Title: State ex rel. Maron v. Corrigan

State: ohio

Issuer: Ohio Supreme Court

Document:

[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as State 
ex rel. Maron v. Corrigan, Slip Opinion No. 2023-Ohio-2556.] 
 
 
 
 
NOTICE 
This slip opinion is subject to formal revision before it is published in an 
advance sheet of the Ohio Official Reports.  Readers are requested to 
promptly notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of Ohio, 65 
South Front Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215, of any typographical or other 
formal errors in the opinion, in order that corrections may be made before 
the opinion is published. 
 
 
SLIP OPINION NO. 2023-OHIO-2556 
THE STATE EX REL. MARON, APPELLANT, v. CORRIGAN, JUDGE, APPELLEE. 
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it 
may be cited as State ex rel. Maron v. Corrigan, Slip Opinion No.  
2023-Ohio-2556.] 
Prohibition—Appellant failed to show that judge lacks jurisdiction under 
jurisdictional-priority rule to proceed in civil case filed against her—Court 
of appeals’ denial of writ affirmed. 
(No. 2022-1495—Submitted May 16, 2023—Decided July 27, 2023.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Cuyahoga County, 
No. 112130, 2022-Ohio-4406. 
__________________ 
Per Curiam. 
{¶ 1} Appellant, Jessica Maron, appeals the judgment of the Eighth District 
Court of Appeals denying her petition for a writ of prohibition.  She argues that under 
the jurisdictional-priority rule, appellee, Judge Peter J. Corrigan, lacks jurisdiction to 
proceed in a civil case filed against her because the case involves property that may 
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be subject to equitable division in a pending divorce case.  We affirm the court of 
appeals’ judgment. 
Background 
{¶ 2} Jessica and her husband, Ari Maron, are parties to a divorce case 
pending in the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas, Domestic Relations 
Division.  Ari filed the divorce case in September 2020. 
{¶ 3} In September 2022, United Twenty-Fifth Building, L.L.C., sued Jessica 
in the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas, General Division.  United Twenty-
Fifth alleges that Jessica is interfering with an easement involving a multistory 
building in Cleveland consisting of five parcels.  United Twenty-Fifth owns two of 
the parcels (the first and second floors), and Jessica and Ari own the other three 
parcels (a third-floor residence; the elevator, lobby, and stairwell; and a parking 
area).  The parcels are all subject to a declaration of easement granting the owners 
of each parcel certain rights of access to the other parcels.  Ari and his brother each 
have a 50 percent ownership interest in United Twenty-Fifth.  Jessica alleges that 
she has an equitable interest in Ari’s half of the company. 
{¶ 4} Jessica and her minor children reside on the third floor of the building.  
She alleges that Ari, through United Twenty-Fifth, has engaged contractors to work 
in the building and that the workers have entered her residence.  In October 2022, 
the domestic-relations court issued an ex parte domestic-violence civil protection 
order enjoining Ari from entering Jessica’s residence or interfering with her use of 
it.  Also in October 2022, Jessica filed a motion in the divorce case asking the 
domestic-relations court to issue a temporary restraining order enjoining Ari from 
interfering with her use of the residence.  She later filed a motion asking the 
domestic-relations court to add United Twenty-Fifth as a party defendant in the 
divorce case. 
{¶ 5} In its lawsuit against Jessica, United Twenty-Fifth alleges that Jessica 
is violating the easement by preventing access to the building’s elevator, lobby, and 
January Term, 2023 
 
