Wooster v. Carbon County School District No. 1

2005 WY 47, 109 P.3d 893, 2005 Wyo. LEXIS 53, 2005 WL 850858

• Court: Wyoming Supreme Court
• Decided: April 14, 2005
• Docket: 04-146
• Status: Published

Opinions

VOIGT, Justice.

[¶ 1] The district court granted summary judgment to the appellee in this negligence action because the appellant’s notice of governmental claim did not meet constitutional and statutory requirements. We agree and dismiss this appeal for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.

ISSUES

[¶ 2] The dispositive issues in this appeal may be stated as follows:

1. Does the district court have subject matter jurisdiction in a Wyoming Governmental Claims Act case where the claim does not meet the requirements of Article 16, § 7 of the Wyoming Constitution?¹

2. Can a defective notice of claim presented within the two-year period of limitation of Wyo. Stat. Ann. 1 — 39—113(a) (Lexis-Nexis 2003) be cured by presentment of a non-defective notice of claim after that period has passed?²

3. Is the holding of Beaulieu v. Florquist, 2004 WY 31, ¶ 8, 86 P.3d 863, 866 (Wyo.2004) (Beaulieu II) that governmental claims, when presented, must meet the requirements of Article 16, § 7 of the Wyoming Constitution, to be applied prospectively only?

STANDARD OF REVIEW

[¶ 3] Our standard of review of summary judgments is well known and will not be repeated here. See Beaulieu v. Florquist, 2001 WY 33, ¶¶ 8-10, 20 P.3d 521, 525-26 (Wyo.2001) (Beaulieu I).

DISCUSSION

[¶ 4] The material facts are undisputed. On September 18, 2001, the appellant was driving a tractor-trailer that collided with a school bus driven by the appellee’s employee. On July 16, 2002, the appellant presented to the appellee a notice of claim alleging injuries and damage resulting from the collision. The notice of claim was signed only by the appellant’s counsel. On November 4, 2002, the appellant filed a complaint in district court alleging, inter alia, presentment of the notice of claim.

[¶ 5] On March 25, 2004, this Court issued its decision in Beaulieu II.3 On the following day, the appellee filed a motion for summary judgment alleging that the appellant had not signed his notice of claim and it was not signed under penalty of perjury. The appellant responded on March 31, 2004, by presenting to the appellee an amended notice of claim, duly signed by the appellant and certified under penalty of perjury. Clearly, the amended notice of claim was presented more than two years after the date of the collision.

[¶ 6] Further detailed analysis of this case is unnecessary. The ruling of the district court is correct. The law is as follows: (1) when presented to the governmental entity, a notice of claim must be signed by the claimant and certified under penalty of perjury, as required by the Wyoming Constitution; (2) such presentment, and the allegation thereof, is a condition precedent to suit and is, therefore, jurisdictional; (3) the limitation period of Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 1-39-113(a) is not a mere procedural statute of limitations, but is a jurisdictional non-claim statute, meaning that a defective notice of claim cannot be cured via the relation-back doctrine by presentment of a non-defective notice of claim after the period has passed; (4) the holding in Beaulieu II that a notice of claim must meet the requirements of Article 16, § 7 of the Wyoming Constitution is not applied prospectively only, because such has always been the law, as was stated in Beaulieu I, three years earlier.⁴ See Bell v. Schell, 2004 WY 153, ¶¶ 10-11, 16-36, 101 P.3d 465, 468, 469-76 (Wyo.2004); Yoak v. Ide, 2004 WY 32, ¶ 6, 86 P.3d 872, 874 (Wyo.2004); Beaulieu II, 2004 WY 31, ¶¶ 6-15, 86 P.3d at 866-69; and Beaulieu I, 2001 WY 33, ¶¶ 12-18, 20 P.3d at 526-27.

