MAX N. TOBIAS, JR., Judge.
The plaintiff, Brookewood Investments Co., L.L.C. ("Brookewood"), appeals the trial court's judgment that failed to adjudicate a tax sale as an absolute nullity, in addition to its determination that Brookewood's only source of reimbursement is from the defendant, Sixty-Three Twenty-Four Chef Menteur Highway, L.L.C. ("Sixty-Three") and Jacob Morreale ("Morreale") and not the City of New Orleans ("the City"). For the following reasons, we amend the trial court's judgment and affirm the judgment as amended.
In 2006, Brookewood filed a motion for writ of seizure and possession, seeking corporeal possession of certain immovable property located at 6324 Chef Menteur Highway, New Orleans, Louisiana. Brookewood had acquired the property, which was assessed in the name of Mr. V.A. Morreale, on 10 November 2003 at a tax sale conducted by the City of New Orleans subsequent to the accumulation of $591,343.03 in unpaid ad valorem taxes for years 1999, 2000, 2001, and 2002. Brookewood paid the full amount of the taxes, in addition to $140.00 in costs. A tax deed memorializing the transaction was recorded at CIN 281131 on 20 April 2004 in the Orleans Parish conveyance records.1
Responding to Brookewood's motion, Sixty-Three and Morreale filed a reconventional demand seeking to annul the tax sale on the grounds that the City had assessed the property in an erroneous name and failed to provide the requisite notice to the proper owner of record. At the time of the advertisement and eventual tax sale, the assessment records indicated that the property was owned by V.A. Morreale for nearly forty years.2 Pursuant to an Act of Capital Contribution dated 30 September 1994, Sixty-Three became the owner of the property; recordation of this property transfer was never made.3
Brookewood then filed a third-party demand against the City and Norman S. Foster, in his capacity as the Ex-Officio Tax Collector of the City. Brookewood averred that pursuant to La. C.C. art. 2033, in the event the tax sale was deemed an absolute nullity, it would be owed reimbursement by the City in the full amount of the taxes and costs associated with the 10 November 2003 tax purchase since the City's agents or officers erred by failing to serve notice of the transfer to the proper owner of record.4
On 16 November 2011, following a trial on the merits and determining that the City failed to comply with the notice requirements set forth in La. R.S. 47:2180, the trial court rendered judgment annulling the tax sale and ordering the "judgment to take effect only upon the defendant owner of record making full payment of the taxes, costs and interest at ten percent per annum accruing as of 10 November 2003." Additionally, the trial court ruled that while reimbursement is owed to Brookewood for the funds it expended in the 2003 tax sale purchase, the City is not the responsible party, but rather, the defendant owner of record is Brookewood's sole source of relief.
On 24 February 2012, the trial court issued a final judgment decreeing the tax sale and the related tax deed a nullity and, further ordered that, pursuant to La. Const. Art. VII, § 25(C) and La. R.S. 47:2290 and 2291, Sixty-Three is liable to Brookewood in the amount of $1,617,698.20, with interest thereon at the rate of ten percent annum from the date of the signing of the judgment.5 The judgment further declared that all other prior judgments were preliminary and/or interim in nature.
Brookewood's timely appeal followed.
Brookewood's appeal raises two questions of law, which we review de novo. Louisiana Municipal Association v. State, 04-0227, p. 35 (La.1/19/05), 893 So.2d 809, 836; Provident Bank v. Leslie, 08-1449, p. 5 (La.App. 4 Cir. 1/13/10), 28 So.3d 1196, 1199.
First, Brookewood avers that although the trial court ruled the tax sale a nullity, it erroneously failed to adjudicate the tax sale an absolute nullity. We agree.
"Under the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Louisiana Constitution Article I, § 2, a person is protected against a deprivation of his life, liberty or property without `due process of law.'" Hamilton v. Royal International Petroleum Corp., 05-846, p. 9 (La.2/22/06), 934 So.2d 25, 32 (citations omitted). The fundamental requirement of procedural due process is notice and the opportunity to be heard at a meaningful time and in a meaningful manner. Id.
