Opinion ID: 2976676
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Sigler’s Motion to Consider Medical Records

Text: On June 29, 2007, Sigler filed a motion titled “Motion of Plaintiff-Appellant Shelly Sigler to Have the Court Consider the Medical Record of Dr. David Adams Dated October 5, 2004.” Sigler’s counsel claim that they first became aware of the medical record on March 26, 2007, and the district court docket sheet reflects that on March 27, 2007, Sigler filed a supplement to her exhibit list and her witness list. R. Nos. 47 and 48, No. 1:05-cv-00296. On March 30, 2007, the district court granted Honda’s motion for summary judgment without considering this medical record. Sigler offers two bases upon which we could grant her motion: first, that we may take judicial notice of certain facts under Rule 201 of the Federal Rules of Evidence; and second, that we have an inherent equitable power to supplement the record with material not reviewed by the district court. Mot. to Consider Medical Records at 3 (citing United States v. Murdock, 398 F.3d 491, 499 (6th Cir. 2005)). We deny her motion on both grounds. Federal Rule of Evidence 201 governs judicial notice of “adjudicative facts.” Fed. R. Evid. 201(a). Rule 201(b) provides that “[a] judicially noticed fact must be one not subject to reasonable dispute in that it is either (1) generally known within the territorial jurisdiction of the trial court or (2) capable of accurate and ready determination by resort to sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned.” The evidence that Sigler seeks to add to the record—medical notations from Sigler’s post-accident visit to her treating physician—clearly does not fall within either category. Sigler contends that the Seventh Circuit’s decision in Denius v. Dunlap, 330 F.3d 919 (7th Cir. 2003), supports granting her motion, but Denius in fact demonstrates why her motion is inappropriate under Rule 201. Sigler describes Denius as holding “that the trial court had abused its discretion in refusing to take judicial notice of medical records contained on the National Personnel Record Center’s website.” Pl.’s Mot. at 8. In fact, the Seventh Circuit in Denius permitted judicial notice only “to note that the NPRC [National Personnel Records Center] and the VA [Department of Veterans Affairs] do in fact maintain medical records of retired United States military personnel,” but the court did not permit judicial notice of the contents of any medical records, as Sigler requests that we do. Denius, 330 F.3d at 926 (emphasis added). Denius involved a lawsuit brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 by an employee against a state-government employer for requiring the employee “to authorize the release of a broad range of personal information as a condition of continued employment,” and the issue before the court was whether the state employer’s authorization form, which demanded that employees consent to the release of records maintained by the NPRC, among other agencies, extended to medical records. Id. at 921, 921-27. Although the plaintiff, a retired Air Force technical sergeant, “offered no evidence about the nature of the NPRC,” the Seventh Circuit held that “the fact that the NPRC maintains medical records of military personnel is appropriate for judicial notice because it is not subject to reasonable dispute.” Id. at 925, 926. To take judicial notice of the medical notations made by Sigler’s treating physician bears little resemblance to taking notice of “a factual issue[, such as the role of the NPRC,] that, according to information readily available in the public domain, cannot be reasonably disputed.” Id. at 927. Accordingly, Rule 201 offers Sigler no support. Sigler also argues that United States v. Murdock, 398 F.3d 491 (6th Cir. 2005), supports the proposition that “a court of appeals has discretionary authority to supplement the record with No. 07-5471 Sigler v. American Honda Motor Co. Page 5 material not reviewed by the district court in special circumstances.”5 Id. at 499. In Murdock, we listed “several factors to be considered in deciding whether to exercise that discretion,” including 1) whether proper resolution of the case was beyond any dispute, 2) whether it would be inefficient to remand to the district court for review of additional facts, 3) whether the opposing party had notice of the existence of the disputed evidence, and 4) whether the case is before the court on a habeas corpus claim, because federal appellate judges have “unique powers” in that context. Id. at 500 (quoting Dickerson v. Alabama, 667 F.2d 1364, 1367-68 (11th Cir. 1982)). We also cited the Third Circuit’s opinion in In re Capital Cities/ABC, Inc.’s Application for Access to Sealed Transcripts, 913 F.2d 89 (3d Cir. 1990), which listed a similar set of factors including “whether remanding the case to the district court for consideration of the additional material would be contrary to the interests of justice and the efficient use of judicial resources.” Id. at 97. We hold that Sigler’s motion fails these tests. Sigler produced the information at an extremely late stage, offered essentially no explanation for the delay, and should have uncovered the information long before discovery had closed. Sigler’s explanation for the delay is that she has suffered memory loss following the accident and only recently learned that she had visited her treating physician Dr. Adams on October 5, 2004, when she received an overdue billing notice from the office in late March 2007. In her motion, Sigler notes that Dr. Adams treated her on the day of her accident at Bradley Memorial Hospital, Pl.’s Mot. at 6; see also J.A. 148-50 (Bradley Memorial Hospital Records), and given that Sigler’s condition and the effects of her accident is the central issue in this lawsuit, Sigler had every reason to request all relevant medical records from physicians who treated her, and to do so well before the close of the discovery period. Permitting her to supplement the record on appeal with information that she could have easily obtained much earlier would not advance the interests of justice and would not further efficient use of judicial resources. See Capital Cities, 913 F.2d at 97. Our decision denying Sigler’s motion in our court does not, however, prevent the district court on remand from reaching its own decision regarding this medical record.