Court Opinion

ID: 9587312
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:20:56.60835+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:37:12.651372
License: Public Domain

THOMAS, Justice,
concurring specially, with whom URBIGKIT, Chief Justice, joins.
I concur in the disposition of this case according to the majority opinion. I am troubled that the Legislature of the State of Wyoming apparently read the opinion of the court in Hoem v. State, 756 P.2d 780 (Wyo.1988), as addressing the narrowness of the class of defendants in the context of equal protection of the law. Read carefully, I am satisfied that, in the Hoem case, this court' made it clear that the equal protection violation was found in the disparity in treatment of injured persons, some of whom were required to submit their cases to the medical review panel while others did not encounter that impediment to pursuing their claims. Obviously, this new legislation does not even address that same deficiency.
I also adhere to the additional rationale to support a conclusion of unconstitutionality set forth in the concurring opinion in Hoem that I authored and in which Justice Urbigkit joined.