Court Rulings

This is a teacher tenure case. Appellant, a tenured teacher employed by Appellee Shelby County Board of Education, was fired for insubordination and conduct unbecoming. Appellant appealed the Shelby County School Board's decision to the Chancery Court for Shelby County. In a post-trial motion, Appellee petitioned the court to consider an email notification of the board's decision that was sent to Appellant's attorney. Specifically, Appellee argued that the email constituted statutory notice to the Appellant so as to start the thirty-day time period for filing an appeal of the board's decision in the trial court. Tenn. Code Ann. 49-5-513(b). The trial court denied the motion as newly discovered evidence. We conclude that the email goes directly to the question of whether the Appellant's petition was timely so as to confer subject-matter jurisdiction on the trial court. Accordingly, the trial court erred in treating the motion as one for permission to file "newly discovered evidence." Because the trial court applied an incorrect legal standard in ruling on the admissibility of the email evidence and did not address the question of its subject-matter jurisdiction, we vacate the trial court's order and remand for further proceedings.

This is an interlocutory appeal pursuant to Rule 9 of the Tennessee Rules of Appellate Procedure. In this health care liability action, we must determine whether the plaintiff properly complied with the pre-suit notice requirement found in Tennessee Code Annotated section 29-26-121(a)(1). The original defendants in this matter all filed a motion to dismiss and/or for summary judgment alleging that they did not provide medical treatment to the plaintiff/appellee. Subsequently, the plaintiff filed a response to the defendants' motion acknowledging that she had mistakenly identified a proper defendant in this suit. The plaintiff also filed a motion to amend her complaint attempting to remedy that mistake by substituting in the proper defendant. After both motions were heard, the trial court denied the original defendants' motion to dismiss and/or for summary judgment and granted the plaintiff/appellee's motion to amend her complaint. For the following reasons, we affirm the decision of the trial court and remand for further proceedings.

I concur in the majority opinion's denial of West Tennessee Health Network and West Tennessee Healthcare, Inc.'s Motion to Dismiss and/or for Summary Judgment. Like the majority, I express no opinion whatsoever on whether dismissal of these two parties might be appropriate under other theories. However, I must respectfully dissent from the majority opinion's holding that pre-suit notice was provided to the District and that amendment of Ms. Runions' complaint was proper. The majority opinion states: "we cannot ignore the unmistakable acknowledgement from Ms. Zamata's letter that Ms. Runions did, in fact, provide written notice of a potential claim against the District." Herein lies my disagreement with the majority opinion.

Trial court did not err in denying railroad's motion for directed verdict, in which the railroad argued that plaintiff's Federal Employers' Liability Act claim was precluded by the Federal Railroad Safety Act (FRSA), where the subject matter of plaintiff's claim was not "covered" by the FRSA and the preclusion analysis recently set forth by the United States Supreme Court makes it clear that the claim is not precluded.

Workers' compensation R.C. 4123.512 de novo scope of review failure to object to absence of exhibits to notice of hearing and deposition transcripts constitutes waiver. A trial court's scope of review on appeal from a workers' compensation determination pursuant to R.C. 4123.512 is, unlike traditional administrative appeals, de novo, and is based solely on the evidence placed before the trial court by the parties. The claimant bears the burden of proving entitlement to workers' compensation fund participation. The failure to object at the trial court to the absence of deposition and administrative hearing exhibits upon receipt of a notice of filing thereof constitutes a waiver of the argument, and appellant did not proffer the exhibits.

Mother has appealed the trial court's decisions regarding parenting time, criminal contempt, child support, and the child's surname. We have determined that the trial court erred in finding Mother in criminal contempt as to one of the three incidents at issue, in setting temporary child support, in failing to order Father to pay child support by wage assignment, and in ordering the child's surname to be changed to Father's surname. In all other respects, we affirm the decision of the trial court.

Wrongful death medical malpractice trial. The magistrate concluded that the diagnosis, care and treatment rendered by defendant's medical professionals leading up to plaintiff's decedent's cardiac arrest complied with the standard of care. The magistrate found defendant's expert testimony more persuasive and supported by medical evidence than plaintiff's expert testimony. Judgment recommended in favor of defendant.