Court of Civil Appeals Dismisses Two Appeals As From Non-Final Judgments Where the Orders Appealed From Adjudicated Less Than All the Issues Before It, Yet Deems Another Judgment Final Where Two Motions Remained Pending in the Trial Court
Appeals in both Stocks v. Stocks, No. 2081033, and Laney v. Garmon, No. 2071233, were dismissed as from non-final judgments by the Court of Civil Appeals last week. By contrast, in A.M. v. J.S, a final judgment was found to support an appeal to the same court even though the circuit court had not ruled on two motions pending before it.
In Stocks, the mother appealed from a judgment entered by the Fayette Circuit Court awarding custody of her minor children to their paternal relatives. The judgment at issue arose from a divorce complaint that the mother filed in which she sought custody, child support, and an equitable division of the parties’ property. The mother later amended her complaint to include a request for alimony. By order dated October 1, 2008, the trial court awarded legal and physical custody of the children to their paternal relatives, ordered the father to pay child support, and reserved jurisdiction to order the mother to pay child support until such time as she became employed. The trial court did not rule on the mother’s request for alimony or her request for an equitable division of property.
In Laney v. Garmon, Laney filed a complaint seeking to enjoin Garmon from blocking access to a roadway. He sought a declaration that the roadway was a public road, an injunction preventing Garmon from blocking the public’s access to it, and declaring that Garmon had no right or interest in a parcel of property that both parties claimed was included in the property descriptions in their deeds. Following an ore tenus hearing, the trial court held that the road had been abandoned for more than twenty years and was not, therefore, a public road. The trial court’s order did not address ownership of the disputed property.
Both Stocks and Laney implicated the final judgment rule: an appeal only lies from a final judgment. Ordinarily, a judgment is not final unless all claims, or the rights or liabilities of all parties, have been decided.
In Stocks, while the trial court’s order reserving jurisdiction to order the mother to pay child support fully adjudicated that issue, the trial court did not rule on the division of the marital property or the mother’s request for alimony. Accordingly, the order appealed from was not a final judgment and would not support an appeal.
The same result obtained in Laney. Because the trial court’s order adjudicated only the claims pertaining to the roadway and neglected to dispose of those related to the parcel of property, rights and liabilities between the parties remained undecided. The appeal was due to be dismissed.
Contrast Stocks and Laney with A.M. v. J.S. In that domestic relations case, the father filed a petition in the juvenile court to modify a 2001 judgment which had given custody of his daughter to the daughter’s mother. The petition was denied and the father appealed to the Elmore Circuit Court for de novo review. On September 11, 2008, the circuit court awarded custody of the child to the father, ordered the mother to pay child support to the father, and ordered that the father take special steps to accommodate the child’s dyslexia.
The mother filed her notice of appeal on September 16, 2008, as well as a motion seeking to stay execution of the judgment pending appellate review. Also on September 16, 2008, the father filed a postjudgment motion requesting that the circuit court amend its judgment to reflect that the court had applied the Ex parte McClendon standard rather than the best interest standard. He also filed an objection to the mother’s motion to stay execution of the judgment. On September 19, 2008, the circuit court entered an order denying the mother’s request to stay execution of the judgment. On September 30, 2008, the father filed a motion to clarify the visitation provisions in the judgment, requesting that the court designate the location at which visitation exchanges should take place.
The circuit court never ruled on the September 30, 2008 motion, but on October 9, 2008, made and initialed the following entry on the case action summary sheet: “upon motion to amend, granted in that McLendon standard applied to ruling.” On October 10, 2008, the father filed a “Notice of Compliance,” contending that he had complied with certain provisions of the judgment requiring him to obtain treatment for the child’s dyslexia. That same day, the mother filed an emergency motion alleging that the father had failed to comply with the provisions he was ordered to make for the child’s dyslexia and requesting that the court enforce those provisions.
Because there were two motions pending in the trial court (the mother’s motion to enforce the court’s judgment regarding the child’s dyslexia treatment and the father’s motion to clarify the visitation provisions), the court first considered whether the judgment was a final judgment or not. The court concluded that the judgment was a final judgment and would support an appeal, reasoning that the father’s September 16, 2008 postjudgment motion was denied by operation of law on September 30, 2008 (fourteen days after it was filed pursuant to a juvenile court rule), because the circuit court had not ruled on it. When the circuit court purported to rule on the father’s motion by making and initialing the October 9, 2008 entry on the case action summary sheet, that action was a nullity. Therefore, to the extent the father’s September 30, 2008 motion to clarify the visitation provisions could be viewed as a postjudgment motion, it was untimely because it was not filed within 14 days of the entry of the circuit court’s September 11, 2008 order, and the circuit court had no jurisdiction to act on it.
The mother’s notice of appeal, which had been held in abeyance pursuant to Alabama Rule of Appellate Procedure 4(a)(5) “quickened” on September 30, 2008, the date the judgment became final. Regarding the mother’s October 10, 2008 emergency motion to enforce the provisions regarding the child’s dyslexia, the court reasoned that it was akin to a contempt motion and initiated a proceeding separate and independent from the action in which the custody-modification order had been entered. Therefore, it did not affect the finality of the custody-modification order and the court had jurisdiction to consider the substantive issues on appeal.
