From the Circuit Court of Fairfax County comes Shiye Qiu v. Chaoyu Huang, Anna Ouspenskaya and Arlene Starace. Case No. Record No. 0459-22-4.
In this complex divorce case where Mr. Qui believes he is being conspired against by the wife and other parties, he argues that the court erred by sustaining appellee's joint demurrer and then dismissing his claims of tortious interference with his parental rights and a civil conspiracy against the three women. There is also his claim that the court dismissed his allegations of fraud against Ms. Starace. He further contends that the court erred by staying the proceedings, including discovery, prior to ruling on the demurrer.
Mr. Qiu (the father) and Sharon Yip (the mother) were married in 1995, and their daughter, M.Q., was born in 2005. The parties separated when M.Q. was eight years old. A few months later, the mother began divorce and custody proceedings and also sought pendente lite relief. Two years later, in 2016, while the divorce and custody proceedings were ongoing, the father filed a pro se tort complaint - the subject of appeal. In his complaint, he alleged that two of the mother’s acquaintances and one of her attorneys were tortiously involved in the custody dispute. In February 2017, the circuit court entered the final divorce decree and awarded joint legal custody of M.Q. to the parents, with primary physical custody to the mother.
Afterwards, the father retained counsel in the tort suit and obtained service of the complaint on the defendants, who challenged it with demurrers. The circuit court granted the father leave to amend various parts of the complaint on multiple occasions. In June 2019, he filed his fifth amended complaint, which was more than fifty pages long and contained nine counts. Additional facts that he pleaded made clear that none of the three women physically took M.Q. from the father or the mother. Instead, they merely encouraged and aided the mother in leaving the father and in obtaining a divorce and award of shared custody.
At a scheduling conference in September 2019, trial was set for the following July. On February 14, 2020, while discovery was proceeding, the defendants filed a joint motion to stay the proceedings pending resolution by the Supreme Court of Virginia of an appeal in a separate, unrelated case, Padula-Wilson v. Landry, 298 Va. 565 (2020). They represented that
Padula-Wilson also involved a claim of tortious interference with parental rights. The defendants argued that the Supreme Court’s opinion was likely to be dispositive of the issues raised in the father’s complaint or at least to “set forth the parameters” under which his primary claims would be resolved. They also provided the court with copies of the briefs filed in Padula-Wilson and noted that oral argument in that case was “likely to occur in the next few months.” On February 28, 2020, the court granted the requested stay, which included discovery.
Three months after the motion was filed, on May 14, 2020, the Supreme Court issued its opinion in Padula-Wilson. Based on that decision, the defendants made a motion to lift the stay, withdraw their answers, and file a renewed joint demurrer to the father’s complaint. An order from July 16, 2020, granted the requests. On July 31, 2020, following a hearing, the court sustained the demurrer in all relevant respects, dismissing the tortious interference, fraud, and conspiracy claims against the three defendants, as well as other counts against Dr. Small. The court granted the father leave to amend one of the counts against Dr. Small. After additional proceedings, the father and Dr. Small reached a settlement, and the court dismissed the action with prejudice. The father then noted this appeal of the previously dismissed claims against Huang, Ouspenskaya, and Starace.
The father suggested that the complaint properly stated claims against the defendants for tortious interference with parental rights, fraud, and civil conspiracy. As a result, he contended that the circuit court erred by sustaining their joint demurrer to counts one through four, eight, and nine.
The Court of Appeals evaluated the father’s contentions under the standards for all demurrers. "The appellate court reviews a decision to sustain or overrule a demurrer de novo because that decision “involves issues of law.” Coutlakis v. CSX Transp., Inc., 293 Va. 212, 216 (2017). A demurrer “tests the legal sufficiency of facts alleged in pleadings, not the strength of proof.” Abi-Najm v. Concord Condo., LLC, 280 Va. 350, 357 (2010) (quoting Augusta Mut. Ins. Co. v. Mason, 274 Va. 199, 204 (2007)). Consequently, a demurrer “can be sustained if the pleading, considered in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, fails to state a valid cause of action.” Hooked Grp., LLC v. City of Chesapeake, 298 Va. 663, 667 (2020) (quoting Welding, Inc. v. Bland Cnty. Serv. Auth., 261 Va. 218, 226 (2001)). In evaluating a demurrer, the appellate court “consider[s] as admitted the facts expressly alleged and those which fairly can be viewed as
impliedly alleged or reasonably inferred.” Id. (quoting Welding, Inc., 261 Va. at 226). As relevant to the first three assignments of error, the demurrer involved three potential legal theories for recovery: tortious interference with parental rights, fraud, and civil conspiracy.
"The holding in Padula-Wilson is sufficiently analogous to this case to control the outcome here. Further, to the extent the father contends that the defendants’ alienation efforts were for the ultimate purpose of interfering with his parental and custodial rights, these allegations fail to state a claim of tortious interference with parental rights as that action has been recognized in Virginia. This is so in part because, as explained more fully below, one cannot be permitted to do indirectly what he is forbidden from doing directly."
The court concludes: "For these reasons, we affirm the circuit court’s rulings sustaining the demurrer as to the challenged counts in the complaint and granting the motion for a stay of the proceedings."
Affirmed
This appellant would not concede and continued to file pleading after pleading to no avail. Fighting for our clients is valid but not inexpensive. When money isn't an option, it's often possible to lose sight of the facts and issue of the case. He didn't win so he kept fighting. Again, the court remains consistent and sides with the circuit court.
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