Case Title: City of Suffolk v. Lummis Gin Co.

Citation: 

Docket Number: 082345

State: virginia

Court: Virginia Supreme Court

Date: 2009-09-18T00:00:00Z

Document:
Present:  All the Justices 
 
CITY OF SUFFOLK 
 
 
 
OPINION BY 
v.  Record No. 082345 
JUSTICE LAWRENCE L. KOONTZ, JR. 
 
 
 
     September 18, 2009 
LUMMIS GIN COMPANY, ET AL.  
 
FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE CITY OF SUFFOLK 
Rodham T. Delk, Jr., Judge 
 
 
This appeal arises from a complaint filed by the City of 
Suffolk on March 9, 2006 in the Circuit Court of the City of 
Suffolk, pursuant to Code §§ 58.1-3965 et seq., seeking to 
sell a certain parcel of land located within the city in order 
to satisfy delinquent real estate tax liens on the parcel.  
The merits of the assertions in the complaint are not at issue 
in this appeal.  By order entered on February 12, 2008, the 
circuit court granted the City’s motion for a nonsuit.  
Thereafter, by order entered on September 22, 2008, the 
circuit court found that the City had taken a second nonsuit, 
rather than a first nonsuit, in the matter and awarded a 
number of the defendants attorney fees and costs pursuant to 
Code § 8.01-380(B).  The issues we consider are whether the 
circuit court erred in finding that the February 12, 2008 
order was for a second nonsuit and whether that order was a 
final order as contemplated by our Rule 1:1 such that the 
circuit court was without jurisdiction to award attorney fees 
and costs by the September 22, 2008 order. 
BACKGROUND 
 
On September 25, 1995 the City filed a combined complaint 
in the circuit court against Western Branch Crossing LP, the 
Lummis Gin Company, and numerous other alleged property owners 
as defendants.  The City sought sale of various parcels of 
land within the city in order to satisfy delinquent real 
estate tax liens on those parcels.  That case was styled, City 
of Suffolk, Virginia v. Western Branch Crossing LP, Circuit 
Court Case No. CH95-285.  The parcel identified as being owned 
by the Lummis Gin Company and its survivors in title is the 
same parcel involved in the current case.  The City 
subsequently filed a motion for a nonsuit so “that this action 
may stand dismissed as to the defendant, Lummis Gin Co., 
without prejudice to the bringing of another action.”  On May 
16, 1996, the circuit court granted the City’s motion. 
 
On March 9, 2006, the City again filed a complaint in the 
circuit court seeking to satisfy all delinquent real estate 
taxes on the same parcel of land previously identified as 
being owned by the Lummis Gin Company in the 1995 complaint.  
In addition to the Lummis Gin Company and numerous individual 
defendants, the suit named Mills Staylor, Kay Simmons, Lewis 
B. Smith, David B. Smith, and William B. Smith (collectively, 
“the Baker heirs”) as defendants.  Only the Baker heirs filed 
an answer to the complaint.  At a February 12, 2008 hearing, 
 
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the City submitted a proposed order for a nonsuit to the 
circuit court.  The Baker heirs contended that since the 1995 
delinquent tax case against the Lummis Gin Company resulted in 
a nonsuit, the City’s motion for a nonsuit in the instant 
matter represented a request for a second nonsuit.  
Accordingly, the Baker heirs sought an award of attorney fees 
and costs.   
 
At the conclusion of the hearing, the circuit court 
articulated that it was “going to enter the nonsuit order 
[and] going to retain the case on the docket to [consider] the 
issue of fees and costs and whether this is a first voluntary 
nonsuit of right or whether it is the second nonsuit 
contemplated by [Code § 8.01-380(B)].”  On that same day the 
court entered an order granting the City’s motion for a 
nonsuit without prejudice.  The order further provided that 
“[t]his suit shall remain on the docket for the Court to 
determine issues concerning attorney fees, costs and expenses 
incurred by [the Baker heirs].” 
 
