Court Opinion

ID: 9713887
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 05:25:04.924378+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:21.210949
License: Public Domain

BOURCIER, Justice,
dissenting.
I would deny Lombardi’s appeal and affirm the Superior Court’s summary judgment in favor of Allstate. Accordingly, I am unable to join in the opinion of my colleagues, and respectfully dissent.
Peter J. Lombardi (Lombardi) was a passenger in a motor vehicle driven by Donna Grattage (Grattage) that was insured by Allstate Insurance Company (Allstate). Lombardi did not sue Grattage, but did file a negligence action against Richard J. Woloohojian (Woloohojian), the driver of the vehicle that struck the Grat-tage vehicle. Unfortunately for Lombardi, Woloohojian’s insurer, American Universal Insurance Company, was placed in receiv*874ership. Lombardi then sought underin-sured and uninsured motorist coverage (UIM) damages from Allstate, which insured the Grattage vehicle. Allstate’s often advertised “good hands,” however, were nowhere to be seen, and Lombardi demanded arbitration under Allstate’s policy-
Before the arbitration proceedings began, Allstate offered Lombardi $25,000, the full limit of its UIM coverage.- He rejected the offer and demanded that Allstate pay him, in addition to the $25,000, interest on that amount from the day of the collision, May 30, 1986. Allstate refused, and the matter proceeded to arbitration. At the time of Allstate’s offer to pay Lombardi the full amount of its UIM coverage and at the time of Lombardi’s insistence upon receiving prejudgment interest, this Court in Allstate Insurance Co. v. Pogorilich, 605 A.2d 1318, 1321 (R.I.1992), had ruled that prejudgment interest in excess of the limits of Allstate’s uninsured/underinsured motorist coverage was not permitted.
After arbitration, the arbitrators, on August 5, 1992, apparently unaware of our previous holding in Pogorilich, awarded Lombardi an amount in excess of Allstate’s UIM policy limits and $29,000 in prejudgment interest.
Following the arbitration award, Allstate tendered a $25,000 check to Lombardi’s attorney, that being the full amount of its UIM coverage, but in accordance with our Pogorilich holding, tendered no prejudgment interest amount on the $25,000 payment. The Allstate check tendered to Lombardi’s attorney was made payable to the attorney and Lombardi and contained in bold lettering the following notice:
“IN FINAL SETTLEMENT OF ANY AND ALL CLAIMS FOR BODILY INJURY UNDER UNINSURED MOTORIST COVERAGE ARISING FROM ACCIDENT ON MAY 30,1986.”
Both Lombardi and his attorney endorsed and cashed Allstate’s check. I would conclude, as did the Superior Court hearing justice, that when Lombardi accepted Allstate’s check, without condition or reservation, and thereafter cashed the check and retained its proceeds, he thereby released Allstate from any and all claims , that he then had against it arising from the May 30, 1986 accident. That release absolved Allstate of any claim Lombardi had, and barred him from attempting to pursue any claim or action originating from the May 30, 1986 accident. See Lamoureaux v. Merrimack Mutual Fire Insurance Co., 751 A.2d 1290, 1293 (R.I.2000); Collins v. Fairways Condominiums Association, 592 A.2d 147, 148 (R.I.1991); Harrington v. Aetna Life and Casualty Co., 441 So.2d 1255, 1256-57 (La.Ct.App.1983); Butters v. Kane, 347 A.2d 602, 604 (Me.1975).
Despite his having accepted and endorsed Allstate’s $25,000 check, which was in full and final settlement of all his claims against Allstate arising from the 1986 accident, Lombardi, three months later, petitioned the Superior Court to confirm the arbitration award, which was based upon his now settled and discharged claim, and sought additional money for prejudgment interest from Allstate. Unfortunately, the attorney handling the claim for Allstate, who obviously believed that the claim had been disposed of by the settlement, and, who was then suffering from what was a terminal cancer, did not respond to Lombardi’s petition and failed to appear and object to its being granted on the hearing day. The hearing justice was not made aware of the previous settlement and was obviously unaware of our holding in Pogo-rilich. In the absence of any objection from Allstate, the hearing justice granted *875Lombardi’s petition to confirm the arbitration award and entered prejudgment interest on the award. A copy of the judgment was mailed to Allstate’s attorney, who was then dying of cancer, and she failed to respond to the judgment.
