Huffman v. Leon De Mendoza

899 P.2d 734, 135 Or. App. 680, 1995 Ore. App. LEXIS 1090
CourtCourt of Appeals of Oregon
DecidedJuly 26, 1995
Docket9300538CV and 9301365CV CA A83260 (Control) and CA A83261
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 899 P.2d 734 (Huffman v. Leon De Mendoza) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Oregon primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Huffman v. Leon De Mendoza, 899 P.2d 734, 135 Or. App. 680, 1995 Ore. App. LEXIS 1090 (Or. Ct. App. 1995).

Opinion

*682 ARMSTRONG, J.

Plaintiff appeals from an amended judgment, which set aside an earlier default judgment in plaintiffs favor, and from a supplemental judgment awarding attorney fees to defendant Frank Leon De Mendoza (Frank). We affirm.

The relevant facts are not in dispute. In August 1990, Frank entered into a retainer agreement with plaintiff, who is an attorney. Shortly thereafter, Frank transferred some real property located in Klamath County to his cousin, defendant Javier Mendoza Mendoza (Javier), stating consideration of “love and affection.” OnApril 13, 1992, Frank filed a petition for Chapter 7 relief in United States Bankruptcy Court. He listed plaintiff in the bankruptcy petition, showing him to be a creditor holding an unsecured claim for attorney fees. The bankruptcy court records show plaintiffs correct address and that he was sent timely notice both of the filing and of the later discharge in bankruptcy of Frank’s debts. That discharge was granted in August 1992, and it applied to the debt to plaintiff.

In February 1993, plaintiff sued Frank for breach of the retainer agreement. Plaintiff filed a motion and affidavit seeking leave to pursue alternative service of summons pursuant to ORCP 7 D(6)(a). 1 Plaintiff told the court that he had tried to find Frank to serve him with summons and complaint by asking of Frank’s whereabouts of “the persons most likely’ ’ to know them, but he had been unable to locate Frank. Plaintiff stated that he had attempted to contact Frank by sending letters to his last known address in San Jose, California. None of the letters was returned. He also had contacted a realtor in Klamath Falls who stated that all contacts he had with Frank were by writing to him at the San Jose address. Based on plaintiff s statements, the court authorized plaintiff to serve summons and complaint on Frank by regular mail and by posting in the Klamath County Courthouse. Frank did *683 not appear in the action, and in March 1993, plaintiff obtained a default judgment against him for $11,355. 2

In April 1993, plaintiff sued both defendants under the Uniform Fraudulent Transfer Act, ORS 95.200-95.310, alleging that he had obtained a judgment against Frank, and that Frank had fraudulently transferred real property to Javier to avoid Frank’s debt to plaintiff. Plaintiff again sought leave to pursue alternative methods of service on defendants. The affidavit in support of plaintiffs motion stated that plaintiff had made “a due [and] diligent search to locate” them.

In addition to the information plaintiff had included in the first affidavit pertaining to Frank, plaintiff stated that he had placed a call to a telephone at the San Jose address and had spoken with someone who would not give his full name, but who said that he forwarded defendants’ mail to an undisclosed location. Plaintiff stated that he believed that defendants were living somewhere in Mexico and had not been in Oregon since 1992. Plaintiff opined that “posting at the Klamath Co. Courthouse and mailing to [defendants’] last known addresses by regular mail” were the methods most likely to result in actual notice.

The court granted plaintiffs motion, and plaintiff served defendants by posting the summons and complaint in Klamath Falls and by mailing them by regular mail to defendants’ last known addresses. On June 3, 1993, plaintiff obtained a default judgment against defendants for the amount of the original judgment against Frank plus additional attorney fees.

In December 1993, defendants moved to set aside both judgments under ORCP 71 B(1)(c) and (d) 3 on the ground that the judgments were void because the underlying debt had been discharged in bankruptcy and because the trial *684 court lacked personal jurisdiction over defendants due to defective service, and on the alternative ground that the judgment had been obtained through fraud. On February 8, 1994, the court entered judgments setting aside the earlier judgments, based on the discharge in bankruptcy of Frank’s debt. The court did not reach defendants’ other arguments. The court later entered a supplemental judgment awarding attorney fees to Frank only, based on ORS 20.094.

On appeal, plaintiff concedes that the judgments against Frank are void due to the discharge in bankruptcy. He argues, however, that the trial court erroneously concluded that the judgment against Javier also was void as a result of the bankruptcy. We do not reach plaintiff’s arguments, because we conclude that there was not adequate service of summons on Javier and, so, the court lacked personal jurisdiction over him.

ORCP 7 D(1) requires that summons be served

“in [a] manner reasonably calculated, under all the circumstances, to apprise the defendant of the pendency of the action and to afford a reasonable opportunity to appear and defend.”

ORCP 7 D identifies various means by which service of summons can be made, depending on the type of defendant to be served. When service cannot be made on an individual through the methods specified in ORCP 7 D(3) or in any other relevant statute or rule, a plaintiff may file an affidavit seeking the court’s permission to use an alternative service method under ORCP 7 D(6)(a).

The affidavit seeking permission to serve a defendant by alternative means “must contain positive averments of probative or evidentiary facts” from which a court can conclude that “all reasonable means have been exhausted” in attempting to locate the defendant for service. Kintigh v. Elliott, 280 Or 265, 270, 570 P2d 659 (1977). The Supreme Court has suggested that the possible sources that should be contacted in an effort to locate a defendant include “the post office for defendant’s last known address; defendant’s employer, if any; public utility companies, such as light, phone, and water; neighbors; and friends or relatives, if any, in the area." Id.; see also Ter Har v. Backus, 259 Or 478, 482, 487 P2d 660 (1971).

*685 Plaintiffs efforts to locate Javier fall far short of the standard of diligence required by the court’s holdings in Kintigh and Ter Har. Plaintiff stated in his affidavit that he had made “inquiry on the following dates of the following persons most likely to know where [Frank could] be found.” Plaintiff then reproduced essentially the same affidavit that he had filed in the first action in support of alternative service on Frank. The only facts in the affidavit relating to plaintiffs search for Javier are: (1) that plaintiff checked with “Maggie” at the county assessor’s office who told plaintiff that the address she had on file for Javier was the San Jose address and (2) that plaintiff spoke to someone at the San Jose address who said that he forwarded Javier’s mail to an undisclosed address.

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Bluebook (online)
899 P.2d 734, 135 Or. App. 680, 1995 Ore. App. LEXIS 1090, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/huffman-v-leon-de-mendoza-orctapp-1995.