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stairwell.  United Twenty-Fifth further alleges that Jessica’s actions are delaying 
the construction of a restaurant on the first floor of the building.  United Twenty-
Fifth seeks a declaratory judgment and a preliminary injunction and asserts claims 
alleging tortious interference with contract, breach of contract, and trespass.  Judge 
Corrigan, who is presiding over United Twenty-Fifth’s case, commenced a 
preliminary-injunction hearing in October 2022.  The hearing had not concluded by 
the time Jessica filed her petition for a writ of prohibition. 
{¶ 6} Jessica filed her prohibition petition in the court of appeals seeking to 
prevent Judge Corrigan from exercising jurisdiction in United Twenty-Fifth’s case.  
She argues that under the jurisdictional-priority rule, Judge Corrigan patently and 
unambiguously lacks jurisdiction to proceed, because the domestic-relations court 
is already exercising jurisdiction over the division of marital property in the divorce 
case. 
{¶ 7} The court of appeals denied the writ, and Jessica has appealed. 
Analysis 
{¶ 8} To be entitled to a writ of prohibition, Jessica must show that Judge 
Corrigan has exercised or is about to exercise judicial power, that the judge lacks 
authority to do so, and that denial of the writ will result in an injury for which no 
other adequate remedy exists in the ordinary course of the law.  State ex rel. Elder v. 
Camplese, 144 Ohio St.3d 89, 2015-Ohio-3628, 40 N.E.3d 1138, ¶ 13.  If Judge 
Corrigan patently and unambiguously lacks jurisdiction, Jessica need not establish 
that she lacks an adequate remedy in the ordinary course of the law.  Id. 
{¶ 9} There is no question that Judge Corrigan has exercised and will 
continue to exercise judicial power in United Twenty-Fifth’s case against Jessica.  
And Jessica’s only theory is that Judge Corrigan lacks jurisdiction under the 
jurisdictional-priority rule.  If the jurisdictional-priority rule applies, Judge Corrigan 
patently and unambiguously lacks jurisdiction.  State ex rel. Tri Eagle Fuels, L.L.C. 
v. Dawson, 157 Ohio St.3d 20, 2019-Ohio-2011, 131 N.E.3d 20, ¶ 9.  The 
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applicability of the rule, therefore, is the only issue we must decide.  Whether a court 
has jurisdiction over a matter is a legal question we review de novo.  State v. Hudson, 
169 Ohio St.3d 216, 2022-Ohio-1435, 203 N.E.3d 658, ¶ 19. 
{¶ 10} Jessica does not question Judge Corrigan’s general jurisdiction over 
the types of claims pending in United Twenty-Fifth’s case.  “When a court has the 
constitutional or statutory power to adjudicate a particular class or type of case, that 
court has subject-matter jurisdiction.”  Ostanek v. Ostanek, 166 Ohio St.3d 1, 2021-
Ohio-2319, 181 N.E.3d 1162, ¶ 36.  Instead, Jessica argues that Judge Corrigan 
patently and unambiguously lacks jurisdiction under the jurisdictional-priority rule, 
which provides that “[a]s between courts of concurrent jurisdiction, the tribunal 
whose power is first invoked by the institution of proper proceedings acquires 
jurisdiction, to the exclusion of all other tribunals, to adjudicate upon the whole 
issue and to settle the rights of the parties,” State ex rel. Phillips v. Polcar, 50 Ohio 
St.2d 279, 364 N.E.2d 33 (1977), syllabus. 
{¶ 11} “The jurisdictional-priority rule generally requires ‘the claims and 
parties [to] be the same in both cases, so “[i]f the second case is not for the same 
cause of action, nor between the same parties, the former suit will not prevent the 
latter.” ’ ”  (Brackets sic.)  State ex rel. Hasselbach v. Sandusky Cty. Bd. of 
Elections, 157 Ohio St.3d 433, 2019-Ohio-3751, 137 N.E.3d 1128, ¶ 9, quoting 
State ex rel. Dunlap v. Sarko, 135 Ohio St.3d 171, 2013-Ohio-67, 985 N.E.2d 450, 
¶ 10, quoting State ex rel. Judson v. Spahr, 33 Ohio St.3d 111, 113, 515 N.E.2d 911 
(1987).  Jessica does not argue that the divorce case and United Twenty-Fifth’s case 
involve identical claims, but she invokes an exception to that requirement of the 
rule, arguing that the two cases present the same “whole issue.”  We have said that 
“the jurisdictional-priority rule can apply even when the causes of action and relief 
requested are not exactly the same, as long as the actions present part of the same 
‘whole issue.’ ”  Dunlap at ¶ 11, quoting State ex rel. Otten v. Henderson, 129 Ohio 
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St.3d 453, 2011-Ohio-4082, 953 N.E.2d 809, ¶ 29, and State ex rel. Sellers v. 
Gerken, 72 Ohio St.3d 115, 117, 647 N.E.2d 807 (1995). 
{¶ 12} We have applied the whole-issue exception “only in the narrow 
circumstances in which the two cases raise the exact same legal claim or involve 
resolution of the same issue.”  Tri Eagle Fuels, 157 Ohio St.3d 20, 2019-Ohio-2011, 
131 N.E.3d 20, at ¶ 14.  In Tri Eagle Fuels, we declined to “expand” the exception 
simply because two actions involved the same property.  Id.  We held that a court had 
jurisdiction to proceed in a landlord’s forcible-entry-and-detainer action even though 
the tenant’s previously filed breach-of-lease action remained pending.  Id. at ¶ 4-5, 
15.  Similarly, in Hasselbach, we held that the whole-issue exception did not apply 
when two actions involved the same zoning ordinance but sought “different relief 
and involve[d] different theories, different causes of action, and a different 
defendant/respondent.”  Hasselbach at ¶ 10. 
{¶ 13} Jessica has not shown that the whole-issue exception applies here.  
She argues that the divorce case and United Twenty-Fifth’s case involve the same 
whole issue because, according to her, United Twenty-Fifth is seeking relief that 
would “directly interfer[e] with the Domestic Relations Court’s ability to issue a 
division of property.”  But she has failed to allege facts supporting that argument.  
The main issue in United Twenty-Fifth’s case is whether Jessica is in breach of an 
easement.  Jessica has not shown how Judge Corrigan’s adjudication of that issue 
will conflict with the domestic-relations court’s identification and division of 
marital property. 
{¶ 14} Jessica’s additional arguments are unpersuasive.  She argues that we 
should prohibit Judge Corrigan from exercising jurisdiction over United Twenty-
Fifth’s case because if the domestic-relations court were to award Ari’s interest in 
United Twenty-Fifth to Jessica, the underlying dispute over the easement would 
become moot.  This argument is not just speculative; it also fails to establish any 
real connection between the issues in the two cases.  The division of marital 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
 
