Court Opinion

ID: 9747032
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-27 14:53:30.668302+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:25:19.455815
License: Public Domain

KITE, Chief Justice, dissenting,
in which BURKE, Justice, joins.
[T15] I respectfully disagree with the majority opinion's conclusion that the savings statute, Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 1-38-118 (Lexis-Nexis 2009), does not apply to cases brought under the Wyoming Governmental Claims Act (WGCA). Section 1-8-118 provides in relevant part:
If in an action commenced in due time ... the plaintiff fails otherwise than upon the merits and the time limited for the commencement of the action has expired at the date of the ... failure, the plaintiff ... may commenee a new action within one (1) year after the date of the failure....
(Emphasis added). Pursuant to W.R.C.P. 3(b):
For purposes of statutes of limitation, an action shall be deemed commenced on the date of filing the complaint as to each defendant, if service is made on the defendant ... within 60 days after the filing of the complaint. If such service is not made within 60 days the action shall be deemed commenced on the date when service is made.
(Emphasis added).
[T16] In the present case, Ms. Hall commenced her action in due time within the meaning of § 1-3-118 and Rule 8(b). That is, she presented a notice of claim to the county "as an itemized statement in writing" on February 22, 2008, less than four months after the October 31, 2007, collision and well within the two year period the legislature prescribed in § 1-89-118 of the WGCA. She then filed her action against the county on February 20, 2009, within one year after the date she presented the notice of claim to the county as $ 1-89-114 requires. Because the county was served with the complaint on April 17, 2009, within sixty days after it was filed, the action was deemed commenced under W.R.C.P. 8(b) on February 20, 2009.
[T17] When the district court subsequently dismissed the action by order dated July 28, 2009, on the ground that the complaint did not allege compliance with Article 16, § 7 of the Wyoming Constitution, the "time limited for the commencement of the action" had expired. Additionally, Ms. Hall's action "failed] otherwise than upon the merits." See W.R.C.P. 41(b) which makes it clear that a dismissal for lack of jurisdiction is not an adjudication upon the merits.5 Un*586der the savings statute, therefore, Ms. Hall was entitled to commence a new action within one year after the July 2009 order of dismissal. Her new action, filed July 27, 2009, was timely and the district court's order dismissing it for lack of subject matter jurisdiction should be reversed.
[T18] In holding otherwise, the majority concludes the savings statute does not apply to cases brought under the WGCA. It reaches this result by reasoning that if the legislature had intended the savings statute to apply, it would have said so. Contrary to the majority, I would conclude that if the legislature had intended the savings statute not to apply, it would have said so.
[¶ 19] When construing statutory enactments, this Court has repeatedly said:
All statutes are presumed to be enacted by the legislature with full knowledge of the existing state of law with reference thereto and statutes are therefore to be construed in harmony with the existing law, and as a part of an overall and uniform system of jurisprudence, and their meaning and effect is to be determined in connection, not only with the common law and the constitution, but also with reference to the decisions of the courts.
Hannifan v. American Nat'l Bank of Cheyenme, 2008 WY 65, ¶ 7, 185 P.3d 679, 683 (Wyo.2008), citing Voss v. Ralston, 550 P.2d 481, 486 (Wyo.1976). When the legislature enacted the WGCA in 1979, therefore, we must presume it was aware of the savings statute. It can reasonably be concluded that the savings statute is one of the provisions the legislature was referring to in § 1-89-114 when it prefaced the statute of limitations for governmental claims with the language "Except as otherwise provided," actions must be commenced within one year after presentation of the notice of claim.
[¶ 20] We must also presume that the legislature enacted the WGCA with full knowledge of this Court's decisions construing the savings statute. In Clause v. Columbia Savings & Loan Ass'n, 16 Wyo. 450, 95 P. 54 (1908), the S & L filed suit against the administrator of the estate of one of its members seeking payment of a debt the member owed to the S & L. The S & L also named the sheriff because the trust deed named him as successor trustee and he had declined to act as trustee after the initial trustee could not perform. Because the sheriff was a named defendant, the coroner served the summons and complaint in his stead as required by statute. The court granted the estate's motion to dismiss the action on the ground that the sheriff was not a proper party; therefore, service by the coroner was improper. The § & L filed a subsequent action naming just the estate. The district court dismissed again.
[¶ 21] Addressing on appeal the question of whether the first complaint and summons "commenced" the action within the meaning of the savings statute, the Court held that it did-the plaintiff's first action was "commenced in due time" and "failed otherwise than on the merits" so as to authorize bringing a new action within one year after the date the first action failed. The Court said:
The [district] court had unquestioned jurisdiction of the subject matter of the action, so that if the service of the summons by the coroner conferred jurisdiction over the person of the defendant, the action must be held to have been commenced. The mere fact that the service was quashed does not determine the question, for it is not every irregularity or imperfection in a summons or the service thereof which will deprive the court of jurisdiction, though it may justify or require the setting aside of service ... or the reversal ... of a judgment. To have the effect of failing to give jurisdiction, the summons or service must be so radically defective that it would authorize a collateral impeachment of a judgment rendered thereon....
Id. at 58-59. The Court said further;
Where there has been actual personal service, and therefore notice of the action, the weight of authority and the better reasoning favors the theory that [misdirected *587process] renders the process voidable, but not void. * * * 'The progressive and equitable idea is that in the administration of justice substance is to be held in higher regard than form, and technical defects should never be permitted to work injustice or deny substantial right. Process that is in every other particular valid, should not, for any omission of or defect in the direction, be considered more than voidable.'
