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Estate of Hernandez v. Clark6/23/2000
a new cause of action against a defendant or to add a new defendant where proper. Rule 15 simply would not help the appellees in this case because there was no pleading to amend when the Thomases filed their "amended complaint" as administrators.
348 Ark. at 204-05, 73 S.W.3d at 588 (citations omitted).
In St. Paul, this court stated that the amended complaint substituted out the original plaintiffs and substituted in entirely new plaintiffs. According to our decision in that case, this substitution of entirely new plaintiffs resulted in the filing of a new suit and did not constitute an amendment under Rule 15. Id. (citing Floyd Plant Food Co. v. Moore, 197 Ark. 259, 122 S.W.2d 463 (1938)).
Rhuland v. Fahr, ___ Ark. at ___, ___S.W.3d at ___.
It is, therefore, clear that a complaint that is a nullity cannot be cured by the relation-back doctrine. As the supreme court pointed out in Davenport v. Lee, supra, there is nothing to amend, and nothing to which an amendment can relate back, when a complaint is a nullity:
Having determined that the original pro se complaint was a nullity, it is unnecessary for us to analyze Appellants' arguments that Ark. R. Civ. P. 15 or 17 should be applied to salvage their cause of action. These rules cannot apply, because the original complaint, as a nullity never existed, and thus, an amended complaint cannot relate back to something that never existed, nor can a nonexistent complaint be corrected.
348 Ark. at 164, 72 S.W.3d at 94.
Following these decisions, as we must, we hold that the circuit court correctly dismissed this lawsuit.
Affirmed.
Gladwin and Griffen, JJ., agree.
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