are in derogation of a common right and therefore must be strictly construed. Hawthorne Oil and Gas Corp. v. Continental Oil Co., 377 So.2d 285, 287 (La.1979). Because of that, a party claiming the benefit of one of the exceptions to the general venue rules was required to bring himself clearly within the exception. Id. The Kellis case explicitly held that the exceptions recognized in La.Code of Civ. Proc. art. 43 and set forth in La. Code of Civ. Proc. art. 71 through 85 are now an extension, supplement, and legal part of the general venue rules, and therefore they are no longer in derogation of common right and subject to strict construction. However, implicit in the Kellis decision is the unstated fact that other exceptions to the general venue rules (i.e., exceptions other than those recognized by La.Code of Civ. Proc. art. 43, which are set forth in La.Code of Civ. Proc. arts. 71 through 85) continue to be in derogation of common right and therefore must be strictly construed. Accordingly, in order to carry its burden of proving that Mrs. Spinosa's action against the trust must be filed in the parish of the sole trustee's domicile, the Trust must meet two requirements. First, the Trust must point to an exception to the general venue rules that specifies the parish of proper venue that applies to this case. Second, the Trust must then bring itself clearly within th[at] exception. Hawthorne Oil and Gas Corp., 377 So.2d at 287. Considered from that perspective, we find no merit in the Trust's arguments in support of its declinatory exception to venue, because the Trust has not carried its burden of proving even the first of the above requirementsi.e., that there is an exception to the general venue provisions that specifies St. Tammany Parish as the proper venue in this case. The Trust claims that La.Rev.Stat. § 9:1725(5) is a provision that specifies venue in any action against the Trust in the parish of the sole trustee's domicile. However, La.Rev.Stat. § 9:1725(5) does not even mention venue, much less dictate the court in which claims against the Trust must be filed. Instead, La. Stat. § 9:1725(5) does nothing more than define a term that appears in numerous statutory provisions of the Louisiana Trust Code unrelated to venue. The lack of merit in the Trust's arguments in this regard is easily demonstrated by review of the specific provisions of the trust code that contain the term proper court, as defined by La.Rev.Stat. § 9:1725(5). [10] Our review reveals that virtually all of those provisions fall under specific parts of the trust code related to administrative matters, such as creation, modification, and termination of trusts, or to duties and powers of trustees. Rather than dictating that actions against the Trust be filed in the proper court, the provisions containing that term simply grant certain powers to and/or impose certain obligations on the proper court. Just as significant to our interpretation of the term proper court in the multiple statutory provisions that use the term are certain other statutes that do not use the term proper court. Significantly, La. Rev.Stat. § 9:2126, which governs Tort liability of trust, does not contain the term proper court. Although that provision contemplates a suit against trustees who have incurred personal liability for a tort committed in the course of administration of the trust, nothing in that provision requires that the claim be filed in the proper court, or in any other designated venue. The same is true of La.Rev.Stat. § 9:2125, which governs Contractual liability of trust. That provision contemplates a cause of action against a trustee arising from a contract, but does not require that such an action be filed in a proper court, or any other court. Ultimately, as we have previously stated, Mrs. Spinosa's claim in this case, at least at this juncture, constitutes an action to partition community property. At this stage of the proceeding, the salient question regarding the Trust is whether any part of the assets being held by the Trust is actually community property. The trust code contains no express provision concerning the proper court to entertain an action to partition community property. In fact, even if La.Rev.Stat. § 9:1725(5) were meant to be a venue provision, as the Trust argues, that phrase simply does not appear in any article that mentions community property generally or the partitioning of community property specifically, nor in any statutory provision related to a third-party action against the trust or trustee. As the Trust itself notes, La.Rev.Stat. § 9:1724 provides expressly that in situations in which the Trust code is silent, resort shall be had to the Civil Code or other laws. The general venue rules contain an express provision regarding venue for an action to partition community property. Specifically, La.Code of Civ. Proc. art. 82 provides, in pertinent part, as follows A. Except as otherwise provided in this Article, an action to partition community property and to settle the claims between the parties arising from either a matrimonial regime or from co-ownership of former community property shall be brought either as an incident of the action which would result in the termination of the community property regime or as a separate action in the parish where the judgment terminating the community property regime was rendered. Under La.Code of Civ. Proc. art. 82(A), venue is proper in this action to partition community property and to settle the claims between the parties arising from either a matrimonial regime or from co-ownership of former community property in East Baton Rouge, which is the parish where the judgment terminating the community property regime was rendered (i.e., the judgment of divorce). Thus, the court of appeal correctly found that venue is proper in East Baton Rouge Parish Family Court under La.Code of Civ. Proc. art. 82. [11] Accordingly, the Trust's exception of improper venue has no merit. In sum, we conclude that the Family Court of East Baton Rouge Parish has subject matter jurisdiction over Mrs. Spinosa's petition to partition community property and the suit was not in an improper venue.