[¶ 7] As to the third issue, that being prospective application of the ruling that governmental claims must meet the signature and certification requirements of the state constitution, we will add the following. Long ago, this Court declared that district courts do not have jurisdiction over governmental claims that were not presented to the governmental entity as required by Article 16, § 7 of the Wyoming Constitution. Price v. State Highway Commission, 62 Wyo. 385, 396, 167 P.2d 309, 312 (1946); Utah Const. Co. v. State Highway Commission, 45 Wyo. 403, 422-25, 19 P.2d 951, 954-55 (1933). In Beaulieu I, we held that, inasmuch as a notice of claim that did not meet the constitutional signature and certification requirements was not a valid claim, the period of limitation found in the Wyoming Governmental Claims Act did not begin to run upon presentment of such deficient claim. In reaching that conclusion, we commented upon the “jurisdictional impact of establishing for purposes of pleading the date of the claim and its appropriate certification....” Beaulieu I, 2001 WY 33, ¶ 18, 20 P.3d at 527. The very clear holding of Beaulieu I was this:

The requirement is clear that an itemized statement in writing is to be filed, which is certified under penalty of perjury. Such a statement must be signed by the claimant or the charge of perjury could not lie. In addition, it is to be filed with the officer or officers charged with the duty to audit the claim.

Id. at ¶ 15, 20 P.3d at 527.

[¶ 8] This Court has always required that governmental claims comply with Article 16, § 7 of the Wyoming Constitution. Earlier eases primarily dealt with the issue of presentment of a claim to the governmental entity. Wyoming State Highway Dept. v. Napolitano, 578 P.2d 1342, 1345-46 (Wyo.1978); Awe v. University of Wyoming, 534 P.2d 97, 100 (Wyo.1975), overruled on other grounds by Dye by Dye v. Fremont County School Dist. No. 24, 820 P.2d 982 (Wyo.1991); Price, 167 P.2d at 312; Utah Const. Co., 19 P.2d at 954-55. Beaulieu I established that governmental claims must comply not just with the presentment requirement of the constitution, but also with its signature and certification requirements. The only change in Beaulieu II was the recognition that, if these requirements were jurisdictional, they could not be waived as had erroneously been held in Martinez v. City of Cheyenne, 791 P.2d 949, 958 (Wyo.1990), overruled by Beaulieu II, 2004 WY 31, 86 P.3d 863.

[¶ 9] The collision that occasioned this lawsuit occurred approximately six months after the publication of Beaulieu I, which opinion clearly stated that governmental claims must be signed by the claimant under penalty of perjury. The appellant’s notice of claim was presented to the appellee nearly ten months later — sixteen months after the publication of Beaulieu I. Thus, the later publication of Beaulieu II did not establish a new principle of law that was relevant to this determinative issue, making prospective application inappropriate.⁵ See Hanesworth v. Johnke, 783 P.2d 173, 177 (Wyo.1989).

[¶ 10] In response to the dissent’s earnest plea for equity in the form of prospective application of Beaulieu II, we feel compelled to review to some extent Wyoming’s governmental claims jurisprudence, with our focus on subject matter jurisdiction. We begin with Houtz v. Board of Com’rs of Uinta County, 11 Wyo. 152, 70 P. 840, 842 (1902), where we noted that the constitutional and statutory requirements that governmental claims be verified “has for its object a showing of good faith and honesty in the presentation of the bill.... ” While deciding the case on other grounds, we noted that the notice of claim at issue was neither certified nor presented properly. Id. at 844. Perhaps presaging Beaulieu I, we found that a notice of claim that was not “presented in form” likely was not intended to be an attempt to comply with the claim statute. Houtz, 70 P. at 844. Significantly, we did not distinguish between the constitution’s verification and presentment requirements in discussing whether the questioned instrument was a governmental claim.

[¶ 11] In Utah Const. Co., 19 P.2d at 955 (quoting Gates v. State, 128 N.Y. 221, 228, 28 N.E. 373 (1891)), we made clear that, because the State cannot be sued except as it has, itself, allowed, compliance with the constitution and the statutes implementing the constitution’s mandates is “ ‘a question of jurisdiction [and] could be raised at any time, and could not be waived....’ ” Thus, “[t]he objection that the plaintiff has failed to perform a condition that would have given him a right to sue raises a question of jurisdiction.” Id. Furthermore, while the specific issue before the court was the failure to present a governmental claim, rather than to verify it, this Court held that implementing statutes “cannot be given a meaning that would permit an evasion of the mandatory constitutional provision[.]” Id. at 953. Carried into the present controversy, that means that the courts cannot interpret governmental claims statutes to allow less than the constitution requires; courts cannot give themselves jurisdiction over claims that are not signed or certified to under penalty of perjury.

