Justia Alaska Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

A taxi driver injured in an accident while working filed a report with the Alaska Workers' Compensation Board. The nature of the relationship between the taxi company and the driver was disputed. The driver retained an attorney for a lawsuit against the other driver, and settled that claim with the other driver's insurance company without his taxi company's approval. Because the taxi company did not have workers' compensation insurance, the Alaska Workers' Compensation Benefits Guaranty Fund assumed responsibility for adjusting the workers' compensation claim. The Fund asked the Board to dismiss the taxi driver's claim because of the unapproved settlement. The Board dismissed the claim, and the Workers' Compensation Appeals Commission ultimately affirmed the Board's decision. The taxi driver appealed, but finding no reversible error, the Alaska Supreme Court affirmed the Commission's decision. View "Atkins v. Inlet Transportation & Taxi Service, Inc." on Justia Law

Frank Griswold submitted public records requests to the City of Homer, seeking all records of communications between members of the Homer Board of Adjustment, City employees, and attorneys for the City leading up to the Board’s decision in a separate case involving Griswold. He also requested attorney invoices to the City for a six-month period. Citing various privileges, the City Manager refused to provide any records of communications surrounding the Board’s decision; the Manager provided some complete invoices but provided only redacted versions of some invoices and completely withheld some invoices. Griswold appealed the partial denial of his records request to the City Council; the Council affirmed, and Griswold appealed to the superior court. The superior court substantially affirmed. Griswold then turned to the Alaska Supreme Court. After review, the Supreme Court affirmed with respect to the communications relating to the Board’s decision, but vacated and remanded the attorney invoices issue for further analysis. View "Griswold v. Homer City Council" on Justia Law

Frank Griswold twice appealed the Homer Advisory Planning Commission’s approval of a conditional use permit to the Homer Board of Adjustment and later appealed the Board’s second decision to the superior court, which sua sponte dismissed his appeal for lack of standing. Because Griswold did not have notice that his standing was at issue, his due process rights were violated. The Alaska Supreme Court therefore reversed and remanded for the superior court to decide his appeal on the merits. View "Griswold v. Homer Board of Adjustment" on Justia Law

Paulette Harper sued two New York corporations in Alaska superior court alleging violations of her right of publicity and right of privacy. Her claims related to an allegedly false account regarding her recovery from cancer; she discovered the account in a brochure promoting products by BioLife Energy Systems, Inc., while working for BioLife’s distributor in Colorado. The defendants filed a motion to dismiss based on lack of personal jurisdiction, claiming that neither of them has the minimum contacts with Alaska necessary to satisfy due process. The superior court granted the motion, reasoning that although BioLife arguably had some contacts in Alaska, the woman’s claims did not relate to those contacts, and the defendants’ contacts were insufficient to establish all-purpose jurisdiction. Harper appealed, but finding no reversible error, the Alaska Supreme Court affirmed. View "Harper v. Biolife Energy Systems, Inc." on Justia Law

Alaska’s medical peer review privilege statute protected discovery of data, information, proceedings, and records of medical peer review organizations, but it did not protect a witness’s personal knowledge and observations or materials originating outside the medical peer review process. A hospital invoked the privilege in two separate actions, one involving a wrongful death suit against a physician at the hospital and the other involving both a medical malpractice claim against the same physician and a negligent credentialing claim against the hospital. In each case the superior court compelled the hospital to disclose materials related to complaints submitted about the physician and to the hospital’s decision to grant the physician medical staff membership. The hospital and the doctor sought the Alaska Supreme Court's review of the discovery orders. Because the Supreme Court concluded these discovery orders compelled the hospital to disclose information protected by the peer review privilege, it reversed the discovery orders in part. Furthermore, the Court held that the false information exception to the privilege provided in AS 18.23.030(b) applied to actions for which the submission of false information was an element of the claim and thus did not apply here. View "Mat-Su Valley Medical Center, LLC v. Bolinder" on Justia Law

Homeowners Brooke and Patrick Corkery appealed the denial of their application of a variance by the Anchorage Zoning Board of Examiners and Appeals. The homeowners’ house exceeded the 30% lot coverage limit for their zoning district by over 10% due to a renovation performed in 1983 by a prior owner. The Board denied the variance application because it concluded that three of the seven standards required to grant a variance had not been satisfied. On appeal, the homeowners challenged the Board’s interpretation of the variance standards. They also argued the equitable doctrine of laches barred the Board from denying their variance request. Furthermore, the homeowners argued the Board’s consideration of a memo written by a Municipality attorney violated their due process rights and that this violation warranted a trial de novo at superior court. After independently interpreting the variance standards, the Alaska Supreme Court agreed with the Board’s interpretation. In light of the Court's de novo interpretation of these variance standards, any error in the memo’s legal advice or in the process of the Board’s consideration was deemed harmless and did not warrant trial de novo. The Court also concluded the homeowners could not invoke the defense of laches because, in the zoning context, this defense was available only to defendants in a zoning enforcement action. View "Corkery v. Municipality of Anchorage" on Justia Law

