Court Opinion

ID: 9587792
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:26:20.43579+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:34:30.104585
License: Public Domain

OPALA, Justice,
concurring in part and dissenting in part:
I recede from today’s pronouncement because, on the record before it, the trial court clearly erred when it rendered judgment for the defendants, even though it was legally correct in sustaining their demurrer to the petition. I would remand the case with directions that plaintiff be permitted to amend her petition.
While the demurrer, filed on August 13, 1980, was pending, plaintiff sought to discover the availability of public liability coverage for the harmful episode in suit, by interrogatories propounded on August 27. The court’s judgment was rendered below September 22, 1980.
Whenever the demurrer to a petition is sustained in preanswer stages, our statutory law affords the plaintiff the opportunity to amend, if the defect can be remedied. 12 *157O.S.1981 § 318; Hart v. Bridges, Okl., 591 P.2d 1172, 1173-1174 [1979]; Maben v. Norvell, Okl., 328 P.2d 425, 427 [1958]. The legal flaw in the petition was plainly remediable. It could have been cured by pleading the existence of public liability coverage for the injurious event in suit. Lament Ind. School Dist. No. 1-95 of Grant County v. Swanson, Okl., 548 P.2d 215, 216-217 [1976]. Lamont plainly holds that whenever a school district does have public liability insurance for the harm that is sought to be vindicated, its immunity is waived “to the extent of the ... coverage only”.
The plaintiff chose not to test the sufficiency of her pleading by electing to stand on it, and the defect found to exist in her petition was plainly curable. Final termination of this lawsuit was hence clearly unwarranted. The court’s decision deprives the plaintiff of a basic right that is firmly secured to her by our Code of Civil Procedure, 12 O.S.1981 §§ 317 and 318. Today’s disposition represents a step back into an era of ritualistic formalism reminiscent of the common-law writ system. I cannot countenance, at this late date, a return to the “one-strike-and-you-are-out” judicial philosophy.
I am authorized to state that WILSON, J., concurs in my view.