Summary
In AT. v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company, 989 P.2d 219 (Colo.App. 1999), State Farm obtained medical information about a psychological disorder of one of its insured's, A.T., during arbitration to settle an uninsured motorist claim.
Summary of this case from State v. BedellOpinion
No. 97CA2020
May 27, 1999 Certiorari Denied November 29, 1999.
Appeal from the District Court of the City and County of Denver, Honorable Joseph E. Meyer, III, Judge, Honorable Larry J. Naves, Judge, No. 95CV1979.
JUDGMENT AND ORDER AFFIRMED
Sears Swanson, P.C., Victoria C. Swanson, Colorado Springs, Colorado, for Plaintiff-Appellant.
Seaman and Giometti, P.C., Gregory R. Giometti, Thomas J. Seaman, Denver, Colorado, for Defendant-Appellee.
Plaintiff, A.T., appeals the summary judgment entered in favor of defendant, State Farm Automobile Insurance Company, and the court's denial of her motion to amend her complaint. We affirm.
Plaintiff, a self-employed chiropractor, sustained injuries in an auto accident. She filed three separate actions against State Farm, her insurer. Plaintiff's claim for uninsured motorist benefits was submitted to arbitration and an award was entered in her favor. The other two suits involved claims for personal injury protection and they were dismissed.
In the course of pursuing her claims, plaintiff provided medical records regarding her mental and psychological history and treatment. These records disclosed that plaintiff had been diagnosed with a psychological disorder.
Thereafter, plaintiff testified as an expert medical witness in litigation between one of her chiropractic patients and State Farm. State Farm's attorney cross-examined plaintiff, during her voir dire examination, about her psychological history and treatment, including the psychological disorder diagnosis.
Plaintiff asserted that the use of her medical history by State Farm was not authorized and brought this action against State Farm based on disclosure of confidential information. Her amended complaint includes five causes of action: extreme and outrageous conduct, intentional interference with a contractual relationship, bad faith breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, negligence, and breach of a confidential relationship.
Plaintiff then moved to amend her complaint to include the claim of invasion of privacy. State Farm moved for summary judgment and plaintiff filed a cross-motion for summary judgment. After a hearing on these motions, the trial court granted summary judgment in favor of State Farm, and denied plaintiff's motion to amend her complaint.
I.
The threshold issue is whether the trial court erred, as a matter of law, by determining that plaintiff's medical information disclosed during the uninsured motorist benefits arbitration was not confidential. Plaintiff argues that the arbitration proceeding was private and that the disclosed information is confidential. We disagree.
Because the facts of the case are undisputed and the court disposed of defendant's other arguments, the determinative legal issue for the trial court was whether the information disclosed in the arbitration proceeding was confidential.
The court found that the parties had not entered into a confidentiality agreement or disclosure-restriction provision regarding the arbitration. No protective order was sought by plaintiff or obtained from the arbitrators or the court. The court found that this arbitration was not conducted under the rules of the American Arbitration Association, which would have provided confidentiality, but rather, under the Uniform Arbitration Act of 1975, 13-22-201, et seq., C.R.S. 1998, which is silent on confidentiality.
The court concluded that because the arbitration statute provides that an arbitration award can be filed, enforced, and challenged in court, an arbitration record may become an open public record. Therefore, because the plaintiff did not obtain a confidentiality or protective order or agreement, the record was available for use by State Farm in later, separate litigation.
Because the trial court's factual findings are undisputed and we agree with its conclusions of law, we conclude that the summary judgment was proper. See Walcott v. Total Petroleum, Inc., 964 P.2d 609 (Colo.App. 1998).
There is a presumption that the public has access to court records. Anderson v. Home Insurance Co., 924 P.2d 1123 (Colo.App. 1996).
Because an arbitration record is potentially public in nature and plaintiff failed proactively to preserve it as confidential, we agree with the trial court's conclusion that the plaintiff's medical information disclosed in the arbitration proceeding was not confidential.
We also agree with the trial court's qualification that its conclusion does not render the entire arbitration akin to a public record available to anyone for any purpose. We hold only that the arbitration record, under the facts here, was available to defendant to use in another unrelated case in which plaintiff was involved.
Accordingly, because all of the plaintiff's claims in her first amended complaint essentially depend on the disclosed information being confidential, the trial court was correct in concluding that all such claims fail.
II.
Plaintiff also contends that the trial court committed reversible error by denying her motion to amend her complaint to include the claim of invasion of privacy. Again, we disagree.
The plaintiff's claim of invasion of privacy relies on Robert C. Ozer, P.C. v. Borquez, 940 P.2d 371 (Colo. 1997), which concluded that invasion of privacy based on the unreasonable publication of one's private life is a cognizable tort. However, an element of that tort is that the published information is private. See Ozer v. Borquez, supra.
The trial court concluded, on undisputed evidence, that the information was disclosed in an arbitration that was not made private or confidential. Therefore, the plaintiff waived, at least as to State Farm's use, the confidentiality that might otherwise attach to that information. The trial court therefore concluded that the claim of invasion of privacy would necessarily fail.
We agree with the trial court's conclusion that because the disclosed information was no longer private, plaintiff's claim of invasion of privacy would fail. Thus, the court's refusal to permit amendment of the complaint to include such claim was not erroneous.
The judgment and order are affirmed.
JUDGE RULAND concurs.
JUDGE ROTHENBERG concurs in part and dissents in part.