Szymanski v. Dotey

52 A.3d 289, 2012 Pa. Super. 141, 2012 Pa. Super. LEXIS 1576
CourtSuperior Court of Pennsylvania
DecidedJuly 11, 2012
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 52 A.3d 289 (Szymanski v. Dotey) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Superior Court of Pennsylvania primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Szymanski v. Dotey, 52 A.3d 289, 2012 Pa. Super. 141, 2012 Pa. Super. LEXIS 1576 (Pa. Ct. App. 2012).

Opinion

OPINION BY

FITZGERALD, J.:

Appellant, David G. Szymanski, appeals pro se from the judgment entered in the Chester County Court of Common Pleas, following the denial of his post-trial motion. He challenges the trial court’s decision not to grant him a new trial after entering judgment in favor of Appellees, Robert Dotey and Sherry Jenkins, following his failure to appear. We hold that under the unique facts of this case, a presumption of receipt of the notice scheduling trial is not established when a party seeking to invoke the mailbox rule has failed to demonstrate a presumption of mailing of the notice or that the notice was actually mailed. We reverse.

This case stems from a dispute over a 350-foot long privacy hedgerow on Appellant’s property allegedly removed by Ap-pellees. Appellant, represented by counsel, sued Appellees in magisterial district court and won a judgment of $8,168. Ap-pellees appealed to the Chester County Court of Common Pleas, where the case was sent to an arbitration panel, which ruled in favor of Appellees. Appellant appealed the ruling, and the matter was listed for trial for June 14, 2010. That day, Appellant’s counsel filed, and the court granted, a petition to withdraw because Appellant did not pay counsel’s legal bills.

On December 9, 2010, the matter was again listed for trial during the two-week term beginning January 3, 2011. Docket No. 2009-02324-DA, at 10. A copy of the trial list for the two-week January 3 term was mailed to Appellant at his home address, and he acknowledged receiving it. Mot. for Post-Trial Relief, 2/10/11, at ¶ 7. The Civil Court Administrator also allegedly mailed a letter dated December 14, 2010, to Appellant, scheduling trial for January 10, 2011, at 9:30 a.m. The December 14, 2010 letter was purportedly sent to the same home address as the trial list. Trial Ct. Op., 11/2/11, at 2.

On January 10, 2011, Appellant failed to appear at 9:30 a.m. for the scheduled trial. N.T., 1/10/11, at 2. At 10:06 a.m., Patricia Drangel, the Civil Court Administrator, was called to testify. Id. at 4. Ms. Dran-gel’s substantive testimony appears below:

The Court: And you were the author of the letter dated December 14, 2010 to
[Appellant] and [Appellee’s counsel]?
Ms. Drangel: Yes, your Honor.
The Court: Have you had any return mail in connection with that or any insufficient days’ notification, et cetera?
Ms. Drangel: Your Honor, we have received nothing back from this correspondence indicating that it has been returned to us.

Id. (capitalization omitted). Following Ms. Drangel’s testimony, the court entered judgment for Appellees. Id. at 5.

Appellant filed a post-trial motion, claiming lack of notice of the trial date. The trial court held a hearing on the post-trial motion on March 25, 2011, where Appellant testified that he never received the December 14 letter- despite “waitfing] every day for it” and checking his mail every day. N.T., 3/25/11, at 4. Appellant further testified that because he cannot see his mailbox from his house, he has had problems receiving mail in the past; his mail was stolen twice, and within the last four years, he “lost” his mailbox “three or four times.” Id. at 2-3.

In response, Appellees’ counsel cited the “mailbox rule,” that proof of mailing raises a rebuttable presumption that the letter was received. Id. at 6-7. Appellees’ [292]*292counsel cited case law holding that mere assertion of non-receipt is insufficient to rebut the presumption of receipt. Id. at 7 (citing, e.g., Breza v. Don Farr Moving & Storage Co., 828 A.2d 1131, 1185 (Pa.Super.2003)).

The court denied Appellant’s motion, holding that Appellant did not provide sufficient evidence to rebut the presumption of receipt. Id. at 12. The court noted that because Appellant had received mail at his home address both before and after the subject letter in question and was aware of prior problems in receiving mail, he should have been “diligent and in touch with court administration” if he had any concern about receiving mail from the court. Id. at 12-13.

Appellant timely appealed from the trial court’s denial of his post-trial motion and timely filed a court-ordered Pa.R.A.P. 1925(b) statement. He raises the following issue for our review:

Whether the trial court correctly applied the mail box rule, when it ignored [Appellant’s] sworn testimony that he did not receive the trial notice by first class mail-where there was no evidence, much less sufficient evidence that the trial notice was placed into the United States mail-and thus deprived [Appellant] of his constitutionally protected right to trial.

Appellant’s Brief at 4.

Appellant claims that the trial court erred in determining that Appellees met the evidentiary predicate necessary for application of the mailbox rule, where there was no evidence that the trial notice was placed in the mail. Id. at 12. Appellant notes that the mailbox rule dates from a period when mail service was more reliable. Id. Appellees argue that the trial court properly applied the mailbox rule presumption because Ms. Drangel’s testimony was competent evidence of mailing, which is enough to raise the presumption of receipt. Appellee’s Brief at 22-24 (citing Commonwealth Dep’t of Transp. v. Grasse, 146 Pa.Cmwlth. 17, 606 A.2d 544, 546 (1992) [hereinafter Grasse ]). After reviewing the record in this matter, we are compelled to agree with Appellant.

“Our scope of review in a non-jury trial is limited to whether findings of fact are supported by competent evidence and whether the trial court committed an error of law.” Breza, 828 A.2d at 1134 (citations omitted). “With respect to factual conclusions,” this Court “may reverse the trial court if its findings of fact are predicated on an error of law or are unsupported by competent evidence in the record.” Mastroni-Mucker v. Allstate Ins. Co., 976 A.2d 510, 518 (Pa.Super.2009).

The mailbox rule provides that “depositing in the post office a properly addressed, prepaid letter raises a natural presumption, founded in common experience, that it reached its destination by due course of mail.” Jensen v. McCorkell, 154 Pa. 323, 325, 26 A. 366, 367 (Pa.1893) (citation omitted). As the Pennsylvania Supreme Court noted: “The overwhelming weight of statistics clearly indicates that letters properly mailed and deposited in the post office are received by the addressees.” Meierdierck v. Miller, 394 Pa. 484, 487, 147 A.2d 406, 408 (Pa.1959). Thus, “[e]vidence that a letter has been mailed will ordinarily be sufficient to permit a jury to find that the letter was in fact received by the party to whom it was addressed.” Shafer v. A. I. T. S., Inc., 285 Pa.Super. 490, 428 A.2d 152, 156 (1981) (citations omitted).

However, “evidence of actual mailing is not required.” Commonwealth, Dep’t of Transp.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
52 A.3d 289, 2012 Pa. Super. 141, 2012 Pa. Super. LEXIS 1576, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/szymanski-v-dotey-pasuperct-2012.