Court Opinion

ID: 9635775
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 14:04:21.800884+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:09:35.348267
License: Public Domain

DISSENTING OPINION BY
President Judge LEADBETTER.
I must respectfully dissent. First, I do not agree that Mr. Leckey “substantially complied” with Rule 1311.1. While he stated damages in his pretrial statement, Mr. Leckey did not attach any documents and did not include all the elements of the form specifically required by Rule 1311.1(e). It may be true, as Appellant *427avers, that some of these documents were given to PennDOT at the arbitration hearing and the remaining ones were given at a later date. However, Rule 1311.1 applies in the situation of a trial de novo and so clearly contemplates that the opposing party may already be in possession of the documentary evidence from the arbitration hearing.
Nonetheless, since it does not appear that DOT was actually prejudiced in this situation, I might agree with the majority’s decision to overlook Mr. Leckey’s failure to comply with the rule if he were not an attorney, or if he were representing a client who would suffer because of his lawyer’s negligence. However, Mr. Leck-ey is an attorney and he represents only himself in this case. Rule 1311.1 is simple, clear and explicit. It provides a form that anyone, even a pro se litigant, can easily follow, and there is no excuse for an attorney to fail to do so. Indeed, Mr. Leckey has suggested no reason why he chose to ignore the rule and adopt his own idea of the appropriate notice to give opposing counsel. Presumably, he simply didn’t bother to check the rule, but that is a lawyer’s job. Furthermore, as the majority opinion points out, Mr. Leckey served his pretrial statement and produced the additional documents only after DOT had moved for sanctions because Mr. Leckey had ignored its request for production of documents. Our procedural rules are not suggestions, and if the courts adopt the attitude that they do not matter, I do not understand how we can expect the Bar to respect them.
While the trial judge had discretion to waive the rule, he also had discretion to enforce it and, under the circumstances presented here, I would affirm his ruling.
Judge COHN JUBELIRER joins in this dissenting opinion.