Dana Richard+ v. Sally McGreevy
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DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA COURT OF APPEALS
Nos. 06-CV-1056, 06-CV-1057 & 07-PR-1411
D ANA R ICHARD, P RAFULL D AVE, R ICHARD R ATNER, AND R OBERT M ADSEN,
A PPELLANTS,
v.
S ALLY M CG REEVY, P ERSONAL R EPRESENTATIVE,
A PPELLEE.
Appeals from the Superior Court of the
District of Columbia
(CAB2120-06, CAB2345-06, & FEP24-06)
(Hon. Geoffrey M. Alprin, Trial Judge)
(Hon. Rhonda Reid-Winston, Probate Judge)
(Argued February 22, 2008
Decided July 24, 2008)
Henry St. J. FitzGerald, with whom Dana F. Richard was on the brief, for appellant.
Mark A. Binstock for appellee.
Before F ISHER, B LACKBURNE-R IGSBY, and T HOMPSON, Associate Judges.
B LACKBURNE-R IGSBY, Associate Judge: After the death of Ted Wolfe, doctors and
lawyers who alleged that they provided medical and legal services to him prior to his death
sought payment for these claims by Mr. Wolfe’s estate. In these consolidated appeals, these
doctors and lawyers challenge the Probate Division’s dismissal of their complaints filed after
2
the estate disallowed their claims and the Civil Division’s dismissal of their consolidated
complaints.1
Appellants allege that (1) the Superior Court’s Probate and Civil Divisions erred in
respectively dismissing their consolidated complaints against the estate on the grounds that
their suits should have been filed with Maryland courts and were thus improperly before the
Divisions; and (2) the Civil Division erred in ordering the appellants and the District of
Columbia Recorder of Deeds to release thirteen Notices of Lis Pendens from the land records
when appellants’ cases were still pending on appeal and undecided. We hold that the Probate
Division could properly exercise jurisdiction over the appellants’ claims and, therefore, we
reverse and remand its dismissal of the complaints. We also reverse the Civil Division’s
dismissal of the appellants’ consolidated complaints. Holding that the Civil Division lacked
jurisdiction to order the release of the Notices of Lis Pendens because notices of appeal had
been filed, which divested the Civil Division of its jurisdiction, we vacate that order.
1
In this case, appellants challenge the dismissals of their consolidated complaints by the
District of Columbia Superior Court Probate and Civil Divisions. The Probate Division and the
Civil Division have separate areas of jurisdiction and will be referred to separately in this opinion.
See D.C. Code § 11-902 (2001).
3
I. Factual and Procedural Background
On February 15, 1995, Ted Wolfe executed his Last Will and Testament (“Will”) in
Maryland, whereby the entirety of his estate was devised to The Ted Albert Wolfe Trust
(“Trust”), which was created on the same date. Mr. Wolfe died in his Maryland home on June
7, 2005. As provided for in his Will and Trust, his first cousin, appellee Sally Ann McGreevy,
became Executor of the Will and Trustee of the Trust.2
Appellants Dana Richard, Robert Madsen, Richard Ratner, and Prafull Dave
(“Creditors”) each claim that they provided medical or legal services to Mr. Wolfe and that
they are owed payment for these services.
On June 10, 2005, an estate creditor, who is not a party to these complaints or appeals,
initiated a probate proceeding in the District of Columbia and sought to be appointed personal
representative, but the Probate Division dismissed this proceeding without prejudice in late
October 2005. On July 6, 2005, Ms. McGreevy opened a probate estate in Montgomery
2
The Trust named Ted Wolfe as Trustee and, in the event of his death, passed that position
to Joseph Julius Erdos and upon his death, passed that position to Ms. McGreevy. Similarly, the
Will named Mr. Erdos as Executor and, upon his death, that position passed to Ms. McGreevy.
Mr. Erdos had died on September 20, 1995.
4
County, Maryland. The following day Maryland issued Letters of Administration to Ms.
McGreevy, who was appointed Personal Representative of the estate. On November 2, 2005,
the District of Columbia probate petition was dismissed without prejudice because the Probate
Division believed that the domicile issue was being litigated in Maryland.3
On December 7, 2005, the Creditors presented their claims in Maryland against the
estate to Ms. McGreevy in her capacity as Personal Representative. The estate issued a notice
of disallowance of those claims on January 10, 2006.
