Title: In re Davis

State: ohio

Issuer: Ohio Supreme Court

Document:

IN RE DAVIS. 
[Cite as In re Davis (1999), ___ Ohio St.3d ___.] 
Juvenile law — Dispositional hearings for children adjudicated abused, 
neglected, or dependent — Seven-day time lime of R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) is 
directory, not mandatory — Court not deprived of jurisdiction by failure to 
comply. 
The seven-day time limit set forth in R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) is directory, not 
mandatory, and failure to comply with it will not deprive a court of 
jurisdiction. 
(Nos. 98-50 and 98-98 — Submitted October 14, 1998 at the Mercer County 
Session — Decided March 3, 1999.) 
APPEAL from and CERTIFIED by the Court of Appeals for Paulding County, No. 11-
97-6. 
 
In August 1993, sixty-five-year-old appellant Howard Davis contacted the 
Paulding County Department of Human Services (“DHS”) regarding his five 
young children, who ranged in age from one to five years.  Howard’s wife, 
appellant Tammy Davis, was incarcerated at the time and Howard could not 
manage the children alone.  As a result, he signed an agreement with DHS giving 
it temporary custody of the children for one month.  He later signed an extension 
of that agreement, continuing DHS’s custody for one additional month. 
 
Just prior to the expiration of the extended agreement, DHS arranged an 
appointment for Howard to sign a further extension of custody, but Howard failed 
to appear as scheduled.  When attempts to locate him proved unsuccessful, DHS 
believed his whereabouts to be unknown.  It filed a complaint in the Paulding 
County Juvenile Court alleging the children to be dependent and requesting that 
 
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temporary custody be extended.  In October 1993, Judge Russell J. McMaster 
continued temporary custody of the five children with DHS. 
 
Two months later, appellants appeared at an adjudicatory hearing and 
admitted the allegation of dependency.  Judge McMaster adjudicated the children 
dependent and continued temporary custody with DHS.  The judge thereafter 
continued temporary custody two additional times.  Finally, after nearly two years 
of temporary custody, DHS requested permanent custody of all five children. 
 
Following several postponements, Judge McMaster held the permanent 
custody hearing in November 1995.  He thereafter allowed time for each party to 
file written closing arguments, and the case was deemed submitted in early 
December 1995.  The following July, having yet received no decision in the 
matter, DHS requested that the annual review hearing include an order extending 
temporary custody again until the court decided the pending issue.  The court 
granted the motion for continued temporary custody on the third anniversary of the 
original grant of temporary custody to DHS.  Six months later, having still 
received no judgment on the permanency matter, DHS moved the court for a status 
hearing.  The court never responded to this motion but eventually, some seventeen 
months after the conclusion of the permanent custody hearing, issued its order 
granting permanent custody of the Davis children to DHS. 
 
Appellants appealed this judgment and the Third District Court of Appeals 
affirmed.  Finding its decision to be in conflict with In re Omosun Children 
(1995), 106 Ohio App.3d 813, 667 N.E.2d 431, a decision from the Eleventh 
Appellate District, the court of appeals entered an order certifying a conflict.  Case 
No. 98-98 is now before this court upon our determination that a conflict exists.  
Case No. 98-50 is before this court pursuant to the allowance of a discretionary 
appeal. 
 
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__________________ 
 
Michael C. Jones, for appellants. 
 
Joseph R. Burkard, Paulding County Prosecuting Attorney, for appellee. 
 
James M. Sponseller, guardian ad litem. 
__________________ 
 
COOK, J.  The issue certified to this court is “whether the seven-day limit 
within which a juvenile court must enter its disposition of a child adjudicated as 
abused, neglected or dependent under R.C. 2151.35 also applies to motions filed 
by an agency under R.C. 2151.414 prior to the September 1996 amendment to that 
statute.”  We find that the seven-day limit does apply but that it is directory, not 
mandatory, and that either party may seek to enforce the statutory time 
requirement through a writ of procedendo. 
I 
 
The seven-day limit in question appears in the Revised Code section 
delimiting the procedure for dispositional hearings for children adjudicated 
abused, neglected or dependent.  R.C. 2151.35(A) provides that after a child has 
been so adjudicated, a juvenile court must conduct a dispositional hearing 
pursuant to R.C. 2151.35(B).  R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) requires that after the 
dispositional hearing is concluded, “the court shall enter an appropriate judgment 
within seven days.”  Revised Code sections regarding permanent custody 
decisions also cross-reference this time limit.  R.C. 2151.413 states that when an 
agency such as DHS has had temporary custody for at least six months of an 
abused, neglected or dependent child, that agency may request permanent custody 
pursuant to R.C. 2151.414.  Pre-amendment R.C. 2151.414(A) specified no time 
limit but provided that where an R.C. 2151.413 motion for permanent custody is 
filed, “[t]he court shall conduct a hearing in accordance with section 2151.35.”  
 
