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Delphi Corp. v. Orlik7/26/2005
tion to continue the hearing. In the ensuing delay, the trial court held a status conference in the matter and entered a default judgment against the uninsured motorist. No one had notified State Farm about the status conference before it had actually taken place. Id. at 115.
When State Farm eventually learned of the default judgment, it moved to set it aside so that it could defend its rights under the uninsured motorist policy. The trial court granted State Farm's original motion to intervene, but it denied the motion to set aside the default judgment. We reversed, finding-among other things-that the plaintiffs' counsel was under an obligation to inform State Farm about the lawsuit, as well as the intention to seek a default judgment. Id. at 116-17.
In this case, Kendall, the attorney who represented Orlik, did attempt to notify Delphi of the existence of the lawsuit. But in response to Delphi's statement that it knew nothing about the lawsuit, Orlik's counsel first indicated that he had mailed the complaint to Kuplicki but that the envelope containing the complaint had been returned unopened. Additionally, Orlik's counsel did not place the call for the status conference, and he did not inform Delphi of his intent to move for a default judgment. In essence, there was no additional effort on the part of Orlik's counsel either to notify Delphi that service had been perfected on C.T. or to notify Delphi that he intended to move for the default. Given these circumstances, I am of the view that it was reasonable for Delphi to believe that Orlik's counsel had not yet served Delphi but that he would eventually perfect service. More to the point, Delphi had appointed C.T. as its agent for service of process, and I believe that it reacted appropriately when it learned of a pre-trial conference in a case in which it believed it had not been served. And Delphi reasonably retained its belief that it had not been served after Orlik's counsel did not initiate the pretrial conference call to the trial court.
In sum, I do not believe that Delphi was duty-bound to do more than it already did. Hence, I vote to reverse the denial of Delphi's motion to set aside the default judgment.
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