Court Opinion

ID: 9471008
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 03:23:14.828107+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:42:14.086576
License: Public Domain

McKAY, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
When a trial court converts a Rule 12 motion into one for summary judgment pursuant to Rule 56, it is the court’s duty to notify the parties of its intent to make the conversion and to give an adequate opportunity to respond to the new issue. While it is possible that there are circumstances in which the court’s duty may be waived by the parties, see Mustang Fuel Corp. v. Youngstown Sheet and Tube Co., 480 F.2d 607 (10th Cir.1973), this is not a case which would justify such an extreme measure. In the instant case, the appellant merely pointed out in a brief that the appellee’s Rule 12 motion was not a proper Rule 12 motion and might hypothetically be a Rule 56 motion. In addition, in a responsive pleading, the appellee miseharacterized appellant’s observations as an agreement that the motion was a Rule 56(c) motion. Appellant did not respond to this mischaracterization, which of course it had no duty to do.
The notice of conversion of a Rule 12 motion to a Rule 56 motion and the consequences of a failure to "'notify are serious business. It is an unequivocal duty of the trial court. It is very simple to comply with the notice mandate of the rule. I simply do not comprehend why we are continuing to see so many cases in which the trial courts fail to follow that mandate and in which the successful party defends that failure under a theory of waiver. The burden of showing waiver is and ought to be a heavy one. We ought not to be called on repeatedly to reconstruct inadequate records because of the failure to give this notice and get the appropriate responses that would complete the record. We ought not to be required to deal with the probabilities when the realities are so simple to bring into focus. This case will only encourage the courts to ignore a simple mandate of the rules to the continued detriment of the parties and the workload of this court.
I would reverse and remand for failure to comply with Rule 56(c). Torres v. First State Bank of Sierra County, 550 F.2d 1255 (10th Cir.1977); Adams v. Campbell County School District, 483 F.2d 1351 (10th Cir. 1973); Dolese v. United States, 541 F.2d 853 (10th Cir.1976).