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Because R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) requires a decision within seven days following the 
conclusion of a dispositional hearing, judges ruling on R.C. 2151.413 permanent 
custody motions must meet that time limit where the motion was filed prior to the 
September 18, 1996 amendment to R.C. 2151.414.  Thus, Judge McMaster should 
have issued his ruling within seven days after the date the matter was submitted to 
him; he took seventeen months. 
II 
 
Appellants argue that the seven-day constraint is mandatory and that the 
juvenile court’s failure to adhere to it deprived the court of authority (we read 
“authority” as indistinguishable from “jurisdiction”) to determine permanent 
custody.  We, however, view the provision as directory rather than mandatory, 
leaving the juvenile court’s jurisdiction unaffected by the untimeliness of its 
decision. 
 
It is true that where a statute contains the word “shall,” the provision will 
generally be construed as mandatory.  Dorrian v. Scioto Conservancy Dist. (1971), 
27 Ohio St.2d 102, 56 O.O.2d 58, 271 N.E.2d 834, paragraph one of the syllabus.  
“A mandatory statute may be defined as one where noncompliance  * * * will 
render the proceedings to which it relates illegal and void.”  See State ex rel. Jones 
v. Farrar (1946), 146 Ohio St. 467, 471-472, 32 O.O. 542, 544, 66 N.E.2d 531, 
534. 
 
But, even with “shall” as the operative verb, a statutory time provision may 
be directory.  “As a general rule, a statute which provides a time for the 
performance of an official duty will be construed as directory so far as time for 
performance is concerned, especially where the statute fixes the time simply for 
convenience or orderly procedure.”  Id. at 472, 32 O.O. at 544, 66 N.E.2d at 534.  
This is so “unless the nature of the act to be performed or the phraseology of the 
 
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statute or of other statutes relating to the same subject-matter is such that the 
designation of time must be considered a limitation upon the power of the officer.”  
State ex rel. Smith v. Barnell (1924), 109 Ohio St. 246, 255, 142 N.E. 611, 613. 
 
The statute reviewed here fits the general Farrar rule for construing that 
statute as directory; it is a time restriction on the performance of an official duty.  
And, the language and purpose of the provision do not trigger the Barnell 
exception to this general rule because R.C. 2151.35 does not include any 
expression of intent to restrict the jurisdiction of the court for untimeliness. 
 
Finding the provision directory makes sense from a practical standpoint as 
well.  If we decided that the time constraint is mandatory and that juvenile courts 
therefore lack jurisdiction to decide these cases from the eighth day following 
submission of the issue, we would defeat the very purposes the time limit was 
designed to protect.  If there were jurisdictional consequences, a missed deadline 
would require either that the child be returned to a potentially risky home 
situation, or that a new complaint be filed and the process begun anew, delaying 
the final resolution of the issue even further.  Such consequences would not serve 
the interests of children, who are too often relegated to temporary custody for too 
long. 
 
In light of the rule stated in Farrar and the consequences that would result 
otherwise, then, we conclude that the seven-day time limit set forth in R.C. 
2151.35(B)(3) is directory, not mandatory, and failure to comply with it will not 
deprive a court of jurisdiction to decide the issue. 
III 
 
Although we hold that the seven-day time limit is directory rather than 
mandatory, such a finding does not render the provision meaningless.  Where a 
juvenile court delays its ruling beyond the seven days allowed by R.C. 
 
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2151.35(B)(3), the time constraint in the statute serves as justification for seeking 
a writ of procedendo. 
 
