Opinion ID: 783388
Heading Depth: 6
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Pending Actions

Text: 92 Washington's Rule 13(a) excuses a defendant from asserting an otherwise compulsory counterclaim if at the time the action was commenced the claim was the subject of another pending action. Noel argues that his wiretapping claims are not barred as unasserted compulsory counterclaims because on January 29, 1998, when Sandra Hall filed her complaint against Noel in Clark County District Court for privacy and wiretap violations, Noel had pending in superior court in Skamania County a claim relating to the tape-recorded conversations under the federal wiretapping statute, 18 U.S.C. §§ 2511-2520. On May 28, 1998, however, four months after Hall filed her complaint in the Clark County District Court, the Skamania court, following Hall's unopposed motion for voluntary dismissal, dismissed both Hall and Noel's wiretapping claims. The court explained that another action was pending in Clark County District Court and Clark County would be a forum more convenient to the parties. 93 When the Skamania court dismissed the wiretapping claims, Noel had already filed his answer in Clark County District Court two months earlier, on March 27, 1998. In his answer, Noel had raised as a defense the fact that the action was already pending in Skamania County. Although Noel argued in his answer that the Skamania County action had priority, he did not oppose the motion to dismiss the wiretapping claims from the Skamania County lawsuit. Noel then elected not to amend his pleadings in the Clark County action to assert his wiretapping claims as counterclaims in that suit. Under Washington Rule 15(a), leave to amend a pleading shall be freely given when justice so requires. CRLJ 15(a); see also Wilson v. Horsley, 137 Wash.2d 500, 974 P.2d 316, 319 (1999) (discussing liberal amendment policy under the identically worded CR 15(a)). Although Noel would have had to seek permission from the Clark County District Court to amend his pleading to assert his wiretapping claims, we can see no bar in Washington law to such an amendment. 94 We have found no Washington authority interpreting the pending claim exception to Rule 13(a). The purpose of the exception, however, is to prevent Party A from forcing Party B, who has a pending claim against Party A in another forum, into a forum of Party A's choosing. See Union Paving Co. v. Downer Corp., 276 F.2d 468, 470 (9th Cir.1960) (interpreting the analogous federal Rule 13(a)). Here, the Skamania County Superior Court dismissed the pending claims specifically to allow the parties to litigate all the wiretapping claims in the Clark County District Court. Noel neither opposed the motion to dismiss, nor argues to us that he could not have asserted his wiretapping claims in the Clark County suit after they were dismissed from the Skamania County suit. We therefore conclude that Noel's failure to amend his pleadings in the Clark County suit does not now allow him to escape the characterization of his unasserted claims in that court as compulsory. 95