On March 6, 2006, Ms. McGreevy opened an ancillary probate estate in the District
of Columbia with respect to the real property located here. On March 13, 2006, without
knowledge that the ancillary estate had been opened, the Creditors filed Civil Action No. 062345 (hereinafter “First Lawsuit”) in the Civil Division of Superior Court seeking money
damages in the amount of $295,000 for breach of contract and seeking the removal of Ms.
McGreevy as Trustee and Personal Representative. Two days later, the Creditors filed Civil
Action No. 06-2120 also in the Civil Division of Superior Court seeking money damages for
3
The parties disputed whether the decedent Mr. Wolfe was domiciled in Maryland or the
District of Columbia at the time of his death. Because the Maryland probate proceedings
commenced earlier, the Probate Division of the District of Columbia Superior Court advised the
parties to raise their domicile arguments in the Maryland proceedings. Id.
5
breach of contract in the amount of $295,000 and seeking a declaratory judgment that Mr.
Wolfe was domiciled in the District of Columbia at the time of his death. The Creditors
learned of the probate estate in the District of Columbia on March 23, 2006, and re-filed Civil
Action No. 06-2345 in the Civil Division the following day with an amended caption that
reflected the resident agent for the estate in the District of Columbia.
The Creditors
demanded a jury trial in both complaints.
In April 2006, the Creditors filed thirteen Notices of Lis Pendens with the District of
Columbia Recorder of Deeds and referenced Civil Action No. 06-2345 as the action that
formed the basis for each of the notices. Ms. McGreevy, in her capacity as Personal
Representative, filed a Motion to Dismiss the Complaint in Civil Action No. 06-2345 on May
10, 2006, in the Civil Division. She also filed a Motion to Strike Filing of Notice of Lis
Pendens on May 23, 2006, in Civil Action No. 06-2345. The Civil Division trial judge
responsible for Civil Action No. 06-2345 granted Ms. McGreevy’s motion and ordered the
Recorder of Deeds to strike all thirteen Notices of Lis Pendens on June 6, 2006. On July 7,
2006, the District of Columbia Recorder of Deeds filed a Motion to Intervene and to Vacate
the Court’s Order to strike the Notices of Lis Pendens because it contended that the order
exceeded the Recorder of Deeds’s authority because the Recorder of Deeds was not
authorized to remove any of the Notices of Lis Pendens that had been recorded. Ms.
6
McGreevy did not oppose this motion. The Creditors timely filed a Notice of Appeal of the
June 6th Order striking the thirteen notices on July 10, 2006.
After it was discovered at the July 14, 2006 scheduling hearing in Civil Action No. 062345 that another civil action by the Creditors was pending against Ms. McGreevy (Civil
Action No. 06-2120, presided over by the Honorable Geoffrey Alprin) in the Civil Division,
Judge Alprin sua sponte consolidated both cases.
The Civil Division granted Ms.
McGreevy’s Motion to Dismiss on the grounds that the Creditors were barred from asserting
their claims in the District of Columbia because they had failed to comply with the Maryland
statute requiring lawsuits be filed in Maryland after the disallowance of their claims and
ordered that the consolidated complaints in Civil Action Nos. 06-2345 and 06-2120 be
dismissed.
On August 25, 2006, the Recorder of Deeds’s unopposed Motion to Vacate the earlier
order to strike the thirteen Notices of Lis Pendens was granted. Thereafter, the Creditors filed
a Motion to Vacate this order on September 5, 2006. On September 11, 2006, the Creditors
timely filed Notices of Appeal of the September 8, 2006, Order that dismissed their
consolidated complaints and the August 25, 2006, Order granting the Recorder of Deed’s
7
Motion to Vacate the order to strike the thirteen notices. The Creditors’ Motion to Vacate the
August 25, 2006, Order was denied as moot on November 6, 2006.
The Creditors presented their claims against the ancillary probate estate in the District
of Columbia on September 21 and 25, 2006. These claims were denied by the estate on
October 26, 2006. The Probate Division of Superior Court granted the estate’s motion to
dismiss the Creditors’ complaints, which they filed after the disallowance of their claims, on
June 27, 2007. The Creditors timely appealed that order in appeal No. 07-PR-1411.
