Court Opinion

ID: 9534420
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:39:23.43483+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:30:35.227138
License: Public Domain

STEWART, Associate Chief Justice,
dissenting:
The majority rules that because plaintiffs did not post a supersedeas bond and obtain a stay of the trial court’s judgment which denied plaintiffs specific performance of a land sale contract and quieted title in defendants, defendants’ sale of the property during the pendency of the appeal has mooted the breach of contract issue. Clearly, the case is not moot if plaintiffs would have a damage remedy in lieu of specific performance on a remand if this Court were to rule that the trial ’ court erred in finding no breach of contract. However, the Court holds that if there were a reversal, plaintiffs would not be entitled to damages in lieu of specific performance on the hyper-technical and, I submit, erroneous ground that plaintiffs failed in their prayer for relief in the complaint to add *723to their request for specific performance the words “and in the alternative, a judgment for damages.”
I submit that if plaintiffs are correct on the merits of their appeal, they clearly would have a remedy for damages even though they neglected to request damages in their complaint. See Eckard v. Smith, 545 P.2d 501 (Utah 1976) (remanding to determine damages after erroneous decree for specific performance had been executed); see also 11 Charles A. Wright & Arthur R. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2905, at 524-25 (1995) (“[S]o long as, upon reversal, restitution can be enforced, payment of the judgment does not make the controversy moot.”). Because the case is not moot, plaintiffs are being denied their right of appeal.
The majority states, “We do not base our examination of pleadings upon the possibility of future amendments.” That position is an anachronistic throwback to the rigidity of common law code pleading and completely ignores the strong policy in our rules of civil procedure in favor of deciding cases on their merits rather than on procedural technicalities. Rule 54(c)(1) of the Utah Rules of Civil Procedure provides that “every final judgment shall grant the relief to which the party in whose favor it is rendered is entitled, even if the party has not demanded such relief in his pleadings.” (Emphasis added.) That rule has been invoked by this Court on numerous occasions to provide for the amendment of pleadings so that substantive law, rather than a procedural technicality based on an insignificant lapse in the pleadings, governs the outcome of a case. E.g., Mabey v. Kay Peterson Constr. Co., 682 P.2d 287, 289-90 (Utah 1984); Combe v. Warren’s Family Drive-Inns, Inc., 680 P.2d 733, 735 (Utah 1984); Behrens v. Raleigh Hills Hosp., 675 P.2d 1179, 1182 (Utah 1983); see also, e.g., Walsh v. Macaire, 102 Cal.App.2d 435, 227 P.2d 517, 520 (1951); Smith v. Hooker/Barnes, Inc., 253 Ga. 514, 322 S.E.2d 268, 269 (1984); Boyle Holding Corp. v. Medgreen Holding Corp., 154 Misc. 189, 276 N.Y.S. 670, 672 (Sup.Ct.1933); Wittick v. Miles, 274 Or. 1, 545 P.2d 121, 124 (1976).
If plaintiffs were to prevail on the merits of this appeal, they would be entitled on remand to request damages by filing a supplemental pleading pursuant to Rule 15(d) of the Utah Rules of Civil Procedure. That rule provides:
Upon motion of a party the court may, upon reasonable notice and upon such terms as are just, permit him to serve a supplemental pleading setting forth transactions or occurrences or events which have happened since the date of the pleading sought to be supplemented. Permission may be granted even though the original pleading is defective in its statement of a claim for relief or defense.
Rule 15(a) provides that a party may amend a pleading by leave of court or written consent of the other party “and leave shall be freely given when justice so requires.” (Emphasis added.)
This Court has consistently held that Rule 15 is to be construed liberally to allow amendments so that cases may be fully and fairly decided on their merits. See Williams v. State Farm Ins. Co., 656 P.2d 966, 971 (Utah 1982) (“[T]he fundamental purpose of our liberalized pleading rules is to afford parties ‘the privilege of presenting whatever legitimate contentions they have pertaining to their dispute.’ ” (quoting Cheney v. Rucker, 14 Utah 2d 205, 211, 381 P.2d 86, 91 (1963))); see also Timm v. Dewsnup, 851 P.2d 1178, 1182-83 (Utah 1993); Bekins Bar V Ranch v. Huth, 664 P.2d 455, 464 (Utah 1983); Cheney v. Rucker, 14 Utah 2d 205, 211, 381 P.2d 86, 91 (1963).
