Ex parte City of Birmingham (In re: Demarco Stoudmire v. City of Birmingham), No. SC-2025-0591, 2026 WL 1902215(Ala. July 2, 2026).The Court (Shaw, Wise, Sellers, and Parker, JJ., concur; Bryan, J., dissents; Mendheim, J., dissents with opinion, which Stewart, C.J., and McCool, J., join) grants the City's mandamus petition and directs the Jefferson Circuit Court to vacate its order denying the City's summary judgment motion and to enter summary judgment for the City on municipal immunity grounds under § 11-47-190, Ala. Code 1975. *1.
Stoudmire was severely injured in April 2021 when his motorcycle struck a defect on Avenue V in Ensley, and he later sued the City for failing to repair it. *1–2. The City moved for summary judgment on immunity grounds, supporting its motion with testimony that a search of the City's records revealed no report of the defect before the accident. *2–3. In opposition, Stoudmire submitted a former city employee's affidavit, an unnotarized written statement from a neighbor, and first responder patient-care records. *2–3. On the City's renewed motion, the circuit court struck the neighbor's statement, the patient-care report, and part of the City employee’s affidavit, but again denied summary judgment. The City petitioned for mandamus. *3.
Although orders denying summary judgment are ordinarily not reviewable by mandamus, the Court reaffirms the exception for motions grounded on a claim of immunity, reviewing the denial de novo and limiting its consideration to the immunity issues. *3–4. Under § 11-47-190, a municipality may be liable for a defect in a public way only if the defect was called to its attention or existed for such an unreasonable length of time as to raise a presumption of knowledge. *4. The Court holds the City made a prima facie showing of no notice, shifting the burden to Stoudmire. *5.
Stoudmire failed to carry that burden as to either form of notice. The first responder records could not establish actual notice because they were generated contemporaneously with the accident, and § 11-47-190 requires prior notice. *5. The former employee's affidavit, which described an encounter with a large hole on Avenue V somewhere in the 2003–2019 window, had no link to the defect at issue. A conclusion that the two incidents involved the same defect would rest on speculation and therefore cannot defeat a properly supported summary-judgment motion. *6. On constructive notice, the neighbor's statement was properly struck as unauthenticated under Rule 56(e), the record contained no evidence of other accidents at the location, and the assertion that a 20-year-old street must have defects was mere speculation. *6–7. The Court emphasizes that the statutory inquiry is defect-specific: a plaintiff cannot rely on a general assumption that aging infrastructure develops problems but must show that the particular defect persisted long enough to impute knowledge. *7.
Accordingly, the Court grants the petition and issues the writ directing the circuit court to vacate its order denying the City’s motion for summary judgment and to instead grant that motion. *7.