A petition for a writ of procedendo “is appropriate when a court has either 
refused to render a judgment or has unnecessarily delayed proceeding to 
judgment.”  State ex rel. Miley v. Parrott (1996), 77 Ohio St.3d 64, 65, 671 N.E.2d 
24, 26.  “ ‘[A]n inferior court’s refusal or failure to timely dispose of a pending 
action is the ill a writ of procedendo is designed to remedy.’ ”  State ex rel. Dehler 
v. Sutula (1995), 74 Ohio St.3d 33, 35, 656 N.E.2d 332, 333, quoting State ex rel. 
Levin v. Sheffield Lake (1994), 70 Ohio St.3d 104, 110, 637 N.E.2d 319, 324.  The 
seven-day limit set forth in R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) defines what is and is not a 
“timely” disposal of a permanent custody action, lending justification to any 
petition filed after the expiration of that period. 
 
This court previously reached this same conclusion under similar 
circumstances in Linger v. Weiss (1979), 57 Ohio St.2d 97, 11 O.O.3d 281, 386 
N.E.2d 1354.  In that case, the juvenile court had violated two separate time 
requirements set forth in the Juvenile Rules.  We concluded there that “[t]he 
proper remedy in such a case is a complaint for a writ of procedendo.”  Id. at 100, 
11 O.O.3d at 283, 386 N.E.2d at 1356, fn. 5.  And at least one Ohio appellate 
district has already reached a like conclusion in a case analogous to the current 
one.  In In re Fleming (1991), 76 Ohio App.3d 30, 600 N.E.2d 1112, the Sixth 
Appellate District found that “the proper remedy in cases such as this, where a trial 
court fails to meet the seven-day requirement imposed by R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) * * 
* would be for counsel for the parents or counsel for [the agency] to file, upon 
expiration of the seven-day time period, a petition for a writ of procedendo.”  Id. at 
40-41, 600 N.E.2d at 1119. 
 
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Appellants here claim prejudice and a due process violation from the 
inordinate delay by Judge McMaster between the time of the hearing and the date 
of the decision.  Given the availability of this avenue for relief from prejudicial 
delay, however, it follows that any party who has not petitioned for a writ of 
procedendo is estopped from complaining on appeal that delay by the juvenile 
court in excess of the seven days allowed by R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) prejudiced that 
party or violated that party’s due process rights.  At any reasonable time following 
the expiration of seven days, appellants could have forced the court to act by 
seeking a writ of procedendo.  Appellants failed to do this.  Their failure to avail 
themselves of this remedy precludes them from now claiming that they suffered 
from the delay. 
IV 
 
Accordingly, the judgment of the Paulding County Court of Appeals is 
affirmed. 
Judgment affirmed. 
 
F.E. SWEENEY and LUNDBERG STRATTON, JJ., concur. 
 
LUNDBERG STRATTON, J., concurs separately. 
 
DOUGLAS and RESNICK, JJ., concur separately. 
 
MOYER, C.J., and PFEIFER, J., dissent. 
__________________ 
 
LUNDBERG STRATTON, J., concurring.  I respectfully concur in the opinion 
of the majority, but write separately to express my outrage at the extraordinary 
delay in this case.  In August 1993, these children were first removed from a home 
where, clearly, they were at serious risk.  They have now languished in foster care 
for over five years.  Seventeen months of that delay lies clearly at the feet of Judge 
McMaster, who instead of upholding his statutory duty to decide this case in seven 
 
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days, despite DHS’s repeated attempts to bring it to his attention, did not rule on 
the matter for seventeen months. 
 
Seventeen months is an eternity in the life of a child.  Such a delay is 
inexcusable.  We in the judicial system must be zealous to ensure that the lives of 
children will not be disrupted by failure of a judge to perform his or her duties in a 
timely fashion. 
__________________ 
 
ALICE ROBIE RESNICK, J., concurring.  I concur in the syllabus and in the 
judgment but write separately to underscore the reason that the seven-day decision 
requirement specified in R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) is directory rather than mandatory. 
 
This court has previously discussed the issue of when a statute is to be 
directory or mandatory in State ex rel. Jones v. Farrar (1946), 146 Ohio St. 467, 
32 O.O. 542, 66 N.E.2d 531, where the court held at paragraph two of the 
syllabus: 
 
“As a general rule, statutes which relate to the essence of the act to be 
performed or to matters of substance are mandatory, and those which do not relate 
to the essence and compliance with which is merely a matter of convenience rather 
than substance are directory.” 
 
