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Dreding v. Kruse
Citations: 141 So. 3d 507; 2013 Ala. Civ. App. LEXIS 149; 2013 WL 3482207Docket: 2120422
Court: Court of Civil Appeals of Alabama; July 12, 2013; Alabama; State Appellate Court
Parties have appeared before the court for a second time in a wrongful-death case initiated by Viviana Castaneda, representing the estate of David Velez, against Burniee T. Dreding, Jr. The complaint, filed on May 22, 2008, alleged negligence and wantonness, leading to a jury verdict on January 31, 2011, that awarded $5,000,000 in damages. Frank Kruse replaced Castaneda as the personal representative of the estate on the same day. Dreding subsequently filed a postjudgment motion labeled as a “motion to appeal,” followed by a motion to alter, amend, or vacate, which was denied on May 5, 2011. His appeal was dismissed by the Alabama Supreme Court on July 20, 2011, due to failure to submit the record on time. Dreding then filed a motion for relief from judgment under Rule 60(b)(4) on January 12, 2012, claiming the prior order was void, but this was denied the same day. He filed a motion for reconsideration on January 27, 2012, which was also denied. An appeal from this denial was submitted on February 14, 2012, but the court affirmed the lower court's decision, stating Dreding's arguments were repetitive of previous motions. On October 15, 2012, Dreding filed another Rule 60(b)(4) motion, reiterating claims that Castaneda lacked standing and that Kruse's substitution was improper. This second motion was denied on January 15, 2013. Dreding's subsequent notice of appeal on February 19, 2013, was transferred to the current court, which found his arguments unclear yet consistent with previous motions, leading to a conclusion that it lacked jurisdiction over the appeal. Alabama caselaw restricts relief under Rule 60(b) when a party has previously sought such relief. The Alabama Supreme Court ruled in Ex parte Keith that after a post-judgment motion under Rule 60(b) is denied, trial courts lack jurisdiction to consider subsequent motions that seek to reconsider that denial. Thus, if a party files a second Rule 60(b) motion based on the same grounds as an earlier one, it is treated as an unauthorized motion to reconsider. Orders related to such successive motions are deemed nullities and cannot support an appeal (Pinkerton Sec. Investigations Servs. Inc. v. Chamblee). Consequently, the court dismissed Dreding's appeal because the trial court lacked jurisdiction over his recent Rule 60(b) motion. Additionally, even had the court had jurisdiction, Dreding’s attempts to relitigate issues of standing and subject-matter jurisdiction were barred by the law-of-the-case doctrine, which prevents re-examination of issues already decided in the same case. This doctrine aims to avoid repetitive litigation on established matters, as noted in Blumberg v. Touche Ross. Co. and Williams v. Williams.