holding that the trial court did not exceed its discretion in refusing to allow an amendment to a complaint sought 7 months after the original complaint was filed and within 30 days of the original trial date, where the plaintiff had all of the information necessary to amend her complaint from the outset of the action
How later courts described this case
- holding that the trial court did not exceed its discretion in refusing to allow an amendment to a complaint sought 7 months after the original complaint was filed and within 30 days of the original trial date, where the plaintiff had all of the information necessary to amend her complaint from the outset of the action
- holding that the trial court properly struck the amended complaint when the plaintiff offered no reason to refute the trial court's finding that the new allegations in the amended complaint were based on facts the plaintiff had known since the beginning of the action
- holding that trial court erred in entering a summary judgment in favor of defendant on the basis of an unpleaded affirmative defense even though the plaintiff had not objected to the assertion of the unpleaded affirmative defense in the trial court
- reiterating the rule that a nonmovant need not present substantial evidence of a particular element of his claim unless the movant has shifted the burden to the nonmovant by informing the court “where the [nonmovant’s] case suffers an evidentiary failure”
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
I concur in the main opinion in all respects except that I concur only in the *Page 81
result of the analysis about the rule of repose. We should not hold the trial court in error on the ground that the defendant failed to plead the common law rule of repose applied by the trial court to support its summary judgment; for the plaintiff did not assert this ground — the defendant's failure to plead — before the trial court; and we do not reverse trial courts on grounds asserted for the first time on appeal. Ex parte Ryals , 773 So.2d 1011 (Ala. 2000). We can and should, however, reverse the summary judgment on the merits of the application of the common law rule of repose and the requirements for summary judgment in this case. Thus the result of the main opinion is right on the rule-of-repose issue. I concur in the rationales and results on the other issues.