Court Opinion

ID: 9548337
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:01:57.405854+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:18:49.306243
License: Public Domain

OPALA, Vice Chief Justice,
dissenting.
The court today reverses the Oklahoma Tax Commission’s [OTC’s] assessment of additional franchise taxes against the Tulsa Tribune Company [Tribune] and remands the cause for further proceedings.
*896I am unable to join in this pronouncement. I would dismiss this appeal as having been mooted by OTC’s admitted midap-peal withdrawal of its contested assessment and would order that OTC pay Tribune’s appeal-related counsel fees and litigation expenses. The issue sought to be resolved is no longer part of a lively “case or controversy” between antagonistic demands. We are wasting valuable government resources on resolving a controversy that is no longer viable.
I
MATERIAL MIDAPPEAL DEVELOPMENTS
While appellate review is generally confined to the record presented for corrective process, a well-recognized exception permits an appellate tribunal to take cognizance of those facts occurring during the pendency of an appeal which adversely affect the court’s capacity to administer effective relief.1 Rule 72 permits this court to receive evidence in favor of or opposition to an appeal’s dismissal. By affidavit attached to a dismissal motion the movant can apprise this court of any material mi-dappeal development.3
OTC seeks to have the appeal dismissed for mootness. We are informed by affidavit of the following uncontroverted facts which occurred after the contested tax assessment came to be appealed: (a) OTC directed its franchise tax division on September 16, 1986 to withdraw the March 25, 1983 assessment against Tribune; (b) by letter of September 22, 1986 the March 25th assessment was withdrawn; and (c) no protests of additional franchise tax assessments were pending before OTC on October 3, 1986. Tribune, which now has the burden to overcome this midappeal development, tenders no counter-affidavit in response to the dismissal motion.
II
EXCEPTIONS TO MOOTNESS DOCTRINE
Oklahoma jurisprudence recognizes but two “escape hatches” from the mootness doctrine — the public-interest4 and the likelihood-of-recurrence5 exceptions. Neither of these exceptions is invocable here.
While the question before us presents a controversy over public revenue — and hence arguably is one of public inter*897est6 — the likelihood of its recurrence in the same or in a substantially similar legal context is at best one of pure conjecture.
The withdrawn tax assessment covered the years 1982-1983. Reassessment of the tax against Tribune for the same period would be subject to a bar of limitations.7 OTC’s midappeal affidavit states that no tax protest was then pending by any franchise taxpayer. Tribune does not inform us of additional franchise taxes being assessed against other entities or of any pending protests by taxpayers similarly affected. Moreover, Tribune has not shown by counter-affidavit any facts supporting its assertion that OTC is likely to impose the contested tax in the future; neither has it demonstrated that if such a tax assessment were imposed again, the contest could not be fully litigated.8 In short, Tribune has not met its burden of showing that the issue raised in this appeal retains a residue of viability because it is based on circumstances “capable of repetition, yet evading review.” 9
Because the precise issue tendered here is now time-barred and the likelihood of its recurrence in a substantially similar context is at best conjectural, I would order the appeal dismissed but would direct that OTC pay for Tribune’s appeal-related legal services and litigation expenses.10

. See Lawrence v. Cleveland County Home Loan Auth., Okl., 626 P.2d 314, 315 [1981]; Brown Investment Co. v. Hickox, Okl., 369 P.2d 807, 808 [1962]; Carlton v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Ins. Co., Okl., 309 P.2d 286, 289-290 [1957]; and City of Tuba v. Chamblee, 188 Okl. 94, 106 P.2d 796, 798 [1940].

. Rule 7, Rules of the Supreme Court of Oklahoma, 12 O.S.1981, Ch. 15, App. 1, provides:
"All motions, petitions, applications or suggestions shall contain a brief statement of facts and of the objects thereof, and except in cases where all the facts relied upon are of record in this Court, shall be supported by affidavit." [Emphasis mine.]

. Brown Investment Co. v. Hickox, supra note 1 at 808; and Carlton v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Ins. Co., supra note 1 at 289-290.

. Westinghouse Elec. v. Grand River Dam Auth., Okl., 720 P.2d 713, 720 [1986]; Lawrence v. Cleveland County Home Loan Auth., supra note 1 at 316; Application of Goodwin, Okl., 597 P.2d 762, 764 [1979]; Special Indemnity Fund v. Reynolds, 199 Okl. 570, 188 P.2d 841, 842 [1948]; Peppers Refining Co. v. Corporation Commission, 198 Okl. 451, 179 P.2d 899, 901 [1947]; and Payne v. Jones, 193 Okl. 609, 146 P.2d 113, 116 [1944]. In Goodwin, supra at 764, we said that "[w]henever widespread interest may demand an immediate resolution of some vital public law issue, no impediment arising from infirmity in the procedural posture of the case — however well recognized in purely private litigation — will bar our exercise of reviewing power.”

