AI Generated Opinion Summaries

This summary was computer-generated without any editorial revision. It is not official, has not been checked for accuracy, and is NOT citable.

Facts

• The Plaintiff, a former Chair of the Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine at the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, sued the Defendants for breach of contract, breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing, violation of due process, and a violation of the New Mexico Whistleblower Protection Act (WPA). The lawsuit was initiated after the Defendants ceased to pay the Plaintiff according to the terms of an expired two-year employment contract from 2009 and subsequently terminated his employment shortly after being served with the lawsuit (paras 3-5).

Procedural History

• [Not applicable or not found]

Parties' Submissions

• Plaintiff: Argued that the Defendants breached their contract by not paying salaries as per the terms of an expired contract, which had been implicitly continued through their actions. Also claimed that his termination was retaliatory, violating due process and the WPA (paras 4-5, 10).
• Defendants: Moved to dismiss the Plaintiff's claims on the grounds that they failed to state any claim upon which relief could be granted, arguing that the Plaintiff's due process claim was barred by the New Mexico Tort Claims Act (TCA) and that the WPA claim did not meet the statute's requirements (paras 6-7, 13, 17).

Legal Issues

• Whether the district court erred in dismissing the Plaintiff's breach of contract and WPA claims.
• Whether the Plaintiff's due process claim was properly dismissed on the pleadings as barred by the TCA.
• Whether the application of the TCA in this case violated the Plaintiff's constitutional rights.

Disposition

• The district court's dismissal of the Plaintiff's breach of contract and WPA claims, as well as the judgment on the pleadings for the due process claim, were affirmed (para 31).

Reasons

• The Court of Appeals, per Judge Roderick T. Kennedy, with Judges Jonathan B. Sutin and Cynthia A. Fry concurring, held that:
  The breach of contract claim was properly dismissed because it was not founded upon a valid written contract, as required by NMSA 1978, Section 37-1-23(A) (paras 22-25).
  The WPA claim was dismissed because the Plaintiff failed to allege that the Defendants retaliated against him for communicating about an abuse of authority, which is a necessary element for a WPA claim. The Court also found that the Plaintiff's lawsuit did not constitute protected whistleblowing activity under the WPA (paras 13-21).
  The due process claim was dismissed on the grounds that the TCA barred the claim and the Plaintiff's constitutional challenge to the TCA was unavailing. The Court distinguished between the right of access to the courts and the entitlement to recover monetary damages, finding no violation of the Plaintiff's constitutional rights (paras 26-30).