[¶ 12] In Price, 167 P.2d at 312, we sustained the dismissal with prejudice of an amended petition because the governmental claim had never been presented to the state auditor. We did not use the phrase “subject matter jurisdiction,” but we described compliance with constitution and statute as “a condition to the right to sue[.]” Id. The same result was obtained in Awe, 534 P.2d at 99. Although Awe once again involved the failure to present a claim to the state auditor, we went beyond presentment and noted that “no sworn or certified claim of any sort” was presented. Id. at 98. We repeatedly stated the need for “a formal claim, in proper form,” “[a] formal claim fitting the requirements of Art. XVI, § 7, of the Wyoming Constitution -” Awe, 534 P.2d at 99-100. Describing this requirement as a “condition precedent” to the filing of an action, we affirmed judgment in favor of the State. Id. at 99, 102. To the plaintiffs’ allegation that they were misled by the State’s assertion that it would not raise immunity, we responded:

We are not here, however, deciding questions of sovereign immunity, except peripherally. We are discussing and deciding questions of serious and important prerequisite jurisdictional procedures, without which we might as well abandon all rules of orderly conduct of lawsuits, disregard the mandates of the legislature and place everything upon an equitable basis of what we, as judges, might think the arrangement from day to day ought to be. Plaintiffs’ claim of estoppel is without merit; we cannot set up a government or court of men and not of law.

Id. at 105. The point is that there is not a hint in any of these cases that compliance with all of the requirements of Wyo. Const, art. 16, § 7 is not jurisdictional.

[¶ 13] In Napolitano, 578 P.2d at 1345-49, we reiterated the “condition precedent” principles of Utah Const. Co., Price, and Awe, and applied those principles to an inverse condemnation claim. Five years later, in Board of Trustees of University of Wyoming v. Bell, 662 P.2d 410, 415 (Wyo.1983), we added emphasis to our recognition that compliance with claim-presentment requirements is jurisdictional by dismissing an appeal on our own motion for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Three months later, we did the same in Dee v. Laramie County, 666 P.2d 957, 959 (Wyo.1983). In Dye by Dye v. Fremont County School Dist. No. 24, 820 (Wyo.1991), we agreed with the district court’s dismissal for the same reason.

[¶ 14] Ten years after Bell and Dee were published, and two years after Dye, this Court took an even stronger stance. In Amrein v. Wyoming Livestock Bd., 851 P.2d 769, 771 (Wyo.1993), we held that, to gain the jurisdiction of the district court in a governmental claims case, the complaint must allege not only presentment of the claim, but timely presentment under Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 1-39-113(a). Of particular relevance, given the dissenting opinion in the present case, is the fact that this Court applied this requirement to Mr. Amrein, rather than applying it prospectively only, and did so even though the matter had been raised by this Court, and not the parties. The point of Amrein is that plaintiffs must meet and allege compliance with governmental claims procedures with specificity.

[¶ 15] Amrein was followed in 1996 by two cases, Boyd v. Nation, 909 P.2d 323, 325-26 (Wyo.1996), and Allen v. Lucero, 925 P.2d 228, 230 (Wyo.1996), where district courts were found to lack subject matter jurisdiction due to claim presentment deficiencies. Both cases applied Amrein’s “with specificity” rule. Similarly, in Routh v. State ex rel. Wyoming Workers’ Compensation Div., 952 P.2d 1108, 1116-17 (Wyo.), cert. denied, 525 U.S. 814, 119 S.Ct. 49, 142 L.Ed.2d 38 (1998), we held that the Wyoming Governmental Claims Act, being in derogation of the common law, had to be strictly construed, and required claim presentment compliance. Later, Allen, Amrein, and Bell were again followed in Garnett v. Brock, 2 P.3d 558, 561 (Wyo.2000). And in Campbell County School Dist. v. Catchpole, 6 P.3d 1275, 1281 (Wyo.2000), we reaffirmed the jurisdictional nature of the condition precedent of a timely presentment of a notice of claim to the state auditor.

