Montana v. Jordan

135 So. 3d 1212, 2013 La.App. 4 Cir. 1410, 2014 WL 1370176, 2014 La. App. LEXIS 574
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedFebruary 26, 2014
DocketNo. 2013-CA-1410
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 135 So. 3d 1212 (Montana v. Jordan) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Montana v. Jordan, 135 So. 3d 1212, 2013 La.App. 4 Cir. 1410, 2014 WL 1370176, 2014 La. App. LEXIS 574 (La. Ct. App. 2014).

Opinion

PAUL A. BONIN, Judge.

I,The trial judge granted Patricia Jordan’s motion for summary judgment, dismissing with prejudice Yvonne Montana’s action to annul the judgment, which confirmed Ms. Jordan’s title to property acquired at tax sale. The trial judge also denied Ms. Montana’s motion for summary judgment and overruled Ms. Jordan’s peremptory exceptions of no cause of action, no right of action, and prescription. Ms. Montana appeals both the final judgment dismissing her claim with prejudice and the interlocutory judgment denying her motion for summary judgment.

Having conducted a de novo review of the cross-motions for summary judgment, we conclude that both parties failed to meet their respective burdens of proof as set forth in La. C.C.P. art. 966. Ms. Jordan did not identify an absence of factual support for an element essential to Ms. Montana’s claim, and Ms. Montana failed to establish that no genuine issue as to any material fact exists. As a result, the trial judge was precluded from granting summary judgment to either party. We therefore reverse the trial judge’s decision to grant Ms. Jordan’s motion for summary judgment, affirm her denial of Ms. Montana’s motion for summary | ¡.judgment, and remand the matter to the trial court for further proceedings. We explain our reasoning in greater detail below.

I

We begin by describing the facts underlying this controversy.

Ms. Irma Santiago, the mother of the appellant, owned residential property located at 3100 Louisa Street in New Orleans. The ad valorem taxes assessed against this property went unpaid for the 2006-2008 tax years; as a result, on January 28, 2010, the City’s Finance Director executed a Tax Sale Deed for an undivided one percent (1%) interest in the property to Ms. Jordan upon her payment of the delinquent taxes, interest, and penalties. See La. R.S. 47:215s.1 Ms. Jordan later filed a petition to quiet title against Ms. Santiago in Civil District Court under number 12-3842. See La. R.S. 47:2266. On December 18, 2012, the district judge, following, according to the judgment, a contradictory hearing, confirmed Ms. Jordan’s title over the entirety (100%) of the property.

Two days later, Ms. Santiago died in her home in San Antonio, Texas. Ms. Santiago died intestate, and thus Ms. Montana, as her sole heir, became the universal successor of Ms. Santiago as of the time of her death. See La. Civil Code arts. 3506(28), 935.

Neither Ms. Santiago (prior to her death) nor Ms. Montana (after her mother’s death) filed a motion for new trial or an appeal of the judgment | ^confirming tax title. On January 2, 2013, however, Ms. Montana paid all outstanding taxes, interest, and costs due for the 2006-2013 tax years on the property, and the City’s Finance Director issued a Receiving Warrant which verified her payment.

Claiming that the confirmation judgment was obtained by “fraud or ill practices,” Ms. Montana next instituted a nullity action on April 23, 2013 in Civil District Court under number 13-3863.2 Ms. Montana amended this suit after being recog[1215]*1215nized as the sole owner of her mother’s estate, which included the property subject to this confirmation judgment, by Judgment of Possession on May 22, 2013. Ms. Montana had opened her mother’s succession in Civil District Court under number 13-4091.

Ms. Montana then filed a motion for summary judgment, and Ms. Jordan responded by filing her own motion for summary judgment in addition to asserting peremptory exceptions of no cause of action, no right of action, and prescription. See La. C.C.P. arts. 966, 927 A(l, 5, 6). The district judge granted Ms. Jordan’s motion for summary judgment, denied Ms. Montana’s motion, and overruled Ms. Jordan’s peremptory exceptions. Ms. Montana timely appealed the final judgment dismissing her claim with prejudice and the interlocutory judgment denying her motion for summary judgment. See La. C.C.P. art. 2123.3

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Before we substantively discuss our review of the complained-of rulings, we briefly consider Ms. Montana’s status as the universal successor to Ms. Santiago. Even though Ms. Jordan did not file an answer to Ms. Montana’s appeal, see La. C.C.P. arts. 2133 A, and on that account the trial judge’s decision to overrule Ms. Jordan’s peremptory exception of no right of action was not preserved for our appellate review, we consider it helpful to explain why Ms. Montana is the appropriate party to bring this nullity action following the death of her mother. Ms. Jordan asserted that standing to institute this nullity action was the strictly personal, non-heritable right of Ms. Santiago. Ms. Montana, as Ms. Santiago’s universal successor, however, acquired, upon her mother’s death, all of her mother’s rights which were heritable. See La. Civil Code arts. 3506(28); 1416 cmt. (a). Such rights include ownership over her mother’s remaining undivided interest in the property not conveyed at tax sale and, incidental thereto, the right to timely challenge any judgment affecting that property.

A

The status of universal successor affords to its holder numerous rights and responsibilities. A “universal successor represents the person of the deceased, and succeeds to all [her] rights and charges.” La. Civil Code art. 3506(28). Universal successors acquire ownership of the deceased’s estate immediately upon their death, see La. Civil Code art. 935, and “continue the possession of the decedent | swith all its advantages and defects, and with no alteration in the nature of the possession.” La. Civil Code art. 936.

The immediacy of the acquisition of her ownership allows for Ms. Montana to exercise rights with respect to her interests in a thing of the estate as well as in the estate as a whole prior to the judicial appointment of a succession representative. See La. Civil Code art. 938 A. A universal successor may also, prior to the judicial appointment of a succession representative, represent the decedent with respect to her heritable rights and obligations. See La. Civil Code art. 935.

B

As Ms. Santiago’s universal successor, Ms. Montana has standing to institute this [1216]*1216nullity action challenging a confirmation judgment, rendered prior to her mother’s death, which conveyed an additional 99% ownership interest than that reflected in Ms. Jordan’s Tax Sale Deed. Ms. Santiago’s right to protect that ownership interest through a nullity action is heritable. See La. Civil Code arts. 1765,1766.

“A civil action is a demand for the enforcement of a right.” La. C.C.P. art. 421. An action to enforce an obligation is the property of the obligee which on his death is transmitted with his estate to his heir. See La. C.C.P. art. 426. This rule also applies to a right to enforce an obligation, when no action thereon was commenced prior to the obligee’s death. See ibid. An obligation and, by |ñinference, a right is “heritable when its performance may be enforced by a successor of the obligee or against a successor of the obligor.” La. Civil Code art. 1765. “Every obligation is deemed heritable as to all parties, except where the contrary results from the terms or from the nature of the contract.” Ibid.

The nearly unqualified heritability of rights to enforce an obligation has one notable exception — strictly personal rights.

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135 So. 3d 1212, 2013 La.App. 4 Cir. 1410, 2014 WL 1370176, 2014 La. App. LEXIS 574, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/montana-v-jordan-lactapp-2014.