The court then proceeded to hold at paragraph three of the syllabus: 
 
“As a general rule, a statute providing a time for the performance of an 
official duty will be construed as directory so far as time for performance is 
concerned, especially where the statute fixes the time simply for convenience or 
orderly procedure; and, unless the object or purpose of a statutory provision 
requiring some act to be performed within a specified period of time is discernible 
from the language employed, the statute is directory and not mandatory.” 
 
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From the foregoing it is readily apparent that the directory-only application 
arises where the essence of a statute is not involved and the time for doing the act 
is prescribed only for the orderly performance of a judicial act. 
 
“Ordinarily, a statutory requirement that an act be performed is mandatory 
while the time for performing the act is directory.  This is especially true of a 
provision that a tribunal render a decision within a designated time.  Failure to do 
so does not deprive the tribunal * * * of its jurisdiction to act.  See Kyes v. 
Pennsylvania RR. Co. (1952), 158 Ohio St. 362, 49 O.O. 239, 109 N.E.2d 503.”  
(Emphasis added.)  In re Raymundo (1990), 67 Ohio App.3d 262, 268, 586 N.E.2d 
1149, 1153. 
 
Consistent with this view, courts have concluded that time limits directed at 
court actions are generally treated as directory.  State ex rel. Turrin v. Tuscarawas 
Cty. Court of Common Pleas (1966), 5 Ohio St.2d 194, 196, 34 O.O.2d 350, 351, 
214 N.E.2d 670, 671; James v. West (1902), 67 Ohio St. 28, 65 N.E. 156, 
paragraph three of the syllabus.  Such time limits are useful and certainly binding 
on the conscience of judges, but they “are not matters affecting their jurisdiction.”  
Id. at 44, 65 N.E. at 158. 
 
Had the General Assembly intended the seven-day decision time to be of the 
essence and as a result jurisdictional, it certainly knew how to so indicate.  In R.C. 
2151.35(B)(1), the General Assembly requires dismissal when the dispositional 
hearing is not held within the statutory time frame.  By contrast, it is not 
discernible from the language of R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) that a court is without 
jurisdiction to render a decision beyond the seven days.  We cannot and should not 
read into this section of the statute language that is not there.  The seven-day 
provision obviously was intended to encourage the expeditious handling of these 
cases.  Certainly it was not intended to divest a court of jurisdiction if a decision 
 
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was rendered on the eighth day or beyond.  Judges should be encouraged to render 
decisions within seven days, but with the congestion of most court dockets, that is 
not always possible. 
 
As a general rule, therefore, provisions dealing with the timing of a judicial 
act should be treated as directory.  Farrar, supra, 146 Ohio St. 467, 32 O.O. 542, 
66 N.E.2d 531.  Such provisions are generally meant to secure the prompt 
resolution of the public business, not to create a jurisdictional bar that intolerably 
delays the resolution of that business.  Id.; James, supra, 67 Ohio St. at 44, 65 
N.E. at 158. 
 
I concur in the holding of the syllabus that the seven-day time limit set forth 
in R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) is directory and in the judgment. 
 
DOUGLAS, J., concurs in the foregoing concurring opinion. 
__________________ 
 
MOYER, C.J., dissenting.  I respectfully dissent and would reverse the 
judgment of the court of appeals.  R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) requires a juvenile court, 
responding to an agency request for permanent custody, to enter judgment within 
seven days after a dispositional hearing is conducted pursuant to R.C. 2151.35(B).  
Failure to adhere to this time limit divests the court of its authority to rule on the 
pending motion. 
 
The relevant portion of the statute provides: 
 
“After the conclusion of the dispositional hearing, the court shall enter an 
appropriate judgment within seven days * * *.”  R.C. 2151.35(B)(3). 
 
It is a well-established rule that, “[i]n statutory construction, the word ‘may’ 
shall be construed as permissive and the word ‘shall’ shall be construed as 
mandatory unless there appears a clear and unequivocal legislative intent that they 
receive a construction other than their ordinary usage.”  (Emphasis added.)  
 
