Court Opinion

ID: 9526174
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:13:41.997625+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:19:09.114192
License: Public Domain

O’Connell, J.
(dissenting). I respectfully dissent because I would affirm the trial court’s denial of summary disposition. The original parties to this action stipulated to forgo the notice provisions of MCR 2.112(E). The purpose behind the court rule was to protect plaintiffs from unfair surprise and require defendants to give notice of a nonparty’s involvement in the case before allowing the jury to consider the nonparty’s fault in causing the plaintiff’s injuries. See 1 Dean & Longhofer, Michigan Court Rules Practice (4th ed), § 2112.13, pp 296-297. Because the court rule served to benefit plaintiffs in this action, I agree with the trial court that the parties could validly stipulate to waive the application of the rule’s notice provisions. Practitioners routinely stipulate to waive the *537court rules, and the present case should be no different.1
The court below granted plaintiffs’ motion to add the new defendants as parties to the action within ninety-one days of the date that Dr. Marder identified them. In doing so, plaintiffs met the requirements of MCL 600.2957(2); MSA 27A.2957(2), which provides that “a cause of action added under this subsection is not barred by a period of limitation . . . .” Consequently, plaintiffs’ claims against the new defendants were not time-barred, as the majority concludes. In my view, the trial court properly denied the motion for summary disposition, and I would affirm.

 Stipulation to waive the court rules is a well-accepted practice of most seasoned attorneys. Generally, such stipulations save both the court and the parties numerous hours of research and time in court for what would otherwise be ftivolous motions. Disallowing stipulations risks significantly increasing the backlog in most trial courts. The policy favoring stipulations is embodied throughout our court rules. See, e.g., MCR 2.116(A), 2.119(D), 2.316(B)(1), 2.405, 2.504(A)(1)(b), 2.507, 2.512(A), 7.310.