After prevailing against the City of Kodiak on a Public Records Act claim, Kodiak Public Broadcasting Corporation (known by the call letters of its radio station, KMXT) was awarded full attorney’s fees under AS 09.60.010(c)(1), which provided for attorney’s fees to a claimant who prevails in asserting, protecting, or enforcing a constitutional right. The City appealed, arguing that KMXT’s claim was statutory rather than constitutional, that the award included fees which were not necessarily and reasonably incurred, and that the award erroneously included municipal sales tax on attorney’s fees. The Alaska Supreme Court agreed the court erred in granting KMXT full attorney’s fees as a constitutional claimant and reversed the award of attorney’s fees and remanded for a fee award pursuant to Alaska Civil Rule 82 instead. The Court also agreed that it was error to include sales tax in the fee award, and direct the superior court on remand to exclude sales tax from its revised fee award. View "City of Kodiak v. Kodiak Public Broadcasting Corporation" on Justia Law

This case concerned the interpretation of Alaska’s usury statute and whether it provided for a maximum interest rate on contract or loan commitments in which the principal amount exceeds $25,000. William Cox argued the statute provided for a maximum interest rate of 10.5% on all loans in which the principal exceeds $25,000. The Estate of Steve Cooper and Dorothy Cooper (collectively “the Coopers”) argued that parties could contract for any interest rate if the principal of the contract or loan commitment exceeded $25,000. The superior court initially agreed with Cox that loans over $25,000 had a maximum legal interest rate of 10.5%, but the Coopers moved for reconsideration and provided the court with statutory history. This statutory history convinced the court that the Coopers were correct and that AS 45.45.010 did not limit the interest rate for contract or loan commitments over $25,000. Cox appealed, challenging the superior court’s decision to consider statutory history when ruling on the Coopers’ motion for reconsideration and the superior court’s decision to grant the Coopers reasonable attorney’s fees under Alaska Civil Rule 82. The Alaska Supreme Court affirmed the superior court's ruling in all respects. View "Cox v. Estate of Steve Cooper" on Justia Law

The issue this case presented for the Alaska Supreme Court centered on the termination of parental rights and reinstatement. This review necessitated revisiting issues arising from Rita T. v. Alaska, 623 P.2d 344 (1981), in which the Court held that a parent whose parental rights have been terminated retained the right, upon a showing of good cause, to request a review hearing, during which the parent may seek to set aside a termination order and have parental rights reinstated. This then leads the Court to review the superior court’s reinstatement order in this case. The Supreme Court held Rita T. remained viable: at a Rita T. hearing, a termination order can be set aside by clear and convincing evidence that the parent has been sufficiently rehabilitated and is capable of providing the care and guidance that will serve the child’s moral, emotional, mental, and physical welfare and that parental rights reinstatement is in the child’s best interests. Because the factual findings supporting the parental rights reinstatement in this case were inadequate for review of the necessary best interests finding, the case was remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. View "Dara S. v. Alaska, Dept. of Health & Social Services, Office of Children's Services" on Justia Law

Daniel Blair, a seaman, sued his former employer and the former employer’s liability insurer, claiming that the insurer had failed to pay him amounts due under the terms of a settlement agreement. Blair asserted that the “policy limits” settlement included both the policy’s stated limits and attorney’s fees calculated under Alaska Civil Rule 82. The insurer, relying on the policy’s notice that fees were included in the policy limits, argued that the settlement had been fully satisfied. The parties also disagreed about whether costs from a review of Blair's medical bills were properly counted against the policy limits. After contentious discovery, the superior court granted summary judgment for the insurer, finding that the policy’s Rule 82 notice was valid and that the settlement had been satisfied. The court awarded attorney’s fees to the insurer as the prevailing party. Blair appealed the grant of summary judgment, the denial of some discovery, and the award of attorney’s fees. After review, the Alaska Supreme Court affirmed the superior court’s summary judgment and discovery rulings except with regard to whether the costs of the medical review were properly deducted from the policy limits; here, the Court concluded issues of fact precluded summary judgment on this issue. The Court reversed summary judgment only as to that issue, vacated the attorney’s fees award, and remanded for further proceedings. View "Blair v. Federal Insurance Company" on Justia Law