Background
Plaintiffs Joseph Craft, Julie Stevens, and Wesley Oldaker filed suit in the 18th Judicial District Court, Parish of Pointe Coupee (No. 52158), naming as defendants the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development, Wal-Mart Transportation, LLC, driver Caleb Sheldon, and National Union Fire Insurance Company of Pittsburgh, PA. The underlying litigation appears to arise from a transportation or traffic incident involving a Wal-Mart commercial vehicle operated by Sheldon.
Wal-Mart Transportation, LLC and Caleb Sheldon sought supervisory review from the First Circuit, asking the court to exercise its discretionary writ jurisdiction over an interlocutory ruling of the trial court. They also moved for a stay of the trial court proceedings pending the court’s review.
The Court’s Holding
A three-judge panel consisting of Judges Wolfe, Stromberg, and Edwards unanimously denied both the stay and the supervisory writ. The court’s denial rested on the standard established in Herlitz Construction Co., Inc. v. Hotel Investors of New Iberia, Inc., 396 So. 2d 878 (La. 1981) (per curiam), finding that the criteria required for discretionary writ review were not satisfied.
Under Herlitz, Louisiana appellate courts weigh factors including whether the trial court’s ruling is clearly wrong, whether an immediate appeal after final judgment would be inadequate, and whether granting the writ would prevent needless expense and delay. The panel concluded that none of these criteria were met on the record presented by the relators.
Key Takeaways
- The First Circuit applied the Herlitz standard and found no basis for discretionary supervisory review of the trial court’s interlocutory ruling.
- The requested stay of trial court proceedings was also denied, meaning the litigation below will continue without interruption.
- The ruling is a one-line denial on the merits of the writ criteria — it does not address the substance of the underlying dispute between the parties.
Why It Matters
This ruling is a routine but instructive application of Louisiana’s Herlitz supervisory writ standard. Defendants in civil litigation — including large commercial parties with insurance coverage — cannot use supervisory writs to halt trial court proceedings unless they can clearly demonstrate that the trial court erred and that ordinary appeal after final judgment would be an inadequate remedy.
For practitioners, the denial confirms that the threshold for discretionary appellate intervention in ongoing trial court proceedings remains high in the First Circuit, and that a bare assertion of error is insufficient to obtain a stay or writ.