[¶ 16] As mentioned above, the focus of these cases was upon the presentment or filing requirement of Article 16, § 7 of the Wyoming Constitution, and similar requirements found in governmental claims statutes. The signature and certification requirements of the same constitutional provision were not directly addressed, no doubt because the failure before the Court was the failure to present or file any notice of claim. That focus began to change, however, with the publication of Beaulieu I in 2001.⁶ Beaulieu I must be read carefully to understand what it does, and what it does not say. Its specific holding has already been quoted above; that is, to be valid, a governmental claim must be signed by the claimant and certified to under penalty of perjury. Beaulieu I, 2001 WY 33, ¶ 15, 20 P.3d at 527. Furthermore, “establishing for purposes of pleading the date of the claim and its appropriate certification ” has “jurisdictional impact.” Id. at ¶ 18, 20 P.3d at 527 (emphasis added). That is what Beau-lieu I says. It does not say that the constitutional signature and certification requirements may be waived. Rather, Beaulieu I says that waiver, as recognized in Martinez, is not before the court, because signature and certification deficiencies were raised below. Beaulieu I is not an endorsement of Martinez.

[¶ 17] The line of cases just described led up to Beaulieu II. Beaulieu II is the case characterized by the dissent as a “bombshell.” In truth, Beaulieu II is entirely consistent with the jurisprudence reviewed above, from Houtz in 1902, through Beaulieu I, 99 years later. There is, however, one case “out of whack” with all the others. That case is Martinez. In 1990, this Court declared that the constitutional signature and certification requirements were non-jurisdictional and could be waived. Martinez, 791 P.2d at 958. There is nothing in the precedent of this Court to explain this aberrant decision. Perhaps, as we noted in Beaulieu II, 2004 WY 31, ¶ 13, 86 P.3d at 868, the decision is aberrant because the Martinez holding relied upon In re Bear River Irr. Dist., 51 Wyo. 343, 65 P.2d 686 (1937), a case that had nothing whatever to do with governmental claims or Article 16, § 7 of the Wyoming Constitution. Yet it is the existence of Martinez that fuels the dissent in the present case.

[¶ 18] The dissent contends that the erroneous holding of Martinez should be applied to the instant case to save the appellant’s invalid claim, because Martinez was not overruled until Beaulieu II in 2004. We decline to do so, for three reasons. First, as recited above, the appellant’s notice of claim was presented to the appellee sixteen months after the publication of Beaulieu I, where we clearly announced that, to be valid, governmental claims had to be signed by the claimant and certified to under the penalty of perjury. There is no reason not to expect the appellant to have complied with the law. Equity simply does not demand that this Court step in to prevent the natural consequences of the appellant’s own dereliction. In particular, there is nothing to suggest that the appellant was actually misled by the fact that Martinez existed.

[¶ 19] The second reason that we decline to validate the appellant’s invalid claim via Martinez is that, even if the appellant had been aware of Martinez, which has not been shown, MaHinez did not tell the appellant not to sign and certify his claim. Rather, Martinez merely held that such could be waived if not raised in the district court. Inasmuch as these requirements were raised in the district court, waiver is not even available to the appellant.

[¶ 20] Third, we decline to apply our holding herein prospectively only because, with the exception of Martinez, we have for decades considered compliance with Article 16, § 7 of the Wyoming Constitution and its implementing statutes to be jurisdictional, and subject matter jurisdiction cannot be waived. Even more importantly, subject matter jurisdiction can be neither created nor destroyed by judicial fiat. 21 C.J.S. Courts §§ 12, 18, 56, 64 (1990 & 2004 Cum. Supp.). What that means is that the erroneous holding of Martinez does not allow the district courts to acquire jurisdiction that they do not have. Id. at § 90.⁷ Martinez did not create jurisdiction where none existed. Pickle v. Board of County Com’rs of County of Platte, 764 P.2d 262, 264 (Wyo.1988), is not a holding to the contrary. Pickle simply says that “the district courts have subject matter jurisdiction to hear claims filed under the [Wyoming Governmental Claims Act].” Id. We already know that from Wyo. Stat. Ann. § l-39-117(a) (LexisNexis 2003).⁸ What we also already know is that a claim that does not meet the constitutional signature and certification requirements is not a valid claim under the act. Beaulieu I, 2001 WY 33, ¶ 17, 20 P.3d at 527; see also Bell, 2004 WY 153, ¶¶ 10-11, 101 P.3d at 468; Yoak, 2004 WY 32, ¶ 6, 86 P.3d at 874; and Beaulieu II, 2004 WY 31, ¶ 8, 86 P.3d at 866.

