Court Opinion

ID: 9949711
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-12 14:16:27.860366+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:25:47.690123
License: Public Domain

COURT OF APPEALS OF VIRGINIA
UNPUBLISHED

              Present: Judges Huff, Athey and Causey
              Argued at Alexandria, Virginia

              GREGORY YOUST
                                                                              MEMORANDUM OPINION* BY
              v.      Record No. 1940-22-4                                   JUDGE CLIFFORD L. ATHEY, JR.
                                                                                   MARCH 12, 2024
              BUFFALO WING FACTORY, INC., ET AL.

                                    FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF LOUDOUN COUNTY
                                              Douglas L. Fleming, Jr., Judge

                               Charles L. King for appellant.

                               Richard L. Butler (Law Office of Jonathan P. Jester, on brief), for
                               appellee Buffalo Wing Factory Franchising, Inc.

                               Vivek K. Subramanyam (McGavin, Boyce, Bardot, Thorsen &
                               Katz, P.C., on brief), for appellee Buffalo Wing Factory, Inc.

                      Gregory Youst appeals from the Circuit Court of Loudoun County’s (“circuit court”) order

              sustaining the pleas in bar of Buffalo Wing Factory, Inc. (“BWF”) and Buffalo Wing Factory

              Franchising, Inc. (“BWF Franchising”) on the basis that they were not the correct defendants. On

              appeal, Youst contends that the circuit court erred by failing to grant his motion to continue the

              hearing on the pleas in bar until after ruling on his motion to substitute the correct defendant. For

              the reasons stated herein, we affirm the judgment of the circuit court.

                      *
                          This opinion is not designated for publication. See Code § 17.1-413(A).
                                           I. BACKGROUND

        On May 27, 2021, Youst filed a complaint for personal injury against BWF and BWF

Franchising alleging that Youst sustained injuries on June 2, 2019, when he fell while leaving the

bar area of a Buffalo Wing Factory restaurant located in Ashburn, Virginia (the “restaurant”). The

complaint alleged that the defendants owned and operated the restaurant and as a result of their

negligence caused Youst’s injuries by placing “too many chairs too close together” in the bar area

of the restaurant.

        Youst did not attempt to serve the complaint on the defendants until May 10, 2022, just

short of a year after Youst filed the complaint, and almost three years after allegedly sustaining the

injury. After being served with the complaint, both defendants filed pleas in bar denying that they

owned or operated the restaurant.1 The circuit court subsequently scheduled a hearing on their pleas

in bar for November 16, 2022.

        Approximately three weeks after receiving notice of the pleas in bar, but prior to the date of

the hearing, Youst filed a motion to substitute N.V.R. Group, Inc. (“NVR”), the owner and operator

of the restaurant, as a party defendant. In support of his motion, Youst claimed that the Virginia

State Corporation Commission listed twelve entities containing the names “Buffalo Wing Factory,”

“BWF,” or “BWING” and that NVR was not one of them. He further asserted that Belal El-Atari

(“El-Atari”) was the registered agent for and a principal of NVR, BWF, and BWF Franchising, and

had been served with the complaint in his capacity as the registered agent for BWF and BWF

Franchising.2 Youst justified the motion to substitute NVR as a defendant because the “number of

entities, their common-ownership and the use of same registered agent made it difficult to discern”

        1
            BWF Franchising also filed a demurrer, which the circuit court did not rule on.
        2
         Youst specifically claimed that El-Atari was an officer and director of NVR, the
president of BWF, and the chief executive officer of BWF Franchising.
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which entity operated the restaurant. Alternatively, Youst requested that the circuit court allow him

to amend his complaint to name NVR as a defendant based on misnomer.

        Youst served NVR with a copy of his motion to substitute on October 7, 2022. Youst also

filed a memorandum in response to the defendants’ pleas in bar solely asking that the circuit court

defer granting the pleas in bar until it first ruled upon his motion to substitute. Youst conceded that

the defendants were entitled to the relief requested and that because Rule 3:17 gave NVR 21 days to

respond to the substitution motion, a hearing on that motion could not be held before the November

16 hearing on the pleas in bar. Youst also justified his request to delay sustaining the pleas by

arguing that if the circuit court granted his motion to substitute prior to sustaining the pleas, his

claims against NVR would not be barred by the statute of limitations.

        On October 28, 2022, NVR, who was represented by the same counsel as BWF, filed a

memorandum in opposition to Youst’s motion to substitute contending that it could not be

substituted as a defendant because Youst’s naming of BWF and BWF Franchising as defendants

did not constitute a misnomer and that therefore the claims against NVR were barred by the

statute of limitations. That same day, Youst filed a praecipe attempting to schedule a hearing on

his motion to substitute the week before the scheduled hearing on the pleas in bar. BWF

objected to the docketing of Youst’s motion because he did not consult with the defendants

regarding the proposed hearing date. Youst subsequently rescheduled a hearing on his motion

for December 5, 2022.