II. Analysis
A.
The Creditors’ Complaints Are Not Barred in the District of Columbia.
In dismissing the Creditors’ complaints, both the Probate Division and the Civil
Division of Superior Court relied on Maryland law.4 They reasoned that because the estate
had been opened in Maryland, the Creditors’ claims had been denied there, and no subsequent
lawsuit had been filed there challenging the denials, the Creditors were barred from presenting
their claims and subsequent lawsuits in the District of Columbia. Appellants contend that the
Probate Division and Civil Division of Superior Court erred by applying the Maryland statute,
4
MD . CODE ANN ., EST . & TRUSTS § 8-107 (b) (2008).
8
which would have barred their claims against the ancillary estate in the District of Columbia.
In contrast, the District of Columbia statute,5 which applied in this instance, would not have
barred those claims.
We review the trial court’s grant of a motion to dismiss de novo. Chamberlain v. Am.
Honda Fin. Corp., 931 A.2d 1018, 1022 (D.C. 2007). In the District of Columbia, “all claims
against a decedent’s estate . . . shall be barred against the estate, the personal representative,
and the heirs and legatees, unless presented within 6 months after the date of the first
publication of notice of the appointment of a personal representative.” D.C. Code § 20-903
(a) (2001). In interpreting this statutory provision (and that of its predecessor statute), we
have held that “in administering an estate[,] a personal representative is obliged to consider
all valid claims about which [s]he has actual knowledge, even if creditors fail to comply with
the statute’s enumerated filing formalities.” In re Estate of Monge, 841 A.2d 769, 774 (D.C.
2004) (citations omitted) (emphasis added); see also District of Columbia v. Gantt, 558 A.2d
1120, 1125 (D.C. 1989) (holding that trial may not disallow claim about which personal
representative had actual knowledge but where creditors failed to comply with statutory filing
requirements); In re Estate of Phillips, 532 A.2d 654, 656 (D.C. 1987) (holding that because
personal representative had actual notice of claims, no discretionary basis existed for denying
5
D.C. Code § 20-903 (a).
9
claim). A personal representative is required to consider all valid claims about which she has
actual knowledge because we have recognized that the general purpose of our statutory
provisions dealing with creditors’ claims against a decedent’s estate, particularly when the
decedent is a non-resident of the District of Columbia, is “the protection of local creditors of
a non-resident decedent having an estate in the District of Columbia, and is intended to
provide such local creditors a means of enforcing payment through administration in the
District Probate Court.” Stitt v. Simpson, 154 A.2d 719, 720 (D.C. 1959) (quotation omitted)
(discussing non-resident decedent’s estate provision in D.C. Code § 29-191 (1929), recodified
at D.C. Code § 18-501 (1940)).
In this case, the Creditors concede that they did not comply with the statute’s
requirement that they present their claims to the estate through the Probate Division of the
District of Columbia Superior Court prior to the filing of their complaints in the Civil Division
of the District of Columbia Superior Court.6 But it is also undisputed that the Creditors’
6
They concede that their claims presented in Maryland against the estate are barred under
Maryland law because they did not file a subsequent lawsuit in Maryland within the required
timeframe of six months. If a claim is disallowed by the estate in Maryland, as it was in this case,
“the claimant is forever barred to the extent of the disallowance unless he files a petition for
allowance in the court or commences an action against the personal representative or against one or
more of the persons to whom property has been distributed. The action shall be commenced within
60 days after the mailing of notice by the personal representative.” MD . CODE ANN ., EST . & TRUSTS
§ 8-107 (b) (2008). The Creditors did not file a petition or commence an action in Maryland as
required by the statute and thus, their claims against the estate in Maryland are barred.
10
lawsuits here in the District provide the personal representative with actual knowledge of the
claims, which were based upon the identical factual nucleus as the claims they asserted against
the estate in Maryland (i.e., that they were owed remuneration for their medical and legal
services) and sought the same amount of money damages ($295,000).7 Because the personal
representative and estate had actual knowledge of the claims, the Creditors’ failure to formally
present their claims to the estate through the Probate Division in the District of Columbia
prior to filing their actions in the Civil Division of Superior Court does not bar their lawsuits
against the ancillary estate in the District of Columbia. In re Estate of Monge, supra, 841
A.2d at 774.