La. Const. Art. VII, § 25(A) requires that prior to conducting a tax sale of property for nonpayment of taxes, the political subdivision must give notice to the delinquent owner in the manner provided by law. Further, in enacting La. R.S. 47:2180, the legislature established the manner in which notice of delinquency of taxes on immovable property is to be provided in compliance with La. Const. Art. VII, § 25.6 "In sum, notice is a constitutional requirement, and want of notice is fatal to a tax sale." Lewis v. Succession of Johnson, 05-1192, p. 8 (La.4/4/06), 925 So.2d 1172, 1177 (citing Adsit v. Park, 144 La. 934, 81 So. 430 (1919)). The Louisiana Supreme Court has held that, as a matter of law, failure to satisfy the Fourteenth Amendment due process notice requirement renders the tax sale null and void in its entirety, or absolutely null. See C & C Energy, L.L.C. v. Cody Investments, L.L.C., 09-2160, p. 10 (La.7/6/10), 41 So.3d 1134, 1141; Orleans District Redevelopment Corp. v. Ocwen Loan Servicing, 11-0260, p. 12 (La.App. 4 Cir. 12/21/11), 83 So.3d 105, 112; Padilla v. Schwartz, 06-1517, p. 11 (La.App. 4 Cir. 3/11/09), 11 So.3d 6, 14; Sutter v. Dane Investments, Inc., 07-1268, p. 9 (La.App. 4 Cir. 6/4/08), 985 So.2d 1263, 1269.
Accordingly, as a matter of law, we amend the trial court judgment to reflect that the tax sale at issue was an absolute nullity.
Next, Brookewood, relying on La. C.C. art. 2033, (see footnote 4, supra), contends the trial court erred in determining that its only right of reimbursement for monies expended relative to the tax sale, plus interest and cost, is against the tax debtor. In ordering Sixty-Three to reimburse Brookewood, the trial court relied upon La. Const. Art. VII, § 25(C), which states in pertinent part:
No judgment annulling a tax sale shall have effect until the price and all taxes and costs are paid, and until ten percent per annum interest on the amount of the price and taxes paid from date of respective payments are paid to the purchaser.
Further, Brookewood avers that, where the tax sale is deemed a complete nullity, the provisions of the constitution do not apply. Specifically, Brookewood contends that upon finding the tax sale an absolute nullity, in order to restore the parties to the situation that existed prior to the invalid tax sale as is required by La. C.C. art. 2033, the court need not apply the constitution. Moreover, when applying La. C.C. art. 2033 to the tax sale at issue, Brookewood contends the City is the responsible party for returning the consideration.7
In support of its position that its right of reimbursement is against the City and not Sixty-Three, and that the trial court erroneously applied La. Const. Art. VII, § 25(C), Brookewood cites several cases addressing the absolute nullity of a tax sale when notice of the sale is found lacking.8 However, we hold the cases relied upon by Brookewood are inapposite to the instant case because none of them address the issue of who is the responsible party for reimbursing the tax purchaser after a tax sale is annulled for insufficient notice.
In addressing the issue of "who is required to pay whom," and determining that Brookewood's sole right of reimbursement is against Sixty-Three, the trial court found the decision in Westwego Canal & Terminal Co., Inc. v. Pitre, 197 La. 374, 1 So.2d 550 (La.1941), was directly on point. In Pitre, the purchase of the plaintiff's immovable property at a tax sale had previously been declared an absolute nullity. In the proceedings, the tax purchaser was enjoined from interfering with the owner's possession of the property, with a reservation to the tax purchaser of any reimbursement right she had for the amount paid for the property at the tax sale. Applying the express provision found in La. Const. Art. X, § 11(1921), providing that "[n]o judgment annulling a tax sale shall have effect until the price and all taxes and costs paid, with ten per cent per annum interest on the amount of the price and taxes paid from date of respective payments, be previously paid to the purchaser," the court remanded the matter to the trial court to afford the tax purchaser an opportunity to prove the amount of reimbursement to which she was entitled from the property owner. On remand, the property owner attempted to amend its petition claiming, in the alternative, that because the sale was declared an absolutely nullity, the tax purchaser was not entitled to recover the amount she paid for the property. The Court held that the trial court was correct in its determination that, pursuant to La. Const. Art. X, § 11(1921), when a tax sale is declared null, other than "sales annulled on account of the taxes having been paid prior to the date of the tax sale," the record owner of the property is the party responsible for reimbursing the tax purchaser. Id., 197 La. at 377, 1 So.2d at 551.
