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Miller v. Meeks6/29/2000
DATE OF JUDGMENT: 10/22/1998
TRIAL JUDGE: HON. JAMES E. GRAVES JR.
COURT FROM WHICH APPEALED: HINDS COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT
NATURE OF THE CASE: CIVIL - MEDICAL MALPRACTICE
DISPOSITION: REVERSED AND REMANDED - 6/29/2000
EN BANC.
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
. This case comes on appeal from the Circuit Court of Hinds County. A medical malpractice complaint was filed by Merkell M. Fox against Dr. W. Mark Meeks on February 28, 1995, alleging medical malpractice by Dr. Meeks in his treatment of Fox in 1994. Fox died intestate, and the sole beneficiaries of his estate, Sheila Fox Miller, Peggy Fox Watz and Gary Merkell, "the plaintiffs," were substituted as parties in the lawsuit. Discovery was conducted for a period of approximately three years. The circuit court granted a motion for summary judgment on the basis that Dr. Meeks was an employee of the University of Mississippi Medical Center (hereafter UMMC) and that the applicable statute of limitations had run under the Mississippi Tort Claims Act, Miss. Code Ann. ยงยง 11-46-1 to -23 (Supp. 1999), prior to the filing of the complaint. The plaintiffs filed a Notice of Appeal so that this Court could consider whether the granting of summary judgment was proper.
. According to the transcript of the motion hearing, the plaintiffs sought to question Dr. Meeks, who was present under subpoena, regarding his employment status at the hospital, and particularly as to whether he was solely an employee of the hospital. At this point in the proceedings the trial judge made the following pronouncement:
THE COURT: Let me stop you. I need to deal with him because here's what I've done consistently in these cases and here's why. Unless I've been in a coma the last three years and just woke up, let me tell you what I've been doing. I've never been able to determine whether any doctor was an employee of the University or not.
Every time I get one of these cases I invite people to appeal me and I invite the Mississippi Supreme Court to tell me finally whether or not these doctors who work at the University Medical Center are employees of the University Medical Center or are in private practice. Because every single one of them works for the University Medical Center but then has some contract which allows that he engage in private practice and it allows that all above a certain amount of income accrues to him and he can have it. And so it walks, it talks and feels just like a private practice except that when they get sued, they stand behind this shield of immunity and then I'm a State employee. But let me make all the money I can make in this practice under the terms of my contract with the State. So I've never known whether or not they're employees of the State or whether or not they're in private practice.
So every time I get one of these cases I say please, please, I'm putting it on the record, I don't know, Supreme Court. Please tell me who these doctors actually work for . . .
STANDARD OF REVIEW
. For a summary judgment motion to be granted, there must exist no genuine issues of material fact, and the moving party must be entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Miss. R. Civ. P. 56(c). The standard of review of a lower court's grant of a summary judgment motion is de novo. Short v. Columbus Rubber & Gasket Co., 535 So.2d 61, 63 (Miss. 1988). The burden of demonstrating that there is no genuine issue of material fact falls on the party requesting the summary judgment. Id. at 63-64. The court must carefully review all evidentiary matters before it; admissions in pleadings, answers to interrogatories, depositio
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