Id. at 59.
[¶ 22] We recently reaffirmed the principles enunciated in Clause in Haney v. Cribbs, 2006 WY 158, ¶ 25, 148 P.3d 1118, 1125 (Wyo.2006) when we concluded that the savings statute allowed plaintiffs to re-file their personal injury case after their original complaint was dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction because it was served on the Attorney General and Department of Employment by regular mail rather than certified mail as required by Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 27-14-105(b). In holding that the savings statute applied, we looked at W.R.C.P. 3(b) and concluded that "commencement" of an action relates to service which in turn relates to notice. Finding that it is notice to the parties that is critical and, under the facts presented, the parties did not lack notice, "only the quality of the notice" was lacking, we concluded the action was commenced when the first complaint was served even though it was not served in the manner required. See also Hoke v. Motel 6 Jackson, 2006 WY 38, ¶ 16, 131 P.3d 369, 378 (Wyo.2006), stating that the key to determining if service was sufficient to commence an action, and thus make the savings statute applicable to permit re-filing of a dismissed action, is whether the court obtained jurisdiction over the party.
[123] A majority of this Court has determined in other WGCA cases 6 that the failure to allege in the complaint compliance with Article 16, § 7 of the Wyoming Constitution deprives a district court of subject matter jurisdiction to hear a governmental claim. Because a court's jurisdiction originates only by constitutional or statutory provision, a pleading requirement created by this Court eannot grant or take away a district court's jurisdiction. Consequently, the determination that a district court does not have subject matter jurisdiction because a complaint fails to conform to a judicially cere-ated jurisdictional pleading requirement is contrary to the WGCA, which, in § 1-389-117, grants jurisdiction for any claim under the Act to the district courts; in § 1-89-113, requires presentation of a notice of claim "as an itemized statement in writing" to the entity within two years; and, in § 1-89-114, requires commencement of an action against the entity within one year of presenting the notice of claim.7 Onee these statutory re quirements are met, a district court has subject matter jurisdiction. The fact that a complaint fails to allege that the notice of claim complied with the requirements of Article 16, § 7, a requirement this Court and not the legislature created, does not deprive a district court of subject matter jurisdiction. To the contrary, subject matter jurisdiction vests in the district court under the WGCA upon the filing of a complaint within one year after presentation of a claim complying with § 1-89-118.
[¶ 24] In light of the law existing at the time the legislature adopted the WGCA, con*588struing the WGCA in harmony with the existing law as part of a uniform system of jurisprudence, and determining the WGCA's meaning in connection with existing statutes, rules and court decisions as our rules of statutory construction require, I would hold that the savings statute applies to actions brought under the WGCA. Courts in other states have reached this result in construing their statutes. In Cruse v. Board of County Comm'rs of Atoka County, 910 P.2d 998, 1005 (Ok1la.1995), in holding the savings statute applied to a complaint against a county board, the court stated:
The legislature could have forbidden the application of [the savings statute] to the refiling of a timely-filed governmental tort claims act, but it did not. Reading the ... Act in its entirety, we conclude that where valid notice has been given and the governmental tort claims action has been timely filed ..., the court's power is invoked and, at that point, the governmental tort claims action is controlled by the laws of this state, including [the savings statute].
In Perez w. City of Meriden, 1998 WL 519034, 1998 Conn.Super. LEXIS 2274, the court held:
any suit ... is permissible under the savings statute and not barred by sovereign immunity. So long as the original action ... has failed for want of jurisdiction and is refiled within one year it is not barred, even if it is against a state or local government.
See also Reese v. Ohio State Univ. Hosps., 6 Ohio St.3d 162, 451 N.E.2d 1196 (1983), holding the savings statute applicable to suits against the state, and Carroll v. City of Worcester, 42 Mass.App.Ct. 628, 678 N.E.2d 1344 (1997), holding the savings statute applicable to suits against public employers and stating that if the legislature intended the savings statute not to apply to suits against public employers it would have said so.
[T 25] I also find persuasive the following remarks of the Utah Supreme Court made in the context of Utah's Health Care Malpractice Act but generally addressing the relationship between specific statutes of limitations and a savings statute:
The legislature has enacted statutes of limitations specific to a wide variety of statutory and common law causes of action. See, e.g., Utah Code Ann. § 25-6-10 (2008) (statute of limitations on fraudulent transfer claims); Id. § 78-15-38 (statute of limitations on products lability claims); Id. § 78-12-48 (statute of limitations on asbestos damages claims). In each instance, the limitations period is the product of a policy assessment that includes consideration of the nature of the claim, the durability of evidence, and the impact of claims on insurance coverage, to name but a few. The savings statute similarly codifies a legislative policy judgment. We can find no clear conflict between statutes of limitation generally and the savings statute. To the extent that they relate to one another, that tie is complementary. Absent a clear expression of legislative intent that a statute of limitations ought to preempt the savings statute, we will not block access to it. The Malpractice Act provides no clear link between its tolling provisions for prelitigation procedures and an intention to supplant the savings statute. We will not discard rule 3 and cut off access to the savings statute based on this tenuous inference of preemption.
McBride-Williams v. Huard, 94 175, 178 (Utah 2004). Like the Utah court, absent a clear expression of legislative intent that a statute of limitations preempts the savings statute, I would apply the savings statute. The WGCA provides no clear link between its tolling provisions and an intention to supplant the savings statute. I would not discard W.R.C.P. 3(b) and cut off access to the savings statute based on the tenuous inference that the WGCA preempts it as the majority has done.