We find the Supreme Court's decision in Lindner v. City of New Orleans, 116 La. 372, 40 So. 736 (1906) and its progeny to be dispositive of the reimbursement issue in this case. In Lindner, the tax purchaser, who was evicted following suit filed by the record owner of the property because the sale had not been sufficiently advertised, sought reimbursement from the City in an amount for which the owner subsequently sold the property, in addition to costs and attorney's fees he expended in connection with acquiring the property at the tax sale. The Court, in affirming the trial court's dismissal of the suit on the City's exception of no cause of action, stated the following:
It appears that in the litigation with the owner of the property, plaintiff recovered the amounts paid by him therefor, together with costs and interest, as provided by article 233 of the Constitution of 1898.9 This being the remedy provided by our fundamental law, he has no standing for the prosecution of this suit, and even had he availed himself of the remedy so provided, the case would be the same since the fault would have been his. A tax sale, in the absence of special legislation to the contrary, is generally held to be subject to the rule caveat emptor, and the purchaser assumes the risk of all legalities and irregularities in the proceedings, of which, as they are open to his inspection, he is presumed to have notice.
He is therefore without recourse against the municipality at the instance of which the sale is made, and which, not pretending to sell its own property, warrants neither the title nor the return of the price. [Citations omitted; emphasis added.]
Id. See Riddell v. City of New Orleans, 8 Teiss. 3, 8 Orleans App. 3, 1910 WL 1592 (La.App.Orl.1910)(holding that Lindner was "correctly decided that ... the only remedy of the purchaser at a tax sale afterwards annulled, was to reclaim from the owner, the purchase price paid." [Emphasis added.]); Riddell v. Ringe, 11 Teiss. 157, 1914 WL 1935 (La.App.Orl.1914)(pursuant to Article 233 of the Constitution of 1913,10 the tax debtor must reimburse all costs expended by the purchaser at the tax sale before the former can get benefit of judgment annulling the tax sale); In re Land Development Co. of La., 12 Teiss. 147, 1915 WL 1633 (La.App.Orl.1915)(holding that a judgment annulling a tax sale has no effect until the tax debtor reimburses to the tax purchaser the price and all taxes paid by him with interest as provided by the constitution); Mattern v. Parqutt, 10 La.App. 769, 771, 123 So. 189, 190 (La.App.Orl.1929)(applying La. Const. Art. X, § 11 (1921)) (a judgment annulling a tax sale could not be executed until the tax debtor paid to the tax purchaser the amount paid by the latter for the property at the tax sale, and all taxes, with interest at the rate of ten per cent per annum on all items); Robinson v. Zor, Inc., 174 So.2d 154, 157 (La.App. 4th Cir.1965); Garry v. Zor, Inc., 181 So.2d 828, 832-33 (La.App. 4th Cir.1966).
Therefore, we hold that, there being no material change in the Louisiana Constitutions of 1898, 1913, 1921, and 1974 regarding the provision requiring that no judgment annulling a tax sale shall have effect until the price, taxes, costs, et cetera, be previously paid to the purchaser, Lindner and its progeny remain the law of this state. Accordingly, we affirm the trial court's judgment holding that Brookewood's right of redemption is solely against the tax debtor or record owner of the property, Sixty-Three, and not against the City.
CONCLUSION
Based upon the foregoing, we amend the trial court judgment to reflect the absolute nullity of the tax sale, and affirm the judgment as amended.
AMENDED; AFFIRMED AS AMENDED.