[¶ 21] Finally, if we are to concern ourselves with stare decisis, as we should, then we should refuse to deviate again from the law, as we did in Martinez. Martinez, not Beaulieu II, was the bombshell. Never before, or since, have we said that a governmental claim need not be in compliance with the constitution.⁹ We must be especially careful that the siren song of equity does not cause us to abandon the law in jurisdictional matters. Subject matter jurisdiction is determined in constitutional conventions and in legislative halls, not in courtrooms.

CONCLUSION

[¶22] The appellant did not present to the appellee, during the mandatory two-year period of Wyo. Stat. Ann. § l-39-113(a), a notice of claim signed by the claimant under penalty of perjury, as required by Article 16, § 7 of the Wyoming Constitution. The appellant’s belated effort to cure that deficiency was ineffective because his cause of action ceased to exist when the statutory period expired. The presentment of a valid claim being jurisdictional, the district court was correct in determining that it lacked subject matter jurisdiction over the appellant’s claim. Because this Court can have no better jurisdiction than did the district court, we dismiss this appeal. Lankford v. City of Laramie, 2004 WY 143, ¶ 23, 100 P.3d 1238, 1244 (Wyo.2004); Platte Development Co. v. State, Environmental Quality Council, 966 P.2d 972, 974 (Wyo.1998); Sheridan Retirement Partners v. City of Sheridan, 950 P.2d 554, 556-57 (Wyo.1997).

1 .

No money shall be paid out of the state treasury except upon appropriation by law and on warrant drawn by the proper officer, and no bills, claims, accounts or demands against the state, or any county or political subdivision, shall be audited, allowed or paid until a full itemized statement in writing, certified under penalty of perjuiy, shall be filed with the officer or officers whose duty it may be to audit the same.

Wyo. Const, art. 16, § 7.

2 . "No action shall be brought under this act against a governmental entity unless the claim upon which the action is based is presented to the entity as an itemized statement in writing within two (2) years of the date of the alleged act, error or omission....” Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 1 — 39— 113(a).

Beaulieu I made it clear that governmental claims must meet the requirements of Wyo. Const. art. 16, § 7, including the requirement that such claims must be signed and certified under penalty of perjury.... Furthermore, Beaulieu I made it just as clear that the claim "must be signed by the claimant or the charge of perjury could not lie.”

3 Beaulieu II, 2004 WY 31, ¶ 8, 86 P.3d at 866 (quoting Beaulieu I, 2001 WY 33, ¶ 15, 20 P.3d at 527) (emphasis in original).

4 . It is important not to confuse the act of compliance with the constitution's signature and certification requirements with the act of alleging such compliance in a complaint. Beaulieu I reiterated that the former has always been the law. Beaulieu II applied the latter prospectively. In the instant case, the deficiency is the failure in compliance, not just in allegation.

5 . The erroneous holding of Martinez that the constitutional signature and certification requirements were non-jurisdictional and could, therefore, be waived if not raised in the district court, is of no assistance to the appellant in the present case, where the issue was raised in the district court.

6 . We will later discuss Martinez, a 1990 case.

7 . Here, we are concerned with erroneous decisions on questions of law. By way of example, a Wyoming state district court cannot acquire subject matter jurisdiction over a bankruptcy case simply by declaring that it has such jurisdiction, On the other hand, where the question is one of fact, the court may have jurisdiction over the general class of cases, but not over the particular case before it. The district courts have jurisdiction over the general class of cases brought as governmental claims under the Wyoming Governmental Claims Act, but they do not have jurisdiction over cases where the claim does not meet constitutional or statutory requirements. Otherwise, the district court could adjudicate cases in which the State has not consented to be sued.

8 . "Original and exclusive jurisdiction for any claim under this act shall be in the district courts of Wyoming.” Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 1-39-117(a).

9 . In Rissler & McMurry Co. v. Wyoming Highway Dept., 582 P.2d 583, 586-87 (Wyo.1978), we allowed substantial compliance with, rather than strict adherence to, statutory claim presentation procedures. In the minds of the three concurring justices, equitable considerations prevailed where a claim was presented, but to the wrong authority. In dissent, however, the two remaining justices opined that lowering the standard for claim filing to substantial compliance did, in effect, judicially deprive the legislature of its right to determine how and when the State could be sued, and violated the doctrine of separation of powers. Id. at 590 (Thomas, J., dissented, with which Raper, J., joined).