Opinion
CUMSC-CV-16-0356
02-20-2019
DOUGLAS BEAN Plaintiff v. SUPERIOR TRUCKING, LLC Defendant
ORDER
A. M. Horton, Justice.
Plaintiff Douglas Bean's Motion for Relief from Judgment and Motion to Reinstate Case pursuant to M.R. Civ. P. 60(b)(1) and 60(b)(6) are before the court, along with Defendant Superior Trucking, LLCs Opposition and Plaintiffs Reply. The court elects to decide the Plaintiffs motions without oral argument. See M.R. Civ. P. 7(b)(7).
For the reasons given below, the Plaintiffs motions are denied.
This case was filed September 7, 2016. A standard scheduling order issued on October 24, 2016. An amended scheduling order dated February 8, 2017 required Plaintiff to serve expert witness designations by May 8, 2017. Between May and December 2017, a lengthy and convoluted series of interactions between counsel for the parties, and among counsel and the court, ensued.
Ultimately, the court (L. Walker, J.) determined that the Plaintiffs counsel had failed to designate his expert witnesses in a timely manner and Plaintiff himself had failed to cooperate in the prosecution of his cause of action, and dismissed the case as a sanction in an order dated January 18, 2018 and docketed January 23, 2018.
Plaintiff appealed the dismissal to the Supreme Judicial Court of Maine, sitting as the Law Court, see Bean v. Superior Trucking, LLC, Docket No. CUM-18-62 (Me. Sup. Jud. Ct). The Law Court set a deadline of May 10, 2018 for Plaintiff to file his brief on appeal. After that deadline had passed with neither a brief nor a motion to extend the deadline having been filed, the Clerk of the Law Court dismissed the appeal. See id., Order Dismissing Appeal (May 23, 2018). The Plaintiff requested review of the Order dismissing appeal, and the Law Court denied the Motion. See id., Order Denying Motion to Review Order Dismissing Appeal or to Reinstate Appeal (June 5, 2018) (Gorman, J.).
On January 22, 2019, one day short of a year after the dismissal order in this court was docketed, Plaintiff filed the motions for relief and to reinstate that are now before this court. The motions essentially ask that the dismissal be set aside and the case reinstated to the active docket, based on Plaintiffs counsel's excusable neglect.
Neither the Rule 60(b)(1) and 60(b)(6) motion for relief nor the motion to reinstate qualify for relief. Plaintiffs recourse for challenging the trial court's dismissal of his action was to appeal, as he in fact did. The fact that his appeal was dismissed is no justification for allowing Plaintiff to circumvent the appeal process. See Estate of Shapiro, 1999 ME 25, ¶ 13 n.12, 723 A.2s 886 ("A Rule 60(b)(1) motion for relief from judgment cannot be used as a substitute for a direct appeal of the court's decision.").
IT IS ORDERED: Plaintiffs Motion for Relief From Judgment and Motion to Reinstate are hereby denied.
Pursuant to M.R. Civ. P. 79(a), the Clerk is hereby directed to incorporate this Order by reference in the docket.