Preliminary injunction to enforce a noncompete agreement; Mootness

Concluding that a decision here would only answer an abstract legal question, and that the case did not involve a matter of public significance, the court dismissed the appeal as moot. Defendants appealed the trial court’s grant of a preliminary injunction to plaintiff that ordered defendant-doctor “to not provide radiation-oncology services to a competing hospital.” The professional-services agreement the doctor had signed with plaintiff prevented him “from providing services to a competing hospital for one year after its termination, which occurred on” 1/2/25. While plaintiff asked the trial court to extend the restriction by the amount of time the doctor “had worked at the competing hospital, the court’s order did not do so.” As a result, even if the court “were to affirm the trial court’s order requiring [him] to comply with the noncompetition agreement, our decision would answer only an abstract legal question because the order no longer had a practical effect as of” 1/2/26. It also determined that no exception to the mootness doctrine warranted “considering the issue on the merits.”