Summary Judgments – Florida Supreme Court Expressly Adopts the Federal Standard/Construction/Approach for Summary Judgments


On December 31, 2021, the Florida Supreme Court decided two cases on this
topic. The first – Wilsonart, LLC v. Lopez, _ So. 3d _ (Fla. Case No. SC19-
1336, December 31, 2020) – was the case in which the 5th DCA rejected a
summary judgment despite video evidence of the accident that would have
precluded any reasonable jury from accepting the plaintiff’s position on liability.
The Court rejected the offer to make a special rule for cases involving video
evidence, and instead threw out Florida conflicting case law on a summary
judgment standard and adopted, prospectively, the federal procedural standard.
The second case – In re: Amendments to Florida Rule of Civil Procedure
1.510, So. 3d (Fla. Case No. SC20-1490, December 31, 2020) – is where
the Court on its own motion amended Rule 1.510, not by materially changing the
text of the rule, but by expressly incorporating the federal standard for applying it.
The Court directed that our rule shall, effective May 1, 2021, “be applied in
accordance with the federal summary judgment standard articulated in Celotex
Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317 (1986); Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S.
242 (1986); and Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U.S. 574
(1986).”
What will this mean going forward? Who the heck knows, but let me share
some initial thoughts, observations, and “predictions.”

  1. Note: the rule does not technically have a retrospective application. It does
    not go into effect until May 1, 2021.
    a. As such, it should not have any technical play on summary
    judgments being considered before then, or already ruled on. In the
    Wilsonart case, the Court did not reverse and order a summary
    judgment to be entered. Rather it merely answered the certified
    question [should there be a special video evidence SJ rule?] NO,
    and in doing that, the Court said that Wilsonart can come back
    after May 1 and try again…suggesting success in four months.
    b. That said, it is clear that the Court has blessed the somewhat
    “looser” federal standard – the test being whether “The evidence is
    such that a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the
    nonmoving party.” Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242,
    248 (1986). Trial or appellate judges in Florida considering a
    summary judgment between now and May 1, 2021, could be
    excused for looking over their shoulder at the standard that the
    Court has already announced will be the RIGHT one, and using it
    between now and then, but Wilsonart suggests that will not be
    approved.
    c. On the nerdy side, I think that citing three different cases with lots
    of broad statements in them as a means of creating a new gestalt
    meaning to the summary judgment standard is fairly sloppy. The
    rule should have as crisp a standard as possible. I expect that the
    Civil Rules Committee [on which I sit] may or will want to parse
    out the specific language a bit more precisely.
  2. And the Court did not quarrel with any language in the present rule
    1.510, and it would be hard to do so. The problem over the years has
    been the gloss applied to the text, not the text itself. Which takes us back
    to coming up with a better way of defining this new – federal – gloss.
  3. For those of you who expect that this will unleash a flood of summary
    judgments…. take a deep breath. It might, especially in the very short
    run, but my sense is that the judges who will be applying this still slightly
    vague standard on May 1, 2021, will be exactly the same ones who have
    been a little understandably befuddled and distinctly hesitant in the past.
    This might slide a few denials into the “granted” column [especially with
    a rise in the prevalence of video evidence in tort cases], but in the
    absence of a crisp new standard, actually expressed by the Court, I
    expect the shift to be somewhat slow and a bit tepid. Remember, the
    Court did not recede from any prior state decision nor reinterpret any. I
    think this is also evidence that the proposed rule issued by the Court is a
    mere stakeholder, to be replaced by a carefully thought-out textual
    opinion and revised Rule 1.510.
  4. We’ll see.