for the Court:
¶ 1. Richard Smith was injured on the job in an explosion. He received workers’ compensation benefits through his employer, but in this third-party action he seeks tort damages from various other entities he contends are responsible for his injury.
¶ 2. Smith initially filed a lawsuit (Smith I) in the Circuit Court of Harrison County against three defendants that shared the workspace with his employer. He later sought to add the Normand Children Diversified Class Trust (“the Trust”), the owner of the building where the explosion occurred, as a defendant. Smith filed a motion for leave to amend the complaint in Smith I, but he became concerned it would not be addressed before the running of the statute of limitations. He therefore filed the instant action, Smith II, seeking damages for the same injury but naming the Trust as the sole defendant. Smith then filed a motion to consolidate the two suits, but the trial court dismissed Smith II without prejudice as an improperly split claim. Smith appeals from that judgment.
DISCUSSION
¶ 3. We addressed a similar issue in our recent decision in Carpenter v. Kenneth Thompson Builder, Inc., — So.3d - (Miss.Ct.App.2013), where this Court concluded the rule against claim splitting was not violated when a similar procedure was employed in that case. Today’s case, even though it involves different parties and a different lower court, is more straightforward and presents many of the same issues and arguments, probably because all of the attorneys in today’s case were also involved in Carpenter. For largely the same reasons as in Carpenter, we reverse and remand this case.
¶ 4. The trial court based its decision to dismiss for claim splitting on the Mississippi Supreme Court’s opinion in Wilner v. White,
If Wilner had named the four new parties in a separate, original complaint and moved to consolidate the two cases, we would not have an issue with the statute of limitations, nor would there be an issue regarding relating back.
On certiorari, the supreme court responded as follows:
Respectfully, the Court of Appeals is mistaken in its assumption that Wilner could have properly named the new parties in a separate complaint. Had Wil-ner done this, she would have offended the long-standing principal of law in Mississippi prohibiting a party from splitting a cause of action into the subject of two different actions, reaching back to this Court’s decision in Kimball v. Louisville and Nat’l R.R. Co.,94 Miss. 396 ,48 So. 230 (1909). See also Harrison v. Chandler-Sampson Ins., Inc.,891 So.2d 224 , 234 (Miss.2005); Alexander v. Elzie,621 So.2d 909 , 910 (Miss.1992). Suggesting that a party should take this course of action in thefuture is encouraging that party to ignore the law.
Wilner,
§ 62 SPLITTING CAUSE OF ACTION-JUDGMENT FOR PLAINTIFF OR DEFENDANT.
Where a judgment is rendered, whether in favor of the plaintiff or of the defendant, which precludes the plaintiff from thereafter maintaining an action upon the original cause of action, he cannot maintain an action upon any part of the original cause of action, although that part of the cause of action was not litigated in the original action, except[:]
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(c) where the defendant consented to the splitting of the plaintiffs cause of action.
Comment:
a. Rationale: The rule stated in this Section is based on the idea that where a person has a single cause of action, in the interests of convenience and economy to the public and to the defendant he should be entitled to but one right of action and hence should be required to unite in one proceeding all matters which are part of it.
Id. at 320-21.
¶ 5. While Wilner does seem to encompass the facts of today’s case, the discussion is dicta. Dicta are statements “not necessary to the court’s ruling.” McKibben v. City of Jackson,
¶ 6. We certainly agree with the supreme court that claim splitting is not permitted in Mississippi. But we do not find the dicta in Wilner persuasive, at least in today’s case, where the second suit names entirely different defendants. The Wilner court relied on the Restatement of Judgments § 62, quoting it at length, but it neglected the second comment, which states in relevant part:
b. Different parties. The rule stated in this Section presupposes a claim and judgment of a single plaintiff against a single defendant. It does not deal with situations in which there is a single event or transaction from which arise a number of claims by one person against several or by several persons against one or a number of persons. Thus, a person may have a claim against a number of others on a joint and several contract or because of a joint tort; or a number of persons may be entitled to maintain actions for a single act....
¶ 7. It is important to note that the doctrine of claim splitting is closely related to res judicata, and our courts have often used “claim splitting” or “splitting a cause of action” to refer to certain forms of res judicata. See, e.g., Hill v. Carroll Cnty.,
¶ 9. The docket management incarnation of the claim splitting doctrine still requires all four identities of res judi-cata and claim splitting — one of which is the identity of the parties to the cause of action. The Mississippi Supreme Court discussed that element in Harrison v. Chandler-Sampson Ins.,
¶ 10. Dismissal as a form of docket management is subject to an abuse of discretion standard of review. Katz,
¶ 11. Rule 42(a) of the Mississippi Rules of Civil Procedure provides:
When actions involving a common question of law or fact are pending before the court, it may order a joint hearing or trial of any matters in issue in the actions; it may order all the actions consolidated; and it may make such orders concerning proceedings therein as may tend to avoid unnecessary costs or delay.
The decision of whether to consolidate cases remains “within the sound discretion of the trial court.” Smith v. H.C. Bailey Cos.,
¶ 12. THE JUDGMENT OF THE CIRCUIT COURT OF HARRISON COUNTY IS REVERSED, AND THIS CASE IS REMANDED FOR FURTHER PROCEEDINGS CONSISTENT WITH THIS OPINION. ALL COSTS OF THIS APPEAL ARE ASSESSED TO THE AP-PELLEE.