Court Opinion

ID: 9700390
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 21:25:40.867448+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:21:08.463447
License: Public Domain

SCHWELB, Associate Judge,
concurring in the judgment:
I agree with my colleagues that the decision of the District of Columbia Board *165of Medicine should be affirmed. For the reasons set forth below, however, I am unable to join the court’s opinion.
In the Superior Court malpractice case, the jury returned a verdict in the plaintiffs favor, and against Dr. Udebiuwa and Howard University, in the amount of $2,300,000. Judgment was entered on the verdict. The defendants appealed. The case was then settled for $1,500,000, and the parties filed a praecipe agreeing that “[a]s a part of the settlement agreement and release, the parties agree that the judgment entered against [the defendants] is to be vacated.” No motion to vacate the judgment was filed, however, and — most significantly — the trial judge did not vacate the judgment. As my colleagues point out, ante, page 162, the parties could not, without the court’s consent, vacate a judgment that the court had entered. Only the court could do that. Therefore, the judgment remained in effect and collaterally estopped Dr. Udebiuwa from contesting the facts found against him by the jury, namely, that he had committed malpractice against the patient who had sued him in the Superior Court.
That, to me, should be the end of this appeal, or at least of the “collateral estop-pel” issue. On these facts, a judgment that has not been vacated has a “collateral estoppel” effect. It does not make any difference, on this appeal from the decision of the District of Columbia Board of Medicine, whether the judgment in the Superior Court case should or should not have been vacated. The fact is that it was not vacated, that it remains in effect, and that the appeal from the judgment has been dismissed, rendering the judgment final.
In spite of the foregoing, my colleagues in the majority address in some detail the question whether a judgment ought to be vacated when the parties have settled the case during the pendency of an appeal. They tell us, inter alia, that a judgment of the court is “valuable to the legal community as a whole,” that it may have “preclu-sive benefits for third parties,” and that only “exceptional circumstances may conceivably counsel granting a motion for vacation at the behest of settling parties.” Ante at pages 162-63 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). These are certainly interesting propositions, but they have absolutely no bearing on the outcome of this case. Even if the law encouraged vacatur following settlement, and even if the judge ought to have granted a hypothetical motion to vacate the judgment if one had been filed, the fact is that the judgment in the Superior Court was not vacated, that no appeal from the judgment remains pending, that the judgment is therefore final, and that it therefore properly serves as a basis for claim preclusion. That is all that matters. In my opinion, the remainder of the discussion is purely advisory and not necessary to the court’s holding.
“[A]n issue is ripe for adjudication only when the parties’ rights may be immediately affected by it.” Allen v. United States, 603 A.2d 1219, 1229 n. 20 (D.C.1992) (en banc) (citing Smith v. Smith, 310 A.2d 229, 231 (D.C.1973)). Even when we sit en banc, we generally decline to issue guidelines which are not required to decide the case before us. Id. As we explained in District of Columbia v. Wical Ltd. Partnership, 630 A.2d 174, 182 (D.C.1993),
[t]he suggestion that this court may “wish to give the trial court guidance” on an issue not yet presented amounts to a request that we write an advisory opinion. This court has no authority to issue advisory opinions regarding questions which may or may not arise. Smith, [supra ], 310 A.2d at 231; see also Allen, [supra ], 603 A.2d at 1228-29 n. 20. “Courts should not decide more *166than the occasion demands.” Younger v. Smith, 30 Cal.App.3d 138, 153, 106 Cal.Rptr. 225, 235 (1973). Like the Supreme Court of Washington,
[a]s a general rule, this court will decide only such questions as are necessary for a determination of the case presented for consideration, and will not render decisions in advance of such necessity ....
Johnson v. Morris, 87 Wash.2d 922, 557 P.2d 1299, 1305 (1976) (en banc) (citation omitted); see also Local No. 8-6, Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers Int’l Union v. Missouri, 361 U.S. 363, 367-68, 80 S.Ct. 391, 4 L.Ed.2d 373 (1960).
In light of the foregoing, I would end the analysis with the determination that Dr. Udebiuwa is collaterally estopped from contesting the determination of malpractice because the judgment in the malpractice case has not been vacated, and I would defer to another day discussion of the circumstances, if any, under which a trial judge should vacate a judgment because the parties have settled the underlying case.