16 Fla. L. Weekly Supp. 638a
Online Reference: FLWSUPP 167HAMIL
Insurance — Personal injury protection — Discovery — Admissions — Trial court erred in denying motion for relief from technical admissions and entering summary judgment in favor of medical provider based on admissions where insurer sought to withdraw technical admissions three months before motion for summary judgment was filed, record contained sufficient evidence to create issue of disputed fact, and provider has not shown that it would be prejudiced by withdrawal of technical admissions
UNITED AUTOMOBILE INSURANCE COMPANY, Appellant, vs. CHIRO-MEDICAL REHAB OF NORTH MIAMI, a/a/o Thomas Hamilton, Appellee. Circuit Court, 17th Judicial Circuit (Appellate) in and for Broward County. Case No. 07-32671 CACE (08). L.C. Case No. 05-16976 (53). May 22, 2009. Counsel: Thomas L. Hunker, United Automobile Insurance Company, Office of the General Counsel, Miami. Virginia M. Best, Miami.
ORDER AND OPINION
(RONALD J. ROTHSCHILD, J.) THIS CAUSE comes before the Court upon Appellant, United Automobile Insurance Company’s appeal of the Order Granting Summary Judgment entered on March 19, 2008, and the Final Judgment, entered on March 26, 2008, in favor of the Appellee, Broward Rehab Center, Inc. Having reviewed the appellate file; applicable law, and being otherwise fully advised in the premises, the Court hereby decides as follows:
Appellee, Chiro-Medical Rehab of North Miami (hereinafter “Chiro-Medical”), as assignee of Thomas Hamilton, filed suit against United Automobile Insurance Company’s (hereinafter UAI) seeking to recover Personal Injury Protection (PIP) benefits from UAI, arising from a motor vehicle accident which occurred on July 27, 2003. On or about November 14, 2005, Chiro-Medical served UAI with a Request for Admissions. UAI did not respond to the Request. On May 22, 2007, UAI filed for relief from technical admissions. The trial court denied UAI’s request for relief without prejudice, holding UAI’s inadvertence without further elaboration or explanation was not enough to grant relief.
On August 29, 2007, Chiro-Medical filed a Motion for Final Summary Judgment. At the summary judgment hearing, the trial court granted the Motion for Summary Judgment, relying on UAI’s technical admission that the medical bills were reasonable, related and necessary, citing authority that in cases where the insurer fails to explain or inform the court as to why the Request for Admissions were not answered, the court may rely on technical admissions to grant a motion for summary judgment.
The applicable standard of review for orders granting summary judgment is de novo. 5th Avenue Real Estate Dev., Inc. v. Aeacus Real Estate Ltd., 876 So.2d 1220 (Fla. 4th DCA 2004). Summary judgment is appropriate only where there are no genuine issues of material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Volusia County v. Aberdeen at Ormond Beach. L.P., 760 So.2d 126 (Fla. 2000).
Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.370(b) allows for technical admissions to be withdrawn or amended “when the presentation of the merits of the action will be subserved by it and the party who obtained the admission fails to satisfy the court that withdrawal or amendment will prejudice that party in maintaining an action or defense on the merits. . .”
The Appellee urges this Court to rely on those cases cited by the trial court which hold that noncompliance with Rule 1.370 could not be excused “on a base allegation of inadvertence.” It is well established, however, that Rule 1.370 is liberally construed in favor of party’s ability to amend admissions in light of the court’s preference to dispose of a case on its merits. Ramos v. Growing Together, Inc., 672 So.2d 103, 104 (Fla. 4th DCA 1996); see also Wilson v. Dep’t of Admin. Div. of Retirement, 538 So.2d 139, 141 (Fla. 4th DCA 1989) (The 1973 amendment to Rule 1.370 “liberalized the procedure for correcting an improper response or technical admission.”). “The use of admissions obtained through a technicality should not form a basis to preclude adjudication of a legitimate claim.” Sterling v. City of West Palm Beach, 595 So.2d 284, 285 (Fla. 4th DCA 1992). There was no evidence in the record that the failure of UAI to respond to the request for admissions was deliberate or malevolent. UAI requested relief from the admissions before the summary judgment motion was filed and attempted to contact the attorney who was in charge of the case when the request for admissions went unanswered.
Two factors that Florida Courts of Appeal examine when deciding whether summary judgment was properly granted due to a party’s failure to timely respond to a request for admissions are:
1) whether there was sufficient evidence in the record to create the existence of a disputed issue of material fact; and 2) whether the plaintiff has shown that it would be prejudiced.