Thereafter, on March 7, 1994, Lombardi caused an execution on the judgment to issue. Allstate continued to refuse to pay any amount in excess of the $25,000 policy limit it had previously paid to Lombardi, and on November 4, 1994, Lombardi filed a civil action for debt-on-judgment against Allstate (later consolidated with this action) for the approximate sum of $46,000. On December 20, 1994, when Allstate failed to answer Lombardi’s debt-on-judgment action, he requested an entry of default. Before any default judgment could enter, Allstate filed its answer, on January 13, 1995, and a new attorney entered his appearance for Allstate. Allstate suggested that its failure to oppose the confirmation petition was caused by the different law firms handling different portions of the claims arising from the accident, as well as by the intervening illness and death of Allstate’s arbitration hearing attorney.
Seeking relief from the judgment confirming the arbitration award and relief from the default in the debt-on-judgment action, Allstate then filed an independent equitable action on March 14, 1995, pursuant to our holding in Paul v. Fortier, 117 R.I. 284, 366 A.2d 550 (1976). In its complaint, Allstate asserted that the judgment confirming the arbitration award was a nullity because not only had it offered the $25,000 policy limit to Lombardi before the arbitration began, but also,- because thereafter, Lombardi had accepted, endorsed and cashed a check from Allstate for $25,000, which represented the full amount of Allstate’s liability to him and which contained clear warning language on its face stating that payment was “[i]n final settlement of any and all [UIM] claims.” Moreover, Allstate averred that Lombardi still had recourse in his pending action against Woloohojian for any remaining damages that he may have suffered in the May 30, 1986 accident that he believed had not been compensated for in the $25,000 UIM settlement.
The Superior Court, on motion, consolidated all three actions — Lombardi’s underlying confirmation-of-the-arbitration-award lawsuit, Lombardi’s debt-on-judgment action, and Allstate’s independent equitable relief-from-judgment petition. Lombardi then filed motions for summary judgment on his debt-on-judgment action and on Allstate’s equitable petition for relief from judgment. A Superior Court motion justice denied Lombardi’s motions. She found that the judgment confirming the arbitration award was void because this Court’s decision in Pogorilich established that Allstate could be liable only for the limits of its insurance policy, an amount that Lombardi conceded Allstate previously had paid to him. She also noted that this Court had issued its Pogorilich opinion before the arbitrator’s award was entered in favor of Lombardi. Thereafter, Allstate moved for summary judgment on its independent equitable action, seeking relief from the execution that had issued on the final judgment entered following completion of the arbitration proceeding. The motion justice, after a hearing, granted Allstate’s motions for summary judgment on the basis that the judgment confirming the arbitration was void because it was contrary to this Court’s holding in Pogorilich. Ultimately, judgment entered for Allstate in all the consolidated cases.
In his appeal to this Court, Lombardi argues that the motion justice erred in concluding that the judgment confirming the arbitration award was void. He contends that a valid judgment entered and *876that Allstate sat on its rights by negligently failing to raise the Pogorilich case or its accord-and-satisfaction defense either before the arbitrators or before the Superior Court in the arbitration confirmation proceeding. Allstate, he contends, also was negligent in failing to oppose his confirmation petition. Therefore, he argues that Allstate should not have been allowed to obtain relief from the final judgment in the arbitration proceeding because it had been negligent in failing to raise any objection to the entry of that final judgment. Of course, Lombardi conveniently overlooks the undeniable fact that he had previously released all of his claims against Allstate, including his arbitration judgment claim, and was not entitled to any additional monies from Allstate. Like the store customer who tenders the young store cashier a $20 bill to pay for a $10 item and who receives back $80 in change, Lombardi or his attorney ought to have informed the arbitration confirmation hearing justice about the previous total settlement, just as the store customer ought to have informed the cashier of his or her obvious error.
Allstate, in its independent equitable action to set aside Lombardi’s judgment, asserted that the judgment confirming the arbitration award was a nullity because Lombardi had endorsed its $25,000 settlement check to him and that the cheek clearly stated on its face that it was paid in final settlement of all of Lombardi’s claims, including its UIM claim against Allstate arising out of the 1986 accident. Thus, Allstate argues, the Superior Court correctly granted summary judgment in its favor on its independent equitable action to set aside the judgment-espeeially in light of the fact that shortly after Lombardi had accepted its settlement check, Allstate’s lawyer, who had been handling the arbitration claim, died, thereby explaining and excusing its failure to object to-Lombardi’s confirmation petition and to the various orders and judgments that entered following that proceeding.
Both parties concede that the underlying material facts, as above related, were not in dispute at the hearing held on Allstate’s motion for summary judgment. Thus, with no factual issues in dispute, the motion justice’s only task was to determine whether Allstate was entitled to summary judgment on its independent equitable action seeking to set aside the judgment confirming the arbitrator’s award.