. Lawrence v. Cleveland County Home Loan Auth., supra note 1 at 315-316. See also In re D.B.W., Okl., 616 P.2d 1149, 1151 [1980], where an individual had been involuntarily committed to a mental institution and was discharged from the hospital while the appeal from the commitment order was pending. In D.B.W. the court, relying on the rationale of Rex v. Owens, 585 F.2d 432 [10th Cir.1978] and Southern P.T. Co. v. Interstate Com. Com., 219 U.S. 498, 515, 31 S.Ct. 279, 283, 55 L.Ed. 310 [1911], stated that the case was not moot because the litigant there could be subjected repeatedly to brief periods of involuntary commitment, with each instance evading judicial review.

. OTC argues that there is neither widespread interest in the resolution of this case nor does the issue have “wide-ranging ramifications" which would characterize the controversy as one of broad public interest. It asserts that only that corporation which "fail[s] to use the ‘equity method' of accounting to account for its investments in affiliates and subsidiaries” would be affected. This narrowly framed issue, OTC asserts, does not have far-reaching effect.
Tribune, on the other hand, attempts to refute this statement by directing us to OTC’s response to the petition-in-error and its motion to extend briefing time. There, OTC asserts that the issue “would significantly affect other taxpayers" and that it “is of great and far-reaching importance to domestic and foreign corporations doing business in Oklahoma.”

. The terms of 68 O.S.1981 § 223(a) provide in pertinent part:
“No assessment of any tax levied under the provisions of any state tax law except as provided in the following paragraphs of this section, shall be made after the expiration of three (3) years from the date the return was required to be filed or the date the return was filed, whichever period expires the later, and no proceedings by tax warrant or in court without the previous assessment for the collection of such tax shall be begun after the expiration of such period." [Emphasis mine.]

. The Oklahoma Tax Code (68 O.S.Supp.1987 §§ 221 and 68 O.S.1981 § 225) provides for an adequate review of OTC assessments.
The pertinent terms of § 221 are:
" * * * (c) Within thirty (30) days after the mailing of the aforesaid proposed [tax] assessment, the taxpayer may file with the Tax Commission a written protest under oath, signed by himself or his duly-authorized agent_

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(g) Within a reasonable time after the hearing herein provided for, the Tax Commission shall make and enter an order in writing in which it shall set forth the disposition made of the protest and a copy of such order shall forthwith be mailed to the taxpayer.... The taxpayer may within the time and in the manner provided for by Section 225 of this Code, appeal to the Supreme Court....” [Emphasis added.]
The terms of § 225 provide in pertinent part: “(a) Any taxpayer aggrieved by any order, ruling, or finding of the Tax Commission directly affecting such taxpayer may appeal therefrom directly to the Supreme Court of Okla-homa_” [Emphasis mine.]

. In re D.B.W., supra note 5 at 1151; Southern P.T. Co. v. Interstate Com. Com., supra note 5, 219 U.S. at 515 and 31 S.Ct. at 283; and Rex v. Owens, supra note 5.

. OTC’s conduct bears the earmarks of vexa-tiousness. The agency waited until after Tribune had filed its brief-in-chief before attempting to moot the controversy by withdrawing the contested assessment and then moving for dismissal upon that ground. See City Nat. Bank & Trust Co. v. Owens, Okl., 565 P.2d 4, 8-9 [1977] and Moses v. Hoebel, Okl., 646 P.2d 601, 603 [1982]. Both here and in Owens the offending party sought to bring about a controversy’s abrupt end by conduct designed to thwart its resolution in due course of a judicial proceeding. The state may no longer be regarded as absolutely protected by sovereign immunity from counsel-fee liability for vexatious or bad-faith litigation conduct of its lawyers or functionar*898ies. See State ex rel. Poulos v. State Bd. of Equal., Okl., 646 P.2d 1269, 1274-1275 [1982], See also the terms of 12 O.S.Supp.1987 § 941(B), an after-enacted statute, whose provisions impose counsel-fee liability on the agency that proceeds without "reasonable basis" or acts in a "frivolous” manner. The provisions of § 941(B), pertinent here, are:
"The respondent in any proceeding brought before any state administrative tribunal by any state agency, board, commission, department, authority or bureau authorized to make rules or formulate orders shall be entitled to recover against such state entity court costs, witness fees and reasonable attorney fees if the tribunal or a court of proper jurisdiction determines that the proceeding was brought without reasonable basis or is frivolous.... This subsection shall apply to any proceeding before any state administrative tribunal commenced on or after November 1, 1987.” [Emphasis added.]