county was only five martha beat her back and actually the ownership of that land is one of the issues steve walters as a director of walter's logging with to that property and discovered it was fenced in on all sides that you re was resolved a year later walter wagner got a call from the assistant attorney general's office wanting to know about the law again they have the same discussion here are the deeds here the platform here is our logging contract and again they thought this point mike mike mike assumption is there was initially thought this might have been a criminal matter which is why the attorney the local state's attorney was involved i don't know why the attorney general's office was of all but obviously in that to be a civil issue in the complaint because the complaint says that the land that's owned by martha beat her back to the lot and was kind of a bust property that was allegedly owned by the water conservation district the problem is in their complaint they say that they have a boss and reasons why i would fight this he said i have been doing it already said my father was very ill my father passed away i have been able to attend to my my business he did say my clients have given me the answers to the complaints and i simply failed to file a file what happened to fisher after that is simply unknown he did not appear at the hearing on his motion a vacate the default yeah please call that up themselves and the motion was not right not because of a any of the reasons that were side in the motion but because he failed to appear a going to be one that certainly was a council raised their grief that this attorney was negligent we should hold that negligent on the appellants and they should have been more diligent in looking at the case i would submit that's not the true issue at this point in this case because we've never argued it's difficult it minutely to argue that the of how things were strictly diligent certainly in hindsight we should have been looking in on their case and checking and seeing what had happened but there's some mitigating factors here the fact that we're now seven years outside of  we have a contract so she warrants a title to the timber they were under the impression this was a title dispute between this beater back and between the soil conservation district and they were just basically along for the ride now granted that's not a great excuse for not following along but it's understandable given how long that had dragged out they would focus their attention on other things thinking they had an attorney who was there keeping track of the case the other interesting point is at some point you have turned up later mr tissue the other interesting point mr picture was at some point just bar it was this part of the last year according to the attorney registration just but it misses the attorney registration disciplinary commission website lists the last year that attorney was licensed to practice law  year that he was licensed was two thousand and eleven if if you read my client's mr walters affidavit he stated that he was contacted by the state's attorneys are the supreme court and that is what they were informed him that he had in fact  he was engaged in the right and i have not argued that because i simply cannot prove it the only thing i have to go on is my knowledge of whimsy all the requirements or do which is why by the last name as the court knows fisher is a lot like so can i grace period he didn't do it he was removed from the master roles probably within a couple months well i suppose not but if you're not an attorney you're not license to practice law and if that is the case the notices that were sent to mr fisher are not valid on balance because that's not valid notice unless they have an attorney client relationship those notices can't be valid if he is not on the master all of tourney's and state of illinois those notices went to nowhere and i think that's a mitigating factor that the courts a look at and say well that's that's what he was told by what he believed to be this report when they come back that he had been disbarred that might have been a layman calling to tell him that and simply missed use the phrase rather than he failed to complete the ceiling simply removed i don't know  is an unjust situation regardless of that here that they let by that they weren't diligent i still can't allow this judgment to stand because it's unjust that's the true question whether or not they were  decision in vincent in which the lucas case in the first district said well we no longer longer have discretion who cases out of this district said always we have discretion we're going to relax that neither of those cases which have been a rope an act and then i believe c decision said it meant and the interesting thing about the lucas decision is the roku decision which was out of the same or i believe less than six months later said you know that's not right we're not going to follow that they follow the board get a decision out of the second now while we're talking about those other cases an interesting question is what is the standard review for this court and the answer is it depends on who you ask if you ask this court and rope an act it's it's manifest ways if you ask this court before that i reach that because there's no discretion anyway there is it so we don't have to even determine that i would submit that the proper standard review for this court is either of complete abuse of discretion on the novo on the meritorious offenses because that seems like something that would be easily reviewed by interviewing panel but then the decision about due diligence that's a mixed question of fact and of law that's that's really not appropriate for the number of you that i think would be more subject to abuse pressure but what the trial court actually found speaking of the m they have these defenses that are so absolute as the trial court noted were those the the fact that they martha be back actually own the land she actually owns the land they can't get a judgment for wrongful treatment they have a judge for rifle the land she says she own the land whatever standard of inquiry the court holds for a bona fide purchaser they've met that they've more than inquired about who own the land steve walters was held liable for a corporate act with no allegation of a corporate those defenses are i would argue are more than meritorious the bona fide purchaser is basically absolute they had no notice that anyone else on the land that they meet with more above and beyond the duty that they would have to look into that matter and i  that's true your honor but the real question and this is a state that appears in a number of the cases that i cited in my brief justice is more important than due diligence for the