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property Jessica seeks—awarding Ari’s interest in United Twenty-Fifth to 
Jessica—would not resolve the legal issues presented in United Twenty-Fifth’s 
case. 
{¶ 15} Jessica also argues that her property rights, “including the right to 
exclude others from her property,” are pending in both the divorce case and United 
Twenty-Fifth’s case.  Although Jessica does not elaborate on this argument, she is 
presumably referring to the motion she filed in the domestic-relations court seeking 
a temporary restraining order preventing Ari “from interfering, restricting, and/or 
breaching [her] use and enjoyment of the marital residence.”  Jessica filed that 
motion in October 2022—more than two weeks after United Twenty-Fifth filed its 
complaint against her.  Thus, claims about United Twenty-Fifth’s right to access 
the marital residence (and conversely, Jessica’s right to exclude access) were first 
raised in United Twenty-Fifth’s case, not in the divorce case.  Jessica has not shown 
that the jurisdictional-priority rule applies under these circumstances. 
Conclusion 
{¶ 16} For the above reasons, we affirm the judgment of the Eighth District 
Court of Appeals. 
Judgment affirmed. 
KENNEDY, C.J., and FISCHER, DEWINE, DONNELLY, STEWART, BRUNNER, 
and DETERS, JJ., concur. 
_________________ 
Stafford Law Co., L.P.A., Joseph G. Stafford, Nicole A. Cruz, and Kelley 
R. Tauring, for appellant. 
Michael C. O’Malley, Cuyahoga County Prosecuting Attorney, and 
Matthew T. Fitzsimmons IV, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for appellee. 
_________________