. Rule 41. Dismissal of actions.
(b) Involuntary dismissal; effect thereof.-(1) By Defendant.-For failure of the plaintiff to prosecute or to comply with these rules or any order of court, a defendant may move *586for dismissal of an action.... Unless the court in iis order for dismissal otherwise specifies, a dismissal under this subdivision and any dismissal not provided for in this rule, other than a dismissal for lack of jurisdiction ..., operates as an adjudication upon the merits.

. See for example, McCann v. City of Cody, 2009 WY 86, 210 P.3d 1078 (Wyo.2009); Beaulieu v. Florquist, 2004 WY 31, 86 P.3d 863 (Wyo.2004).

. It has long been established in Wyoming that a lack of specificity in allegations does not deprive a district court of jurisdiction. In State v. Kusel, 29 Wyo. 287, 213 P. 367, 369 (1923), the Court said:
It is well settled that jurisdiction does not depend upon the sufficiency of the bill. If the court has jurisdiction of the subject matter and of the parties nothing further is required. The cause of action may be defectively stated, but that does not destroy jurisdiction. * * * Whether a complaint does or does not state a cause of action is, so far as concerns the question of jurisdiction, of no importance, for if it states a case belonging to a general class over which the authority of the court extends, then jurisdiction attaches and the court has power to decide whether the pleading is good or bad.
See also State v. District Court of Eighth Judicial Dist. in and for Natrona County, 33 Wyo. 281, 238 P. 545, 550 (Wyo.1925) in which the Court stated: "(Jurisdiction of the court does not-as most of the courts hold-depend on the sufficiency of a pleading."