Court Opinion

ID: 9939999
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-02-13 16:02:26.010062+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:42:10.426696
License: Public Domain

NOTICE: NOT FOR OFFICIAL PUBLICATION.
  UNDER ARIZONA RULE OF THE SUPREME COURT 111(c), THIS DECISION IS NOT PRECEDENTIAL
                  AND MAY BE CITED ONLY AS AUTHORIZED BY RULE.

                                     IN THE
              ARIZONA COURT OF APPEALS
                                 DIVISION ONE

                   RICHARD DELEON, Plaintiff/Appellant,

                                         v.

             MCCAULAY NWOJO, et al., Defendants/Appellees.

                              No. 1 CA-CV 23-0238
                                FILED 2-13-2024

            Appeal from the Superior Court in Maricopa County
                           No. CV2018-093889
                The Honorable Peter A. Thompson, Judge

                                   AFFIRMED

                                    COUNSEL

Law Office of Robert M. Gregory P.C., Gilbert
By Robert M. Gregory
Counsel for Plaintiff/Appellant

Sanders & Parks P.C., Phoenix
By Robin E. Burgess
Counsel for Defendants/Appellees
                        DELEON v. NWOJO, et al.
                          Decision of the Court

                      MEMORANDUM DECISION

Presiding Judge Daniel J. Kiley delivered the decision of the Court, in which
Judge Kent E. Cattani and Judge D. Steven Williams joined.

K I L E Y, Presiding Judge:

¶1           After undergoing spinal surgery with an unsatisfactory
outcome, Robert DeLeon sued Macaulay Nwojo, M.D., for medical
malpractice. Because DeLeon failed to present admissible evidence that
Nwojo breached the applicable standard of care, the superior court granted
summary judgment for Nwojo. We affirm.

                FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

¶2           DeLeon underwent surgery for multilevel degenerative disc
disease in July 2016. Udaya Kakarla, M.D., performed the surgery, and
Nwojo, then a fourth-year neurosurgery resident, assisted. Nwojo
positioned and prepared DeLeon and made the surgical incision. Kakarla
performed all critical aspects of the procedure itself, including performing
a C2-T1 fusion and placing pedicle screws at the fusion site.

¶3           X-rays taken at a follow-up visit showed that the T1 pedicle
screws were loose. Kakarla recommended revisional surgery to replace the
screws and extend the fusion to T3. DeLeon underwent corrective surgery
in August 2018. Nwojo did not participate in the second procedure.

¶4          DeLeon sued Nwojo, Kakarla, and Neurological Associates,
Ltd. d/b/a Barrow Brain and Spine for medical negligence.1

¶5           DeLeon’s standard of care expert, Matthew Moore, M.D.,
opined at his deposition that, “the resident,” i.e., Nwojo, fell below the
standard of care by “incorrect[ly] plac[ing] . . . the T1 pedicle screw.”
Moore’s understanding that Nwojo placed the pedicle screws was based on
information provided by DeLeon’s counsel. The following exchange then
occurred:

1 To bind the surgeons’ marital communities, DeLeon also named their

spouses as defendants. See A.R.S. § 25-215(D).

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                        DELEON v. NWOJO, et al.
                          Decision of the Court

      Counsel:      [I]s your only criticism relating to Dr. Nwojo
                    himself applicable only if Dr. Nwojo actually
                    placed the screw or screws?

      Moore:        Correct.

¶6           A month and a half after his deposition, DeLeon served an
unverified supplemental disclosure statement stating in part that, after
reviewing additional evidence, Moore formed supplemental opinions that
Nwojo breached the standard of care in various other ways, including
inadequately documenting the procedure and failing to communicate
“important details” to Kakarla “so that he could more readily respond to
[DeLeon’s] intraoperative and post-operative condition.”

¶7            Nwojo moved for summary judgment, arguing in part that
DeLeon failed to present evidence that Nwojo was negligent. Nwojo
asserted that DeLeon’s standard of care expert had identified the improper
placement of “pedicle screws at the T1 level during the spine surgery” as
the “single” act of negligence attributable to Nwojo, and because the
uncontroverted evidence established that “Dr. Kakarla, and not Dr. Nwojo,
placed these screws,” DeLeon’s claim against Nwojo failed for lack of
evidentiary support.