The parties filed briefs and argued their positions 
before the circuit court on August 12, 2008.  The Baker heirs 
contended that the 1995 suit and the current suit were 
duplicate causes of action.  The Baker heirs stressed that the 
current suit sought recovery of “all accumulated taxes, 
penalties, interests and costs thereon.”  Thus, according to 
 
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the Baker heirs, the City was attempting to hold the Baker 
heirs liable for the unpaid taxes in every tax year including 
the 1995 tax year and all earlier tax years.  The City 
asserted that the court’s February 12, 2008 order was a final 
judgment order for purposes of Rule 1:1, and thus the court 
had lost jurisdiction over the matter twenty-one days after 
the entry of the February 12, 2008 order.  Further, the City 
emphasized that pursuant to the language of the May 16, 1996 
order, the only party that the City had suffered a nonsuit 
against in the earlier case was the Lummis Gin Company and 
that the Baker heirs were not named parties in the earlier 
suit.  Accordingly, the City maintained that the nonsuit 
granted by the court on February 12, 2008 was the first 
nonsuit of the case as to the Baker heirs and thus Code 
§ 8.01-380(B) would not authorize an award of attorney fees 
and costs to the Baker heirs. 
 
The court entered a “Final Order” in favor of the Baker 
heirs on September 22, 2008.  The order, in pertinent part, 
provided that: 
 
[T]he Court finds that the [present] case is a 
second or additional nonsuit of the [prior] case 
styled City of Suffolk, Virginia v. Western Branch 
Crossing LP, . . ., and doth sustain [the Baker 
heirs’] motion and award attorney fees and cost[s] 
. . . and the Court doth deny Complaint’s request 
for a ruling pursuant to Rule 1:1 that the Court 
lacked jurisdiction to decide the matters raised in 
the request for attorney’s fees, it is therefore,  
 
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ADJUDGED, ORDERED, and DECREED that the City 
of Suffolk shall pay [the Baker heirs’] attorney 
fees and cost[s] in the amount of $1,113.00. 
 
We awarded the City this appeal. 
DISCUSSION 
 
Code § 8.01-380(B), in pertinent part, provides that: 
Only one nonsuit may be taken to a cause of action 
or against the same party to a proceeding, as a 
matter of right, although the court may allow 
additional nonsuits . . . or counsel may stipulate 
to additional nonsuits.  The court, in the event 
additional nonsuits are allowed, may assess costs 
and reasonable attorneys’ fees against the 
nonsuiting party. 
 
We have stated that this statute grants the plaintiff “an 
absolute right to one nonsuit” and observed that if the 
plaintiff “insists upon taking the nonsuit within the 
limitations imposed by the statute, neither the trial court 
nor opposing counsel can prevent him from doing so.”  Nash v. 
Jewell, 227 Va. 230, 237, 315 S.E.2d 825, 829 (1984).  We have 
further observed, however, that courts act by orders and 
decrees and therefore the litigation is not terminated until 
the court enters the appropriate nonsuit order.  Id. 
 
It is readily apparent that Code § 8.01-380(B) draws a 
clear distinction between a first nonsuit which must be 
granted as a matter of right and a second or additional 
nonsuit which permits the trial court to assess costs and 
 
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reasonable attorneys’ fees against the nonsuiting party.  It 
is this distinction that requires this Court in the present 
case to first determine whether the nonsuit granted by the 
circuit court on February 12, 2008 was the first nonsuit as to 
the Baker heirs. 
 
In this regard, the record in the present case does not 
support the Baker heirs’ assertion that they were parties to 
the prior suit as successors in title of the Lummis Gin 
Company.  Moreover, assuming that they could establish an 
ownership interest in the property sought to be sold by the 
City to satisfy its delinquent tax lien in 1995, the present 
action sought recovery for delinquent taxes regarding 
different tax years.  Code § 58.1-3965(A), as pertinent here, 
permits the sale of real estate to satisfy delinquent taxes 
“[w]hen any taxes on any real estate in a county, city or town 
are delinquent on December 31 following the second anniversary 
of the date on which such taxes have become due.”  Thus, the 
delinquent taxes sought to be satisfied in the 1995 proceeding 
could not have been the same delinquent taxes sought to be 
satisfied in the proceeding commenced in 2006.  Because the 
present action filed by the City was not the same cause of 
action filed by the City in 1995, the nonsuit granted by the 
circuit court in the prior action did not operate to 
extinguish the City’s right to take a first nonsuit in the 
 