Analysis
On the record before us in this case, I agree with my colleagues who opine that the hearing justice erred in concluding as reason for entering summary judgment in favor of Allstate that the judgment in question was void because it was contrary to our holding in Pogorilich. The judgment was not void, but yet was subject to challenge and subject to being set aside pursuant to Rule 60(b)(5) of the Superior Court Rules of Civil Procedure or, as in this case, by an independent equitable action. That latter form of relief had been available to a litigant long before the adoption of our civil rules of procedure, and has been incorporated therein. Paul, 117 R.I. at 287, 366 A.2d at 552. In that case, the late Justice Kelleher wrote, “[t]hus, we hold that an independent action may be based upon assertions of inadvertence, surprise or excusable neglect as well as fraud.” Id. at 290, 366 A.2d at 553. Later, in In re Lisa Diane G., 537 A.2d 131, 133 (R.I.1988), he wrote that an independent civil action could be employed to seek the identical relief that could not be afforded by Rule 60(b) because of its one year limitation. Rule 60(b) was later amended in 1995 to remove the one year restriction with respect to sections (4), (5), and (6) in 60(b), replacing that restriction with a “reasonable time” limitation.
*877In this case, there is no question but that Allstate, if it had filed a timely Rule 60(b)(5) motion for relief from Lombardi’s final arbitration judgment, such relief would have been mandated. Vaughan v. Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co., 702 A.2d 198 (D.C.1997). Relief from a judgment pursuant to Rule 60(b)(5) is appropriate where the limit of a policy has already been paid in final settlement of the underlying claim. Vaughan, 702 A.2d at 206. Here, Lombardi does not dispute that he expressly released Allstate from any further liability to him when he accepted the $25,000 check “[i]n final settlement” of his UIM claims against Allstate.
Moreover, Allstate appears to have more than adequately rebutted its alleged negligence in connection with the final judgment — and thereby excused its failure to oppose the confirmation petition and to appeal from the judgment that had entered in that proceeding. It explained that its arbitration attorney had died after the arbitration hearing had concluded and that, as a result, it never received actual notice of the confirmation proceedings and the various orders and forms of judgment that Lombardi had sent to the deceased attorney’s office in time for Allstate to object thereto or otherwise to oppose the entry of judgment or to appeal therefrom in a timely manner. Accordingly, I believe that the hearing justice properly vacated the earlier judgment in favor of Lombardi and properly entered summary judgment in favor of Allstate, but that she did so for a wrong reason. On the facts and circumstances that were presented to the motion justice, I conclude that it was “no longer equitable that the judgment should have prospective application.” Rule 60(b)(5).
This Court certainly has the prerogative to affirm a decision made by a trial justice on grounds different from those relied upon by the trial justice. Ahlburn v. Clark, 728 A.2d 449, 452 (R.I.1999); Thibodeau v. Metropolitan Property and Liability Insurance Co., 682 A.2d 474, 475 (R.I.1996) (citing Andersen v. Sundlun, 625 A.2d 213, 215 (R.I.1993)(“Supreme Court can affirm the grant of summary judgment on a basis not relied on by the Court below if supported by the law and the record”)). In this case, Allstate was certainly entitled to relief from the judgment confirming the arbitration award because, pursuant to Rule 60(b)(5), the judgment had been previously “satisfied, released, or discharged” and it was “no longer equitable that the judgment should have prospective application.” In its independent equitable action, Allstate averred that before the challenged judgment had entered, Lombardi already had received full satisfaction of Allstate’s maximum liability to Lombardi under the $25,000 UIM liability limit in the insurance policy and had released Allstate from all his 1986 accident claims. Lombardi conceded that he received the $25,000 payment and also conceded that he had accepted and negotiated the check for that amount from Allstate. He has never contested the fact that the check contained a statement on its face indicating that it was “[i]n final settlement” for all his UIM claims against Allstate arising out of the 1986 accident. Under these circumstances, Allstate was clearly entitled to summary judgment on its equitable action to set aside the arbitration confirmation judgment and should not be denied that relief simply because the motion hearing justice gave a wrong reason for doing so.
For all the reasons above set out, I would affirm the Superior Court’s entry of summary judgment in favor of Allstate, because Lombardi’s judgment against Mí-state had been previously satisfied, released and discharged, and I would affirm the denial of Lombardi’s motion for sum*878mary judgment on his debt-on-judgment action and deny his appeal.