¶8              In response, DeLeon argued that his supplemental disclosure
statement set forth Moore’s “rebuttal opinions” that establish “with great
specificity . . . how Dr. Nwojo’s actions breached the standard of care.”
Although DeLeon attached his supplemental disclosure statement to his
response, he did not submit an affidavit from Moore.

¶9             The superior court granted Nwojo’s motion for summary
judgment, determining that DeLeon had presented no admissible evidence
of any act or omission by Nwojo that fell below the standard of care. Noting
that, “[a]s a general rule, an unsworn and unproven assertion is not a fact
that a trial court can consider in ruling on a motion for summary
judgment,” the court held that, in the absence of a supporting affidavit, the
rebuttal expert opinions set forth in DeLeon’s supplemental disclosure
statement were not the kind of “admissible facts” required to withstand
summary judgment. The court added that “any other alleged breaches of
standard of care by Dr. Nwojo lack any causal connection to claimed
injuries alleged by [DeLeon].”

¶10          DeLeon timely appealed after the court entered a final
judgment for Nwojo under Arizona Rule of Civil Procedure (“Rule”) 54(b).
We have jurisdiction under A.R.S. § 12-2101(A)(1).

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                         DELEON v. NWOJO, et al.
                           Decision of the Court

                               DISCUSSION

¶11            DeLeon asserts that the superior court “erred in holding that
there were no genuine issues of material fact concerning whether Dr. Nwojo
was medically negligent.” He does not dispute that Nwojo’s motion and
accompanying evidence made a prima facie showing of Nwojo’s entitlement
to summary judgment but insists that “Dr. Moore’s amended standard of
care opinions disclosed in” DeLeon’s supplemental disclosure statement
“should have been given full weight by the [c]ourt” in determining the
existence of factual disputes precluding summary judgment.

¶12            To prevail on a medical negligence claim, a plaintiff must
establish, inter alia, that the defendant physician “breached the applicable
standard of care.” St. George v. Plimpton, 241 Ariz. 163, 165-66, ¶ 12 (App.
2016). “Unless [medical] malpractice is grossly apparent, the standard of
care” in a medical negligence case “must be established by expert medical
testimony.” Rasor v. Nw. Hosp., LLC, 243 Ariz. 160, 163, ¶ 12 (2017).

¶13           Summary judgment is appropriate when there is “no genuine
dispute as to any material fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment
as a matter of law.” Ariz. R. Civ. P. 56(a). We review a grant of summary
judgment de novo and view the evidence and reasonable inferences in the
light most favorable to DeLeon as the non-moving party. See Zambrano v. M
& RC II LLC, 254 Ariz. 53, 58, ¶ 9 (2022).

¶14            If the moving party makes a prima facie showing of its
entitlement to summary judgment, “the burden shifts to the opposing party
to produce sufficient competent evidence” to establish a factual dispute
precluding summary judgment. GM Dev. Corp. v. Cmty. Am. Mortg. Corp.,
165 Ariz. 1, 5 (App. 1990). Evidence offered to controvert a motion for
summary judgment must be admissible at trial. Ariz. R. Civ. P. 56(e)
(“When a summary judgment motion is made and [properly]
supported[,] . . . [t]he opposing party must, by affidavits or [other materials
that would be admissible in evidence] set forth specific facts showing a
genuine issue for trial.”). “Generally, the ‘facts’ which the trial court will
consider as ‘admissible in evidence’ in ruling on a motion for summary
judgment are those which are set forth in an affidavit or a deposition; an
unsworn and unproven assertion in a memorandum is not such a fact.”
Prairie State Bank v. I.R.S., 155 Ariz. 219, 221, n.1A (App. 1987) (citation
omitted).

¶15          DeLeon contends that, in granting summary judgment, the
court unfairly faulted him for not disclosing his supplemental expert

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                         DELEON v. NWOJO, et al.
                           Decision of the Court

opinions in affidavit form. According to DeLeon, “[t]here is no requirement
in Rule 26.1 or elsewhere in the Arizona Rules of Civil Procedure that
amended expert opinions disclosed in supplemental disclosure statements
be in the form of an affidavit,” nor does A.R.S. § 12-2603 require that
supplemental expert opinions be disclosed in an affidavit. His negligence
claim against Nwojo was “not decided on the merits,” he complains,
because of the court’s own view “of the manner in which expert disclosures
should be made.”

