Brown v. MHC Stagecoach, LLC

129 Neva, Advance Opinion 37

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF NEVADA

KATHERINE BROWN, No. 59036

Appellant,

vs.

MHC STAGECOACH, LLC,

Respondent.

FILED

Jurisdictional screening of a proper person appeal from a

district court order statistically closing a case in an employment matter.

Eighth Judicial District Court, Clark County; Douglas W. Herndon, Judge.

Dismissed.

Katherine Brown, Tacoma, Washington,

in Proper Person.

Jackson Lewis LLP and Elayna J. Youchah, Las Vegas,

for Respondent.

BEFORE THE COURT EN BANC.

OPINION

By the Court, GIBBONS, J.:

This court has jurisdiction to consider an appeal from a

district court order only when the appeal is authorized by statute or court

rule. Katherine Brown appeals from a district court form order that

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statistically closed her case, even though the district court had not yet

entered a final judgment resolving Brown's claims. The question we must

decide is whether such an order is substantively appealable. It is not, as

no statute or court rule authorizes an appeal from an order statistically

closing a case and the order does not constitute a final, appealable

judgment, as none was entered. Because we lack jurisdiction, we dismiss

this appeal.

FACTS

This appeal arises from a district court employment action

filed by appellant Katherine Brown against her former employer,

respondent MHC Stagecoach, LLC. Brown alleged that her supervisor

had violated her civil rights by engaging in discriminatory treatment, and

as a result, she was constructively terminated from her job. Through

counsel, Brown filed a complaint, and the parties entered into settlement

negotiations in an effort to resolve the action. Brown initially authorized

her attorney to settle with MHC for $7,500. The parties dispute whether a

settlement was ever actually agreed to, however, because Brown

ultimately refused to sign the settlement agreement that she was

presented with based on her objection to certain language in the

agreement limiting the parties' ability to disclose details about the conflict

and settlement. Following the breakdown of these settlement efforts,

Brown's attorney requested, and was granted, leave to withdraw.

Immediately after Brown's counsel withdrew, MHC filed a

motion in the district court to enforce the settlement agreement, asserting

that the parties had agreed on the material terms of the settlement,

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rendering the agreement enforceable. As the basis for its motion, MHC

furnished correspondence between MHC and Brown's former counsel and

correspondence between Brown and her former counsel regarding the

settlement terms. Brown, now proceeding pro se, opposed the motion, but

the district court granted the motion and entered an order setting forth

the terms of the parties' settlement. The order did not enter judgment in

favor of either party nor did it otherwise expressly resolve Brown's

insistence that the parties did not reach a settlement. Brown appealed

from that order, but this court dismissed that appeal for lack of

jurisdiction, after concluding that the order was not an appealable, final

judgment because it did not dismiss or formally resolve Brown's

complaint.

Following the district court's grant of the motion to enforce the

settlement agreement, and after the dismissal of Brown's first appeal,

MHC issued a check to Brown for the settlement amount, which she

refused to accept and returned to MHC marked "void." As a result, MHC

filed a motion to deposit the settlement proceeds with the district court,

which the district court granted. Like the prior order granting the motion

to enforce the settlement, this order failed to enter judgment in favor of

either party or otherwise resolve the case. Approximately two weeks after

the district court granted MHC's motion to deposit the settlement

proceeds, Brown filed an untimely opposition to MHC's motion and

proposed order. Thereafter, without addressing Brown's opposition to

MHC's motion, the district court entered a form order statistically closing

the case on the basis that there had been a stipulated judgment. Brown

has appealed from that order.

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DISCUSSION

This court has appellate jurisdiction to review decisions of the

district courts. Nev. Const. art. 6, § 4. But this court's appellate

jurisdiction is limited, Valley Bank of Nev. v. Ginsburg, 110 Nev. 440, 444,

874 P.2d 729, 732 (1994), and we may only consider appeals authorized by

statute or court rule. Taylor Constr. Co. v. Hilton Hotels Corp., 100 Nev.

207, 209, 678 P.2d 1152, 1153 (1984). No statute or court rule directly

provides for an appeal from an order statistically closing a case, see NRAP

3A(b) (designating the judgments and orders from which an appeal may be

taken), however if the order constitutes a final judgment, then it is

substantively appealable under NRAP 3A(b)(1) (permitting an appeal from

a final judgment in a civil action). The finality of an order or judgment

depends on "what the order or judgment actually does, not what it is

called." Valley Bank of Nev., 110 Nev. at 445, 874 P.2d at 733. To be final,

an order or judgment must "dispose[ ] of all the issues presented in the

case, and leave[ ] nothing for the future consideration of the court, except

for post-judgment issues such as attorney's fees and costs." Lee v. GNLV

Corp., 116 Nev. 424, 426, 996 P.2d 416, 417 (2000). Thus, we look to the

text of the order statistically closing Brown's case to determine whether

the order renders a final, appealable judgment.