The estate’s reliance on Laschkewitsch v. Laschkewitsch, 507 N.W.2d 65, 66 (N.D.
1993), for the proposition that a creditor who has actual notice of domiciliary probate
proceedings in one jurisdiction could not file a claim in the ancillary jurisdiction after the time
for filing claims in the domiciliary probate proceedings had expired, is misguided. Id. In that
case, the North Dakota statute specifically provided that “claims barred by the nonclaim
statute at the decedent’s domicile before the first publication for claims in this state are also
barred in this state.” N.D. C ENT. C ODE § 30.1-19-03 (1999); see also Laschkewitsch, supra,
7
The Creditors formally presented their claims against the ancillary estate in the District on
September 25, 2006.
11
507 N.W.2d at 67. In contrast, there is no analogous provision in the District of Columbia
statute that would operate to bar claims to the ancillary estate here in the event a lawsuit or
the claims were barred – as a lawsuit was in this case – in the domiciliary state of Maryland.
See generally D.C. Code § 20-903 (2008 Supp.) (discussing limitations on presentation of
claims against the estate); and § 20-908 (discussing time limitation on filing lawsuit after
claim has been disallowed by the estate).
Furthermore, because the Creditors did not file an action in the Maryland courts to
contest the disallowance of their claims by the domiciliary estate, as was their right under M D.
C ODE A NN., E ST. & T RUSTS § 8-107 (b), see note 6, there is no final judgment from Maryland,
to which we would be required to afford Full Faith and Credit. See 28 U.S.C. § 1738 (2006)
(providing that judicial proceedings of the rendering state “shall have the same full faith and
credit in every court within the United States . . . as they have by law or usage in the courts
of such State . . . from which they are taken”); Burtoff v. Faris, 935 A.2d 1086, 1090 (D.C.
2007) (lack of final judgment prevented application of res judicata and collateral estoppel).
We conclude that the Creditors have stated claims upon which relief could be granted
because their claims are not “forever barred” and may be litigated here in the District of
12
Columbia.8 Therefore, we reverse both the Probate Division and the Civil Division’s
dismissal of the consolidated complaints. We remand to the Probate Division for proceedings
consistent with this opinion.
B.
The Trial Court Lacked Jurisdiction to Order the Release of the Appellants’
Thirteen Notices of Lis Pendens.
We have previously held that an order granting a party’s motion to cancel and release
Notices of Lis Pendens is appealable under the collateral order doctrine. See McAteer v.
Lauterbach, 908 A.2d 1168, 1170 (D.C. 2006). We have also recognized that a trial court
lacks jurisdiction to act upon an issue raised in a pending appeal. See Morfessis v. Hollywood
Credit Clothing Co., 163 A.2d 825, 827 (D.C. 1960) (reversing trial court’s grant of new trial
where losing party had already noted an appeal); accord Griggs v. Provident Consumer
Discount Co., 459 U.S. 56, 58 (1982).
In this case, after the Creditors filed their timely Notice of Appeal of Judge Fisher’s
June 6, 2006, Order to Strike the Thirteen Notices of Lis Pendens, the Civil Division was
divested of jurisdiction over the issue of the Notices of Lis Pendens because the issue was
8
Appellants do not contest the order dismissing without prejudice the claims against Ms.
McGreevy individually. Thus we do not address this on appeal. We note that the resolution of the
claims against the estate does not impair appellants’ ability to pursue a cause of action against Ms.
McGreevy in her capacity as Trustee of the Wolfe Trust.
13
pending before this court. Therefore, the Civil Division’s subsequent August 25, 2006, Order
granting the Recorder of Deeds’s unopposed Motion to Vacate its earlier order was void due
to lack of jurisdiction. Accordingly, we vacate the August 25, 2006, Order. We reverse and
remand the case to the Probate Division for consideration of the merits of the Creditors’
complaints.9
So ordered.
9
At oral argument, Mr. Binstock, counsel for appellee Sally McGreevy in her capacity as
personal representative of the estate, acknowledged that the estate had sufficient liquid assets to pay
the Creditors’ claims.
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