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Dorrian v. Scioto Conservancy Dist. (1971), 27 Ohio St.2d 102, 56 O.O.2d 58, 
271 N.E.2d 834, paragraph one of the syllabus.  “Although it is true that in some 
instances  * * * ‘shall’ must be construed to mean ‘may,’ ” Dennison v. Dennison 
(1956), 165 Ohio St. 146, 149, 59 O.O. 210, 211, 134 N.E.2d 574, 576, “the 
intention of the General Assembly that [‘shall’] shall be so construed must clearly 
appear  * * * from a general view of the statute under consideration  * * *, as 
where the manifest sense and intent of the statute require [such construction].”  
(Citations omitted.)  Dorrian, 27 Ohio St.2d at 108, 56 O.O.2d at 61, 271 N.E.2d 
at 838. 
 
The command of R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) is that the court shall enter an 
appropriate judgment within seven days after the conclusion of the dispositional 
hearing.  The plain words of the statute are not qualified by a “clear and 
unequivocal legislative intent” that the word “shall” is anything other than a 
mandatory requirement of the statute.  Indeed, an examination of the entire statute 
leads only to the conclusion that a mandatory construction is intended. 
 
The word “shall” appears seven times within the text of R.C. 2151.35(B)(3), 
while the word “may” appears once.  Frequent repetition of “shall” in the statute 
supports the conclusion that the General Assembly intended a mandatory 
construction.  See Dorrian, supra, at 107, 56 O.O.2d at 60-61, 271 N.E.2d at 837; 
Cleveland Ry. Co. v. Brescia (1919), 100 Ohio St. 267, 270, 126 N.E. 51, 52.  
Furthermore, the use of both “shall” and “may” in the same section “clearly 
reflect[s] a legislative intent that the two words be given their usual statutory 
construction.”  Dorrian, 27 Ohio St.2d at 108, 56 O.O.2d at 61, 271 N.E.2d at 838.  
I agree with the court of appeals in In re Fleming, which noted that nothing in the 
statute “supports the conclusion that the legislature intended the seven-day 
requirement of R.C. 2151.35(B)(3) to be merely directory despite the use of the 
 
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word ‘shall.’ ”  In re Fleming (1991), 76 Ohio App.3d 30, 39, 600 N.E.2d 1112, 
1118. 
 
I am not unmindful that this application of the statute may raise an 
appropriate concern, as these are often cases where a child’s welfare may be in 
danger.  However, R.C. 2151.35(B)(1), which sets the time limits within which the 
dispositional hearing must be conducted, states that “[i]f the dispositional hearing 
is not held within the period of time required  * * *,” the court is required, upon its 
own motion or the motion of any party or guardian ad litem, to “dismiss the 
complaint without prejudice.”  Dismissal without prejudice allows a party to 
resubmit its complaint.  The General Assembly found it appropriate to provide for 
a dismissal without prejudice in order to balance the parents’ rights and interests 
with the child’s interests. 
 
In providing for a timely hearing in the trial court, the General Assembly 
has recognized that a delay between the hearing and the judgment may prejudice 
the parties, yet by providing for dismissal without prejudice, it has reaffirmed that 
a well-founded complaint should have the opportunity to be judged on its merits.  
Surely, the same rationale is applicable to the mandatory requirements of R.C. 
2151.35(B)(3), especially in view of the basic tenet that “disposition of cases on 
their merits is favored in the law.”  Jones v. Hartranft (1997), 78 Ohio St.3d 368, 
371, 678 N.E.2d 530, 534. 
 
I am also mindful of the observation that the seven-day period from hearing 
to disposition by the trial court is a very short time in which the trial court must 
issue its dispositional order.  However, in the absence of a due process or other 
constitutional infirmity in the statute, it is not for this court to determine that such 
a statement of the law is ill-advised.  Rather, it is apparent that the General 
Assembly responded to a problem, not uncommon in some courts with jurisdiction 
 
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over the placement of children, in which children are left in legal limbo for months 
and indeed sometimes years.  It is not the province of this court to, in effect, tell 
the General Assembly that we do not agree with its attempt to remedy this problem 
in the judicial process by interpreting the words of a statute in a manner clearly not 
intended by the General Assembly. 
 
For the foregoing reasons, I respectfully dissent from the majority holding 
and would reverse the judgment of the court of appeals. 
 
PFEIFER, J., concurs in the foregoing dissenting opinion.