The order statistically closing the underlying case is a form

that, like a standard district court order, contains at the top of the page a

heading identifying the court and the county, the case caption, and the

case number and department. The body of the order has a title and

instructs the court clerk to statistically close the case for a variety of

reasons:

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CIVIL ORDER

TO STATISTICALLY CLOSE CASE

Upon review of this matter and good cause

appearing,

IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the Clerk of the

Court is hereby directed to statistically close this

case for the following reason:

DISPOSITIONS:

O Voluntary Dismissal

O Transferred (before/during trial)

O Involuntary (statutory) Dismissal

O Judgment on Arbitration Award

O Stipulated Dismissal

El Stipulated Judgment

111 Default Judgment

O Motion to Dismiss (by Defendant)

El Summary Judgment

0 Non-Jury (bench) Trial

O Jury Trial

At the bottom of the form order is the date the order was entered and the

district court judge's signature. The order contains no other language or

directives. Drawing from its language, the only effect of the challenged

order at issue in this case is that the district court clerk has been directed

to statistically close the case based on the reason indicated by the checked

box—"Stipulated Judgment."

The language of the order seems to anticipate that a

disposition in the case has already been entered and that the previous

entry of such a disposition forms the basis for the statistical closure of the

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case. But Brown still disputes the validity of the settlement agreement

ordered by the district court. And neither of the district court orders

entered before the order statistically closing the case—the order granting

respondent's motion to enforce the disputed settlement and the order

granting respondent's motion to deposit the settlement proceeds—entered

judgment in favor of any party or otherwise resolved Brown's claims. As a

result, these determinations do not constitute final, appealable judgments.

See Valley Bank of Nev., 110 Nev. at 446, 874 P.2d at 733-34 (concluding

that the district court's order approving a settlement agreement was not a

final, appealable judgment because the parties' claims were not dismissed

or otherwise resolved); St. Louis Union Station Holdings, Inc. v. Discovery

Channel Store, Inc., 272 S.W.3d 504, 505 (Mo. Ct. App. 2008) (noting that

an order granting a motion to enforce a settlement agreement becomes

final and appealable only after a judgment on the settlement is entered

and the case is dismissed); see also Resnick v. Valente, 97 Nev. 615, 615-

16, 637 P.2d 1205, 1205 (1981) (considering an appeal from an order

granting a motion to enforce a settlement agreement where a judgment

was also entered pursuant to the motion). Thus, it appears that there was

no final judgment or disposition in Brown's case below to provide the basis

for statistically closing the case in accordance with the listed dispositions. 1

For the foregoing reasons, the order Brown challenges cannot

be construed as a final, appealable judgment within the ambit of NRAP

1 Because the order only serves to direct the statistical closure of a

case rather than to resolve any claims pending in that case, our conclusion

would be the same had the district court checked the box indicating that

the basis for the statistical closure was a voluntary, involuntary, or

stipulated dismissal or a default or summary judgment.

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3A(b)(1). See Morton Ina, Inc. v. A.E. Staley Mfg. Co., 460 F.3d 470, 481-

82 (3d Cir. 2006) (determining that "[a] n order reciting that no further

action is contemplated and directing the clerk to mark the case closed does

not become final for purposes of appellate jurisdiction merely by reason of

the execution of that order and its entry on the docket"); Delgrosso v.

Spang & Co., 903 F.2d 234, 236 (3d Cir. 1990) (considering an appeal from

an order that directed the clerk of the court to "mark the above captioned

case closed" but noting that "[n] ()thing contained in this order shall be

considered a dismissal or disposition of th[e] matter" and concluding that

the order was not final for appellate purposes). As no other statute or

court rule provides for an appeal from such an order statistically closing a

case, this court lacks jurisdiction to consider this appeal, and it must

therefore be dismissed. Taylor Constr. Co., 100 Nev. at 209, 678 P.2d at

1153.

Once the district court formally resolves the underlying case

by entering a judgment or order that finally and completely resolves

Brown's claims based on its prior order enforcing the settlement

agreement, 2 if aggrieved, Brown may appeal from that disposition to this

court. See Lee, 116 Nev. at 426, 996 P.2d at 417; Valley Bank of Nev., 110

Nev. at 446, 874 P.2d at 733-34. Further, Brown will be able to challenge

in the context of that appeal the interlocutory orders entered in the

underlying matter, including the orders granting respondent's motions to

2 Because

we conclude that we lack jurisdiction over this appeal, we

do not reach the merits of Brown's argument disputing the validity of the

settlement.

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„,

enforce the settlement agreement and to deposit the settlement proceeds.

See Consol. Generator-Nev., Inc. v. Cummins Engine Co., 114 Nev. 1304,

1312, 971 P.2d 1251, 1256 (1998) (explaining that interlocutory orders

may be challenged when appealing a final judgment).

Gibbons

U r-

We concur:

leika , C.J.

Pickering

/irCit't , J.

Hardesty

Parraguirre

Douglas

J.

Saitta

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