        At the November 16 hearing on the pleas in bar, Dan Tufts (“Tufts”), vice president of

multiple Buffalo Wing Factory restaurants, testified that NVR owned the restaurant in which

Youst allegedly fell. At the conclusion of Tufts’ testimony, the defendants argued that the circuit

court should sustain their pleas in bar because they were not the correct defendants. They further

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argued that Youst’s motion to substitute was not on the circuit court’s docket for argument and

therefore substitution of NVR as a defendant would be improper.

       In response, Youst requested that the circuit court continue the hearing on the pleas in bar

until after the hearing on his motion to substitute. Relying on the Supreme Court of Virginia’s

decision in Lake v. N. Va. Women’s Med. Ctr., Inc., 253 Va. 255 (1997), Youst argued that the

circuit court would have discretion to substitute NVR as a defendant in the case because, if given

the opportunity to be heard, he could prove that he was led to sue the wrong entities due to their

names. He further argued that substituting NVR as a defendant was proper because he could

prove that NVR, BWF, and BWF Franchising shared a common principal and the proposed

substitution would not alter Youst’s cause of action.

       The circuit court found that Youst’s motion to substitute was not before it at the time of

the hearing on the pleas in bar. The circuit court noted, however, that it could not “add in a party

to substitute for parties that are . . . not properly named.” It further noted that Lake was

distinguishable from Youst’s case because BWF and BWF Franchising had not contributed to

the confusion that led Youst to sue them. The circuit court subsequently sustained the pleas in

bar and dismissed Youst’s claims with prejudice with the caveat that its ruling was “limited to

what was before the [c]ourt.” The circuit court noted that “[w]hat may happen after is controlled

by other statutes and other rules.” Youst appealed.

                                            II. ANALYSIS

                                       A. Standard of Review

       “The decision of whether to grant a continuance is committed to the discretion of the

circuit court.” Shah v. Shah, 70 Va. App. 588, 593 (2019). “A party challenging a circuit court’s

denial of a motion for a continuance must demonstrate both an ‘abuse of discretion and resulting

prejudice[.]’” Bailey v. Commonwealth, 73 Va. App. 250, 265 (2021) (alteration in original)

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(quoting Haugen v. Shenandoah Valley Dep’t of Soc. Servs., 274 Va. 27, 34 (2007)). “The abuse

of discretion standard ‘rests on the venerable belief that the judge closest to the contest is the

judge best able to discern where the equities lie.’” Id. (quoting Hamad v. Hamad, 61 Va. App.

593, 607 (2013)). A circuit court abuses its discretion:

               when a relevant factor that should have been given significant
               weight is not considered; when an irrelevant or improper factor is
               considered and given significant weight; and when all proper
               factors, and no improper ones, are considered, but the court, in
               weighing those factors, commits a clear error of judgment.

Arch Ins. Co. v. FVCbank, 301 Va. 503, 515 (2022) (quoting Manchester Oaks Homeowners,

Ass’n, Inc., v. Batt, 284 Va. 409, 426 (2012)).

       B. The circuit court was not required to continue its hearing on the pleas in bar for the
          purpose of hearing Youst’s motion to substitute.

       Youst contends that the circuit court should have continued the hearing on the pleas in

bar until after considering his motion to substitute. At oral argument before this Court, Youst

conceded that if the circuit court did not err in denying his motion to continue, the merits of his

arguments as to substitution need not be reached. Since we find that the circuit court did not

abuse its discretion in denying Youst’s motion for a continuance, the circuit court was not

required to consider his motion to substitute before ruling on the pleas in bar.

       “It is fundamental that a motion for a continuance is addressed to the sound discretion of

the trial judge who must consider all the circumstances of the case.” Autry v. Bryan, 224 Va.

451, 454 (1982). “The judgment . . . below will not be reversed on appeal due to the action of

the trial court on such motion, ‘unless such action is plainly erroneous and prejudicial to the

rights of the complaining party.’” Id. (quoting Ferguson v. Colonial Pipeline Co., 206 Va. 719,

722 (1966)). “Abuse of discretion and prejudice to the complaining party are essential to

reversal.” Id. (quoting Ferguson, 206 Va. at 722).

                                                  -5-
       Here, the circuit court’s refusal to continue the case was neither plainly erroneous nor an

abuse of discretion. Youst essentially argues that he might have had a meritorious claim for

substituting proper parties and the circuit court erred in refusing to hear his motion to substitute a

party defendant before ruling on the pleas in bar. Although we acknowledge the unusual

procedural circumstances present here, we are unwilling to restrain the discretion of circuit

courts in managing their dockets by countenancing this argument. While a circuit court certainly

may exercise its discretion to continue and defer ruling upon a plea in bar when presented with a

possibly meritorious pleading supporting substitution of parties, we cannot accept that a circuit

court must always do so.

       Thus, we cannot say the circuit court’s decision to rule on the pleas in bar following a

hearing scheduled for that purpose was erroneous or plainly wrong. Because Youst conceded at

oral argument that the merits of his motion to substitute need not be considered by this Court if

the circuit court did not abuse its discretion in denying his motion to continue, we end our

analysis here, finding no error.

                                          III. CONCLUSION

       For the foregoing reasons, the circuit court’s judgment sustaining BWF’s and BWF

Franchising’s pleas in bar is affirmed.

                                                                                            Affirmed.

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