Title: Cahall v. Thomas

State: delaware

Issuer: Delaware Supreme Court

Document:

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE 
 
BARBARA 
ANN 
CAHALL 
and 
RONALD E. CAHALL, 
 
Plaintiffs Below- 
Appellants, 
 
v. 
 
DEBBIE D. THOMAS, 
 
          Defendant Below- 
Appellee. 
§ 
§ 
§  No. 303, 2005 
§ 
§ 
§  Court Below⎯Superior Court 
§  of the State of Delaware, 
§  in and for New Castle County 
§  C.A. No. 01C-12-031 
§ 
§   
§ 
 
 
 
 
 
Submitted: July 28, 2005 
 
 
 
 
   Decided: September 16, 2005 
 
Before HOLLAND, BERGER and RIDGELY, Justices. 
 
 
 
Upon consideration of the defendant’s motion to dismiss in part.  
GRANTED. 
 
 
 
Beverly L. Bove, Esquire and Vincent J.X. Hedrick II, Esquire, 
Wilmington, Delaware for the appellants. 
 
 
Donald Ransom, Esquire, Casarino, Christman & Shalk, Wilmington, 
Delaware for the appellee. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
HOLLAND, Justice: 
 
 
 
 
 
Pending before the Court is appellee Debbie Thomas’ motion to 
dismiss that portion of appellants Barbara and Ronald Cahall’s appeal from 
the jury’s verdict entered on March 10, 2004.  Thomas asserts that the 
Cahalls’ appeal from the jury’s verdict should have been filed within thirty 
days of the Superior Court’s order denying the Cahalls’ motion for a new 
trial.  The order denying the motion for new trial was entered July 16, 2004.  
Thomas contends that this Court is without jurisdiction to review the jury’s 
verdict because the Cahalls did not timely perfect an appeal from the 
Superior Court’s final judgment.  We agree.  Accordingly, the Cahalls’ 
appeal from the jury’s verdict must be dismissed. 
Procedural History 
 
The Cahalls are husband and wife.  They filed a complaint against 
Thomas in the Superior Court asserting a claim for bodily injury by Barbara 
Cahall and a claim for loss of consortium by Ronald Cahall.  The claims 
arose from an automobile accident in which Thomas’ vehicle struck Barbara 
Cahall’s vehicle from behind.  Following a trial in the Superior Court, the 
jury returned its verdict on March 10, 2004 in favor of Barbara Cahall in the 
amount of $2,500 but made no award to Ronald Cahall on his loss of 
consortium claim. 
 
The Cahalls filed a motion for additur or, in the alternative, for a new 
trial on the issue of damages.  On July 16, 2004, the Superior Court denied 
the Cahalls’ motion.  On August 13, 2004, the Cahalls filed a notice of 
appeal, in case No. 350, 2004 (“Cahall I”), from the Superior Court’s denial 
of their motion for additur or a new trial.  In their opening brief on appeal in 
Cahall I, the Cahalls raised five issues, only two of which related to the 
Superior Court’s denial of their motion for additur or a new trial.  As a result 
of the Cahalls notice of appeal, which was expressly limited to the Superior 
Court’s denial of their motion for additur or a new trial, the Court concluded, 
based on well-settled law, that it did not have jurisdiction to consider the 
Cahalls’ other issues.1  We affirmed the Superior Court’s denial of the 
Cahalls’ motion for new trial. 
After the mandate issued in Cahall I, the Superior Court ruled upon 
Thomas’ motion for costs, which had been filed in March 2004.  On June 22, 
2005, the Superior Court granted in part and denied in part Thomas’ motion 
for costs.  Thereafter, the Cahalls filed a notice of appeal in the present case, 
purporting to appeal not only from the Superior Court’s June 22, 2005 ruling 
on Thomas’ motion for costs, but also from the jury verdict entered on 
March 10, 2004. 
                                          
 
1 Cahall v. Thomas, 2005 WL 1175940 (Del. Supr. May 16, 2005) (citing Trowell v. 
Diamond Supply Co., 91 A.2d 797 (Del. 1952)). 
 
Thomas’ Motion to Dismiss 
 
Thomas has filed a motion to dismiss, in part, the Cahalls’ appeal on 
the ground that their appeal from the jury’s verdict is untimely because it 
was not filed within thirty days of the Superior Court’s final judgment, 
which was the denial of the motion for new trial.2  Thomas asserts that the 
pending motion for costs did not suspend the finality of the Superior Court’s 
judgment.3  Thus, according to Thomas, this Court lacks jurisdiction to hear 
the Cahalls’ untimely appeal from the jury’s verdict. 
Our ruling on Thomas’ motion is dictated by established precedent.  
In Emerald Partners v. Berlin,4 the appellees moved to dismiss that appeal 
as interlocutory because the notice of appeal was filed before the trial court 
ruled on a pending motion for costs.  We denied the motion to dismiss, 
holding that “the pendency of a motion for costs . . . does not delay the 
finality of a judgment on the merits.”5 We reiterated this point in McDaniel 
v. DaimlerChrysler Corp.6 when we granted the appellees’ motion to 
dismiss the appeal on the ground that notice of appeal was not filed within 
                                          
 
2 See Del. Supr. Ct. R. 6(a)(i). 
3 See Emerald Partners v. Berlin, 811 A.2d 788 (Del. 2001). 
4 Id. 
5 Id. at 791. 
6 860 A.2d 321 (Del. 2004). 
thirty days of the Superior Court’s entry of summary judgment.  We rejected 
McDaniel’s contention that a pending motion for costs suspended the 
finality of the trial court’s summary judgment ruling.7  
In light of this clear precedent, Thomas’ motion to dismiss in part 
must be granted.  The Cahalls should have filed their notice of appeal from 
the jury’s verdict within thirty days after the Superior Court’s entry of final 
judgment in this case.  The jury’s verdict in this case became a final, 
appealable order on July 16, 2004 when the Superior Court denied the 
Cahalls’ motion for new trial.  The Cahalls’ failure to properly notice an 
appeal from the jury’s verdict within the required time period deprives this 
Court of jurisdiction to review the jury’s verdict in this appeal. 
 
Consequently, Thomas’ motion to dismiss in part is GRANTED.  The 
Clerk of the Court is directed to establish a brief schedule on the Cahalls’ 
appeal with respect to the issue of costs only. 
                                          
 
7 Id. at 323.