If the record reflects there is sufficient evidence to contradict the technical admissions, and that disputed facts exist, the trial court’s grant of summary judgment is reversed. See Ramos at 104 (The Court reversed the order granting summary judgment because disputed issues of fact existed); Mahmoud v. King, 824 So.2d 248, 249 (Fla. 4th DCA 2002) (Trial court abused its discretion in granting summary judgment based on technical admissions where the record existing at the time of summary judgment “plainly showed evidentiary conflict as to the question of liability”); Ruiz v. G. De Verona, 785 So.2d 508, 509 (Fla. 3rd DCA 2000) (The record contained sufficient information that contradicted the technical admissions); Sher v. Liberty Mut. Ins. Co., 557 So.2d 638, 639 (Fla. 3rd DCA 1990) (The record was “replete with evidence” contradicting the party’s technical admissions).
In the instant case, the trial court did not examine the evidence that UAI had in opposition to the summary judgment motion and based its decision solely on the technical admissions. The record contained sufficient evidence to create an issue of disputed fact, such as Dr. Fleischer’s affidavit, peer review and IME report, along with the deposition testimony of Serlo Mathelier, UAI’s corporate representative.
The Third and Fourth District Courts of Appeal also examine whether the Plaintiff has shown that it would be prejudiced if relief from the technical admissions was not granted and the case proceeded on the merits of the case. See Ramos at 104 (Plaintiff did not establish it would be prejudiced if defendant was allowed to amend its admissions and proceed to the merits); Thomas v. Chase Manhattan Bank, 875 So.2d 758 (Fla. 4th DCA 2004) (Rule 1.370 requires the Plaintiff to show “prejudice” within the meaning of the rule); Melody Tours, Inc. v. Granville Market Letter, Inc., 413 So.2d 450 (Fla. 5th DCA 1982) (If the Plaintiff would not be prejudiced by the withdrawal of the technical admissions, relief from technical admissions could be granted even if defendant inadvertently did not file answers to the request for admissions).
In the case at bar, Chiro-Medical has not shown that it would be prejudiced if the Request for Relief from Technical Admissions was granted. An examination of the record reveals that Chiro-Medical did not seek an order compelling discovery. In fact, Chiro-Medical took no action to move this case forward from June 14, 2006, to May 16, 2007. It was not until after the trial court filed a Notice of Lack of Prosecution that further action was taken on the case. UAI was the first to take action after the Notice of Lack of Prosecution was entered. Less than two weeks after it was filed, UAI filed its Motion for Relief from Technical Admissions. Chiro-Medical did not file its Motion for Summary Judgment until approximately three months after UAI’s motion for relief from technical admissions was filed and heard.
While the Third and Fourth District Courts have frequently determined that summary judgment is inappropriate based on technical admissions alone, the Appellee relies on the recent case of Asset Management Consultants of Virginia, Inc. v. City of Tamarac, 913 So.2d 1179 (Fla. 4th DCA 2005) to argue that this Court should uphold the trial court’s decision. However, the facts of Asset Management are significantly dissimilar from the instant case. In Asset Management, the Court stressed that the trial court’s decision to grant summary judgment was correct because Asset Management did not move to file answers to the request for admissions until after the summary judgment hearing. Id. at 1181 [emphasis added]. Here, UAI filed its Motion for Relief before Chiro-Medical filed its Motion for Summary Judgment and before the hearing. Further, the Court in Asset Management recognized the liberal standard in allowing amendments to permit disposition on the merits, but found that Asset Management’s behavior of filing their Motion after the hearing on summary judgment pushes the limits of the liberal standard too far. Id. The only evidence the Asset Management Court had before it that contradicted the technical admissions was found in the proposed answers that were not filed until the Summary Judgment hearing had concluded. Id.
Moreover, the Asset Management Court also relied, as the trial court did here, on Farish v. Lum’s, Inc., 267 So.2d 325 (Fla. 1972), to support its decision. The facts of the instant case are more like those found in Love v. Allis-Chalmers Corp., W.D., 362 So.2d 1037 (Fla. 4th DCA 1978), where the Fourth distinguished its set of facts from the Farish case. The Court in Love stated that it was dissimilar to Farish, because in Farish the Court did not have a record before it that was replete with evidence that disputed the technical admissions to the contrary. Id. at 1039.
Therefore, based on the unique facts of this case the trial court erred in failing to grant the Rule 1.370 Motion for Relief from Technical Admissions and summary judgment must be reversed.
Accordingly, it is hereby,
ORDERED and ADJUDGED that the Order Granting Summary Judgment is REVERSED and REMANDED for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