court to reach the right conclusion is more important than saying these out of state individuals should have kept more track of their attorney because what's going to happen is as opposing counsel argued in their brief well they have a right against the landowner they can go back and hard you know that she reached her contract for her rights if they don't land but if she owns the land these are going to have a default judgment or my client's putting the trees on the property she's going to provide remains she actually owns the land and we have no right against her so i would ask the court that that justice is more important than due diligence findings of fact on the house it is just really a case about the difference between a technicality versus the facts and justice i don't think it's a case between a technicality i think it's a case as far as what is something that i believe it was done correctly as a matter of law as opposed to something that when the defendants in this case mr walters and others fail to use due diligence to pay attention to their k so i don't think it's technicality versus justice i think it is so very serious determination of one what what the law yes and to applying that law to this case here talking about the law fourteen zero one yes ok what about the law but really who who are in the trees and who really i mean is that is that a judgment that's a windfall oh no it is not we're absolutely confident that the treaties that we allege were cut that were owned by warren county that the facts do indeed yes that's it isn't it indeed it is yeah under vincent and then also looking at the fact pattern under look at us and saying this case is directly on point and i'm bound by lucas and so this is what i indeed directly on point an attorney who that was involved that this is clear in that case there was an answer and look is there was an answer file there was no answer file as a matter of law the good the petitioner mr walters prevailed on his do fourteen zero one petition and you need both and you need buster sprog yes absolutely correct so i believe that held in his order was this there's a decision in lucas that suggests i don't have this discretion or there's a decision rocha from the same court from the first district that is more recent that is six to eight months after lucas that said we're not following that we're following the borghetti decision of the second district that says we believe to death for king no one gives us the authority to do that if you look at the text into a dash or you know one it says all relief here too for available and even specifically was morrison said was i have to weigh these decisions there's vincent's which is seemingly out there and doing one hundred plus years of of jurisprudence there's a lucas decision that says well i guess that case is right and then there's roco from the same same district that says no lucas is wrong vincit is wrong vincent it really mean that vincent's a criminal case about avoid judgement it doesn't bring up your diligence it doesn't have a two year requirement that's it yeah wrong with the  well correct because if you look more correct if you look at the language they use in the section that was picked up upon in this case which is about it is wrong to think of it in terms of discretion discretion as a i don't even know what that means i mean you would think they would just write the word in there but they did it then they said it's wrong to think of it as quickly equitable in putting the word strickly in there instead of just saying it's wrong things that will makes a world of difference  that would mean then that he thought it would be unjust to let non window there's all the fifty two thousand dollars judgment for wrongfully cutting down trees that they don't even know that's the real question the real question is and we're saying there is merit or there would have to be a finding right i would submit certainly that if it was on remand i would file a motion to dismiss and say we're bona fide purchasers are valid here are the deeds they looked at here's the plan looks like she owns the land she gave us the right on the land i'd in two days fourteen zero one two trial courts still have discretion to do justice by relaxing that due diligence requirement in the open after a road check maybe of saying wrong this court this court said we believe in this case we should that against the fact that wait a minute this is a judgment for rightfully cutting down trees and it's for fifty two thousand dollars and in this case sure diligence but we're going to relax that because to allow this judgment to hold would simply be unjust it's not a good actress to say you did your job you looked in the trees you had a rifle right up on the trees but you still the fifty thousand dollars judgment against you later on you weren't as diligent as you should have been but that the courts in illinois are more concerned with doing what's right we really reaching the legal conclusion that justice be done and in this case justice minister want them to deliver yours your like by here ok because there is do frankly and i think that's why the vincent decision the extension that has been given is incorrect because that would require the trial for it to meet the due diligence standard or visible what is that my question goes back to the the relax fall and they help with that weighed against the other party and it went to their due diligence because at the immediately sort of questions they would have been personally you know notified of what happened then they could have stepped in and done that and that sort of discussion o it is again a discussion of you diligence and it seems to me i mean you're really arguing that there should only be one prong to this test if you've got a real good meritorious defense and maybe diligence and before they hired mr fisher they were they were driving down toward how i discuss the case with the attorney general with the state's attorney they were going to look at the land they were discussing some many of them it was only after they took the step to hire a lawyer that the case mitigating factors and the fact of the matter is before i think the case before the case was filed but the dispute was ongoing they were actively involved the second they found out that mr fisher had disappeared and that these guys it was against them they hire counsel and it works fairly diligent in a very short amount of time so the real question then is how unjust does a judge would have to be to say well that here where you were just diligent as you should have been too bad you're still stuck with that judgment and to go on remain and tell the opponents you need to litigate against this landowner who's going to argue that she owns the land so i would return to the maximum