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present action.  Accordingly, the circuit court erred in 
determining in its September 22, 2008 order that its February 
12, 2008 order granted the City a “second or additional 
nonsuit.”  It then follows that the circuit court had no 
authority to award costs and attorneys’ fees against the City 
in the exercise of its absolute right to a first nonsuit.  But 
see, Williamsburg Peking Corp. v. Kong, 270 Va. 350, 354, 619 
S.E.2d 100, 102 (2005) (entry of nonsuit order does not 
conclude a case as to any pending motions for sanctions 
pursuant to Code § 8.01-271.1). 
 
While our holding that the City was granted a first 
nonsuit in this case resolves this appeal, we take this 
opportunity to address the finality of the February 12, 2008 
nonsuit order for purposes of Rule 1:1. 
 
In Super Fresh Food Markets v. Ruffin, 263 Va. 555, 561 
S.E.2d 734 (2002), we held the following regarding the 
application of Rule 1:1: 
 
 
[T]he provisions of Rule 1:1 are mandatory in 
order to assure the certainty and stability that 
the finality of judgments brings.  Once a final 
judgment has been entered and the twenty-one day 
time period of Rule 1:1 has expired, the trial 
court is thereafter without jurisdiction in the 
case.  Thus, only an order within the twenty-one 
day time period that clearly and expressly 
modifies, vacates, or suspends the final judgment 
will interrupt or extend the running of that time 
period so as to permit the trial court to retain 
jurisdiction in the case. 
 
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Id. at 563-64, 561 S.E.2d at 739. 
 
In James v. James, 263 Va. 474, 481, 562 S.E.2d 133, 137 
(2002), we noted that “the concept of nonsuit is sufficiently 
imbued with the attributes of finality to satisfy the 
requirements of Rule 1:1.”  Therefore, we opined that, “from 
its very nature, an order granting a nonsuit should be subject 
to the provisions of Rule 1:1.”  Id.  As pertinent to the 
present case, we held “[n]either the filing of post-trial or 
post-judgment motions, nor the trial court’s taking such 
motions under consideration, nor the pendency of such motions 
on the twenty-first day after final judgment, is sufficient to 
toll or extend the running of the 21-day period prescribed by 
Rule 1:1.”  Id. at 482-83, 562 S.E.2d at 138 (quoting Berean 
Law Group, P.C. v. Cox, 259 Va. 622, 626, 528 S.E.2d 108, 111, 
(2000)). 
 
Notwithstanding the circuit court’s attempt in the present 
case to preserve the issue by including the statement: “[t]his 
suit shall remain on the docket for the Court to determine 
issues concerning attorney fees, costs and expenses incurred by 
[the Baker heirs]” in the February 12, 2008 order, the court 
still only had twenty-one days to resolve the issue before the 
court lost jurisdiction.  Therefore, the court was without 
jurisdiction to decide any issue in the matter twenty-one days 
 
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after entry of the February 12, 2008 nonsuit order.  The 
court’s September 22, 2008 order awarding attorneys’ fees and 
costs to the Baker heirs was a nullity.   
CONCLUSION 
 
For these reasons, we hold that the February 12, 2008 
order of the circuit court granted a first nonsuit as a matter 
of right to the City of Suffolk as to the Baker heirs.  We 
further hold that the February 12, 2008 order was a final 
order as construed under Rule 1:1 and, therefore, the circuit 
court had no jurisdiction to award attorney fees and costs 
twenty-one days after entry of that order. 
 
Accordingly, we will reverse the circuit court’s 
September 22, 2008 order awarding attorney fees and costs to 
the Baker heirs and enter final judgment here in favor of the 
City of Suffolk. 
Reversed and final judgment. 
 
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