Justia Alaska Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Under an Alaska Department of Revenue regulation, all appeals of oil and gas property tax valuation must be heard by the State Assessment Review Board (SARB), while appeals of oil and gas property taxability must be heard by the Department of Revenue (Revenue). Three municipalities challenged this regulation, arguing that it contradicted a statute that grants SARB exclusive jurisdiction over all appeals from Revenue’s “assessments” of oil and gas property. The superior court upheld the regulation as valid, concluding that it was a reasonable interpretation of the statute. But after its review, the Alaska Supreme Court concluded that the regulation was inconsistent with the plain text, legislative history, and purpose of the statute; therefore, the Supreme Court reversed the superior court’s judgment. View "City of Valdez v. Alaska" on Justia Law

The State Office of Public Advocacy (OPA) filed a petition for an ex parte protective order on behalf of an elderly woman against her adult daughter and caregiver, after receiving allegations of financial abuse made by the elderly woman’s other family members. The superior court found those allegations to be unfounded and denied the protective order. The elderly woman’s estate and the caregiver daughter sought attorney’s fees against the State in connection with both the protective order and conservatorship proceedings. The superior court awarded full reasonable fees arising from the denial of the protective order, finding that OPA’s protective order petition was brought without “just cause,” under the fee-shifting provision of AS 13.26.131(d). The superior court declined to award attorney’s fees arising from the proceeding to establish a conservatorship because the State had not “initiated” the conservatorship proceeding as required for fees under AS 13.26.131(d). The State appealed the first award, and the caregiver daughter and the estate of the woman cross-appealed the denial of the second award. After review, the Alaska Supreme Court concluded that AS 13.26.131 did not apply to elder fraud protective order proceedings; nor did Alaska Civil Rule 82. Instead, AS 44.21.415 contained a cost-recovery mechanism that allowed private parties to recover attorney’s fees against the State in such proceedings. So the Supreme Court vacated the superior court’s fee award in the elder fraud protective order proceeding. And because the State did not initiate the conservatorship proceeding here, no attorney’s fees are available against the State in that proceeding. View "Alaska Office of Public Advocacy v. Estate of Jean R." on Justia Law

After the parties to this action divorced, they shared physical and legal custody of their only child. In 2013 the mother filed a motion to modify custody requesting primary physical custody to move with the child from Fairbanks to Anchorage, and the superior court granted her primary physical custody for as long as the parties resided in different communities. The court also made findings regarding the father’s abusive communication style. The father moved to Anchorage soon after the mother, and the parties began sharing physical custody again. After an incident where the father brought the police to the mother’s residence because she had declined to give him visitation time outside the custody order, the mother again moved to modify custody. Following a three-day hearing, the court found that there was a change in circumstances and modified legal custody by giving the mother the right to make all major parenting decisions. But it declined to give the mother primary physical custody because it found that doing so would be devastating to the child and would increase the friction between the parents. The mother appealed, arguing the superior court misapplied the best interest factors. Finding no reversible error, the Supreme Court affirmed the superior court’s order. View "Sweeney v. Organ" on Justia Law

After a work-related injury left appellant Laurie Vandenberg (a nurse) with a permanent partial impairment, she applied for reemployment benefits. The rehabilitation specialist assigned to her case used two job descriptions to describe one of her former jobs because the specialist did not think that a single job description adequately described that former job. The Alaska Workers’ Compensation Board decided that only one job description was needed and that appellant retained the physical capacity to perform the functions of that job description; it therefore denied her reemployment benefits. The Alaska Workers’ Compensation Appeals Commission affirmed the Board’s decision. Appellant appealed, arguing that the Board erred in selecting only one job description because the job description it selected did not adequately describe the job she held. The Supreme Court agreed and reversed the Commission’s decision. View "Vandenberg v. Dept. of Health & Social Services" on Justia Law

Wasilla landowner, appellant Ray Pursche appealed the tax foreclosure against his property, arguing that the property was exempt from local property taxes because it was originally transferred to his predecessor by federal patent. He claimed that the federal patent made this property beyond state court jurisdiction. The Supreme Court affirmed the tax foreclosure, finding that after a patent issues, property disputes must generally be resolved in state court. Land once owned by the federal government was subject to local property taxes after it was conveyed to a private party. View "Pursche v. Matanuska-Susitna Borough" on Justia Law

John and Xong Chao Beeson owned and lived in the Palmer West Subdivision in the City of Palmer. Since they moved to the property in 1985, the Beesons have experienced several flooding incidents on their land, which they attributed to water backing up against Helen Drive, a two-lane road adjacent to their property originally built by Matanuska-Susitna Borough but controlled by the City since 2003. After the City installed a water line under Helen Drive and repaved the road surface in 2005, the flooding became more severe and caused serious damage to the Beesons’ home. The Beesons brought an inverse condemnation claim against the City, arguing that the City was liable for the damage to their property. After a three-day bench trial the superior court found that the City’s road reconstruction project was not a substantial cause of the flooding and therefore the City could not be liable in inverse condemnation. The superior court also granted attorney’s fees to the City. The Beesons appealed both rulings. After review, the Supreme Court affirmed the superior court’s decision with respect to the inverse condemnation claim and remanded for further proceedings regarding attorney’s fees. View "Beeson v. City of Palmer" on Justia Law