¶16          But the court did not, as DeLeon claims, grant summary
judgment because it disapproved of the manner in which DeLeon disclosed
his expert’s rebuttal opinions. Instead, the court granted summary
judgment because DeLeon failed to controvert Nwojo’s motion with
admissible evidence that Nwojo fell below the applicable standard of care.
The court correctly held that DeLeon’s unverified supplemental disclosure
statement, unaccompanied by an expert’s affidavit, was insufficient to
controvert Nwojo’s motion. See Miller v. Hehlen, 209 Ariz. 462, 473, ¶ 38
(App. 2005) (affirming summary judgment where non-moving party
submitted only her own disclosure statement to controvert motion,
reasoning that “descriptions of witness testimony in a Rule 26.1 disclosure
statement” are not “sufficient” to “defeat a motion for summary judgment
accompanied by the sworn affidavit of the movant”).

¶17           DeLeon argues that summary judgment was improperly
granted because he was not afforded an opportunity to cure any deficiency
in his supplemental expert disclosures. In support of his position, he relies
on Rule 26.1(d)(2), which, he contends, establishes the “mechanism for
disputing the form of expert disclosures.”

¶18             Rule 26.1(d)(2) provides in part that “[d]isputes over the form
or sufficiency of expert disclosures must be presented” at a scheduling
conference or under the expedited procedure for resolving disclosure
disputes set forth in Rule 26(d). Summary judgment proceedings, however,
are governed by Rule 56, not Rule 26.1. Nothing in Rule 26.1 supersedes or
negates Rule 56’s requirement that the non-moving party present affidavits
or “materials that would be admissible in evidence” to controvert a
properly-supported motion for summary judgment. See Ariz. R. Civ. P.
56(c)(5)-(6); see also Portonova v. Wilkinson, 128 Ariz. 501, 502 (1981) (“The
opposing party must show that evidence is available which justifies going
to trial, and that evidence . . . must be admissible at trial.”) (cleaned up).
Because DeLeon presented no admissible evidence to show that Nwojo
breached the applicable standard of care, the court properly granted

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                       DELEON v. NWOJO, et al.
                         Decision of the Court

summary judgment on his medical negligence claim. See Rudy v. Meshorer,
146 Ariz. 467, 471 (App. 1985).

¶19           In granting summary judgment, the superior court noted that
DeLeon served his supplemental disclosure statement after the September
1, 2022 deadline for disclosure of rebuttal opinions set forth in the
scheduling order. Pointing to this portion of the court’s ruling, DeLeon
argues the court erred by “ignoring” his expert’s rebuttal opinions “on the
grounds that they had not been timely disclosed.” The parties agreed to
extend the disclosure deadline until November, he contends, so the court
erred by treating “September 1, 2022 as the rebuttal expert deadline.”

¶20          But again, the court did not grant summary judgment on the
ground that DeLeon’s rebuttal expert disclosures were untimely but
because he presented no admissible evidence of his expert’s opinions in
opposition to Nwojo’s motion. DeLeon’s argument thus fails.

¶21            The court concluded its grant of summary judgment with the
statement that “any other alleged breaches of standard of care by Dr. Nwojo
lack any causal connection to claimed injuries alleged by [DeLeon].”
DeLeon argues the court erred in finding evidence of causation lacking
because Nwojo did not raise any “causation” argument in his motion for
summary judgment. Accordingly, he contends, “it was error for the [c]ourt
to conclude sua sponte that there was no causal connection between Dr.
Nwojo’s care and [the] injuries sustained by [DeLeon].” Because summary
judgment was warranted given DeLeon’s failure to present admissible
evidence establishing Nwojo’s breach of the applicable standard of care, we
need not address DeLeon’s challenge to the court’s holding that DeLeon
also failed to establish causation.

                             CONCLUSION

¶22         We affirm. Nwojo may recover taxable costs incurred in this
appeal upon compliance with ARCAP 21.

                          AMY M. WOOD • Clerk of the Court
                          FILED: AA

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