Even on remand, pleadings may be amended to allow the parties to present whatever legitimate contentions they have so that their rights and liabilities may be fully decided, see Call v. City of West Jordan, 727 P.2d 180, 181 (Utah 1986), and this Court has the power to direct the trial court to allow an amendment to the pleadings on remand. Olsen v. Reese, 114 Utah 411, 419, 200 P.2d 733, 738 (1948) (On remand, “[t]he parties are to be permitted to amend their pleadings.”). Thus, if the Court were to reverse and remand this case to adjudicate plaintiffs’ contract action, it could direct the trial court to allow plaintiffs to amend their pleadings or to file a supplemental pleading to include a claim for damages in light of the rule that a *724party is entitled, under Rule 54(c)(1) of the Utah Rules of Civil Procedure, to all appropriate relief, even if not requested. See also Clark v. Second Circuit Court, 741 P.2d 956, 957-58 (Utah 1987).
The majority admits, as indeed it must, that these rules of pleading would have permitted plaintiffs a damage remedy if they had prevailed in the trial court and then, before an appeal was taken, found that defendants could not specifically perform the contract, even though plaintiffs had not asked for damages in their prayer for relief. Nevertheless, the Court holds that a plaintiff is not entitled to damages if the magic words “in the alternative, a judgment for damages” are left out of the prayer for relief and then the plaintiff loses in the trial court, does not file a supersedeas bond, and wins on appeal after the property is sold. The majority suggests no policy and cites no rule as to why the result should be different. Indeed, there is no such policy or rule.
The Court’s sole justification for ruling as it does is that “this court has taken a different approach when an ‘appellant has failed to obtain a stay of the judgment and the remedy sought is thereafter rendered impossible,’ ” citing Kellch v. Westland Minerals Corp., 26 Utah 2d 42, 484 P.2d 726 (1971). However, Kellch does not support the majority’s position. In Kellch, the plaintiffs petitioned for a writ of mandamus in the district court to compel Westland Minerals Corp. to replace the plaintiffs’ investment stock with free trading stock. The trial court granted the writ, and Westland appealed without obtaining a stay. Before this Court issued a decision on the merits, the plaintiffs sold the stock to a third party. This Court ruled that it was “without power to grant any relief to the appellant and upon remand, the court below would be equally powerless." Id. at 43, 484 P.2d at 726 (emphasis added). The reason “the court below would be equally powerless” was that there was no alternative remedy for damages, or any other remedy, that could have been granted by the trial court on the alleged claim, irrespective of what had or had not been pleaded, if the defendant had prevailed on the merits of the appeal. I submit that the majority is simply incorrect in stating that Kellch applies here. Of course a case is moot if no relief can be granted on remand. That is not the case here.
None of the cases the Court cites from other jurisdictions as support for its position is on point. In each case, as in Kellch, no alternative remedy was available once the relief requested for the cause of action asserted was mooted.1 In each case, the appeal was moot because the only remedy for the claim asserted was extinguished while the appeal was pending.2
In sum, plaintiffs have been denied their right of appeal, and if their position on appeal is correct, they have been denied their right to a remedy.
DURHAM, J., concurs in the dissenting opinion of STEWART, Associate C.J.

. Whether another cause of action might provide some kind of remedy presents a different issue than whether there is an alternative remedy for the same cause of action.

. The Court cites the following cases, none of which addresses the issue in this case: Masonry Arts, Inc. v. Mobile County Comm'n, 628 So.2d 334 (Ala.1993); Horvath v. Loesch, 87 Ill.App.3d 615, 43 Ill.Dec. 154, 410 N.E.2d 154 (1980); Jones v. Matthis, 89 Ill.App.3d 929, 45 Ill.Dec. 298, 298-99, 412 N.E.2d 649, 649-50 (1980); Hazzard v. Westview Golf Club, Inc., 217 A.2d 217 (Me.1966); Basiliko v. Welsh, 219 Md. 602, 150 A.2d 220, 220-21 (1959); Wagner v. Boggess Coal & Supply Co., 94 N.E.2d 64, 64-65 (Ohio 1950); Westinghouse Elec. v. Grand River Dam Auth., 720 P.2d 713, 721 (Okla.1986).