A federally recognized Alaska Native tribe adopted a process for adjudicating the child support obligations of parents whose children are members of the tribe or are eligible for membership, and it operated a federally funded child support enforcement agency. The Tribe sued the State and won a declaratory judgment that its tribal court system had subject matter jurisdiction over child support matters and an injunction requiring the State’s child support enforcement agency to recognize the tribal courts’ child support orders in the same way it recognized such orders from other states. Because the Supreme Court agreed that tribal courts had inherent subject matter jurisdiction to decide the child support obligations owed to children who are tribal members or were eligible for membership, and that state law thus required the State’s child support enforcement agency to recognize and enforce a tribal court’s child support orders, the Supreme Court affirmed. View "Alaska v. Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska" on Justia Law

Linden Fyfe was stopped by police while driving on a stretch of highway designated as a "traffic safety corridor." He was charged and convicted of driving under the influence of alcohol. At sentencing the trial court imposed double the statutory minimum fine, relying on AS 28.90.030(a), that doubled “the fine, or maximum fine,” for any violation of a provision of Title 28 in a traffic safety corridor. The court of appeals reversed. It concluded that despite the statute’s plain language, the legislature intended fines to be doubled only for noncriminal traffic offenses. The Supreme Court disagreed with that rationale, not the appellate court's mandate. The Court concluded that the statute applied to both criminal and non-criminal traffic offenses under Title 28. But the court also held that the plain language of the statute precluded its application to minimum fines such as the one at issue here. On that ground the Court affirmed the court of appeals’ decision to vacate Fyfe’s fine and remanded for imposition of the statutory minimum fine. View "Alaska v. Fyfe" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit federal Court of Appeals certified two questions of Alaska law to the State Supreme Court. Ingaldson Fitzgerald was an Alaska law firm. Attorneys Liability Protection Society, Inc. (ALPS) was a Montana insurance company and risk-retention group. From April 29, 2007, to April 29, 2008, ALPS insured Ingaldson Fitzgerald. Ingaldson Fitzgerald’s insurance policy with ALPS insured the firm against claims arising from “an act, error or omission in professional services that were or should have been rendered by [Ingaldson Fitzgerald].” The policy expressly excluded from coverage any claims arising from conversion or disputes over fees. The policy also contained a provision providing that Ingaldson Fitzgerald would reimburse ALPS for fees and costs ALPS incurred in defending non-covered claims. In 2008 the bankruptcy trustee for the bankrupt estate of a former client of Ingaldson Fitzgerald, in conjunction with a separate former client of the firm, brought a claim against the firm arising out of Ingaldson Fitzgerald’s actions in disbursing from and withdrawing fees and costs against a retainer. The former client and the trustee sought recovery of that retainer, and asserted claims against Ingaldson Fitzgerald for, among other things, restitution, disgorgement, and conversion. The Ninth Circuit asked: (1) whether Alaska law prohibited enforcement of a policy provision entitling an insurer to reimbursement of fees and costs incurred by the insurer defending claims under a reservation of rights, where (a) the insurer explicitly reserved the right to seek such reimbursement in its offer to tender a defense provided by independent counsel, (b) the insured accepted the defense subject to the reservation of rights, and (c) the claims were later determined to be excluded from coverage under the policy; and (2) if yes, then did Alaska law prohibit enforcement of a policy provision entitling an insurer to reimbursement of fees and costs incurred by the insurer defending claims under a reservation of rights, where (a) the insurer explicitly reserved the right to seek such reimbursement in its offer to tender a defense provided by independent counsel, (b) the insured accepted the defense subject to the reservation of rights, and (c) it is later determined that the duty to defend never arose under the policy because there was no possibility of coverage? The Alaska Supreme Court answered both certified questions “yes.” View "Attorneys Liability Protection Society, Inc. v. Ingaldson Fitzgerald, P.C." on Justia Law

In the early morning hours of August 29, 2013, Palmer police officer James Gipson noticed Moira M. walking alone along the road. After Moira declined Gipson’s offer of a ride, Gipson continued driving until he noticed a car parked in a gravel lot. Gipson approached the car, discovered it was unlocked, and found an unattended infant in the back seat. While Gipson was waiting for backup assistance, Moira entered the lot and identified the car as belonging to her and the infant as her child. Gipson noticed signs of impairment in Moira’s behavior and notified another officer to contact Moira while Gipson remained with the infant. Moira was taken into custody, and while in custody she admitted to using cannabis, asserted that she had used methamphetamine for the first time the night before, and admitted that she had driven with the infant, Abel, after using these drugs. Moira was ultimately charged with endangering the welfare of a child in the first degree, driving on a suspended license, driving under the influence, and misconduct involving a controlled substance. After taking Moira into custody, the police released Abel into the custody of Moira's boyfriend Jarvis’s mother. Based on this incident, the police sent OCS a protective services report regarding Abel, and The Office of Children's Services (OCS) immediately began an investigation. Abel was ultimately placed in a foster home with a non-relative, and eventually proceedings commenced against Moira to terminate her parental rights. The superior court terminated Moira's rights based on evidence that she failed to remedy her substance abuse and the danger this conduct posed to her child. On appeal Moira argued: (1) the superior court erred when, prior to the termination trial, it denied her request for a visitation review hearing; and (2) at the termination trial, the superior court erroneously reduced OCS's burden to make reasonable reunification efforts after she moved out of state. But the record and Alaska case law supported the superior court’s decisions. The superior court denied the visitation review hearing because OCS responded to the mother’s motion for a hearing by issuing a family contact plan that appeared to fully address her concerns. And the superior court’s analysis of OCS’s efforts properly considered the specific facts of her case. Accordingly the Supreme Court affirmed the superior court’s decision to terminate parental rights. View "Moira M. v. Office of Children's Services" on Justia Law