Court Opinion

ID: 9684375
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 13:55:08.965035+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:55.297652
License: Public Domain

Robert L. Brown, Justice, concurring. I concur with stice, by one aspect of the majority’s reasoning. The issue raised by Buck Jones is whether he could file a compulsory counterclaim raising new issues after the circuit court had issued his letter opinion resolving the case. Clearly, he could not, because he was simply too late. The majority’s analysis, in part, deals with whether Buck Jones could amend his answer to include a counterclaim, using as a vehicle Arkansas Rule of Civil Procedure 15(a). Rule 15(a) permits amendments to pleadings “at any time without leave of the court.” Rule 15(a) further states that if the circuit court determines prejudice would result to the opposing party by the amendment and the case would be unduly delayed, it may strike the amended pleading. Despite Rule 15(a), Arkansas Rule of Civil Procedure 13(a) mandates that compulsory counterclaims be filed at the time of a responsive pleading, and this is the rule that the circuit court relied on in dismissing the counterclaim. The circuit court did not even address or rule on Jones’s Rule 15(a) argument. Moreover, a new pleading raising a new claim after the case is decided and a letter opinion issued is simply too late, either under Rule 13(a) regarding compulsory counterclaims or under Rule 15(a) regarding amended pleadings. Accordingly, I would not engage in a Rule 15(a) analysis, because I conclude the rule has no relevance to the facts at hand. In addition, I would hold that amendments to pleadings raising new issues after the judge has made his decision should not occur under any circumstances. Policy considerations do not support any other conclusion. No party should be permitted to wait for a decision and then bring, in effect, a new lawsuit after losing on the merits of his initial claim. This flies in the face of the whole notion of compulsory counterclaims and runs directly counter to an orderly resolution of litigant issues. In short, I would not analyze whether prejudice accrued to Double D Properties under Rule 15(a), because I determine Rule 15(a) is simply inapplicable to the facts of this case. That essentially is what the circuit court decided. For these reasons, I respectfully concur.