Title: Ex Parte ACK Radio Supply Company of Georgia

State: alabama

Issuer: Alabama Supreme Court

Document:

219 So. 2d 880 (1969)
Ex parte ACK RADIO SUPPLY COMPANY OF GEORGIA.
6 Div. 575.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
February 13, 1969.
*881 Jas. L. Shores, Jr., of Johnston & Shores, Birmingham, for petitioner.
Corretti, Newsom & Rogers, Birmingham, for respondent.
MERRILL, Justice.
Petitioner, ACK Radio Supply Company of Georgia, filed an original petition for writ of prohibition in this court, seeking to prohibit Honorable William C. Barber, Circuit Judge, from proceeding further in the cause of Tingley v. Satellite Broadcasting Company on the ground that the circuit court had lost jurisdiction.
On February 9, 1965, one Glenn V. Tingley filed a bill of complaint against Satellite Broadcasting Company, seeking to enjoin the Broadcasting Company from cutting off Tingley's radio broadcasts over its radio station. A temporary injunction was issued by Judge Barber and, on May 18, 1965, he denied motions to discharge and to dissolve the temporary injunction, and overruled demurrers of the Broadcasting Company. On June 1, a decree was entered extending the time for the filing of an answer.
No further proceedings appear of record until March 7, 1966, when Judge Barber erroneously and inadvertently signed a decree *882 of dismissal for want of prosecution, which reads:
The rendering of this decree was not known to counsel for Tingley or the Broadcasting Company. They had been trying to negotiate a settlement and had kept Judge Barber advised and, on April 19, 1966, Judge Barber made the following order:
On December 21, 1967, the Broadcasting Company filed an answer and cross-bill to Tingley's bill, a cross-complaint against petitioner, and requesting that petitioner be brought into the case. The theory on which petitioner, ACK, was made a party was that the Broadcasting Company had purchased the radio station from ACK and the contract for sale contained a warranty clause setting forth all obligations to be assumed by the Broadcasting Company, and specifically stating there were no liabilities other than those listed. Therefore, if the court should decree that the Broadcasting Company must broadcast Tingley's programs without charge for air time, then ACK should respond to the Broadcasting Company in damages in an amount equal to the value of the air time used by Tingley.
On January 16, 1968, Judge Barber entered the following order:
Petitioner was served with the cross-complaint on January 22, 1968, and the then counsel for petitioner, not the same as *883 counsel in this proceeding, filed a demurrer to the cross-complaint on February 21, 1968, which did not raise the point of jurisdiction of the court, but does raise other matters.
Petitioner argues that the trial court lost jurisdiction of the cause thirty days after March 7, 1966, the date of the order of dismissal under Tit. 13, § 119, Code 1940, which provides, in pertinent part:
Prior to the original enactment in 1915 of what is now Tit. 13, § 119, the judgments of the courts were in the breast of the judge until the final adjournment of the term, and might be set aside or modified during the term. Tit. 13, § 119, now limits the court to thirty days from final judgment.
It will be noted that § 119 provides that "the court shall lose all power over it, as completely as if the end of the term had been on that day." Term time now means thirty days after rendition of judgment. Sisson v. Leonard, 243 Ala. 546, 11 So. 2d 144. When the "term" was the time limit, this court, said, in Kidd v. McMillan, 21 Ala. s25:
In Ex parte Alabama Fuel & Iron Co., 193 Ala. 496, 69 So. 115, this court, after quoting part of the above from 21 Ala. 325, said:
Every court must have authority to correct its own entries, so as to make *884 them speak the truth, even after adjournment of court, on sufficient evidence. The source of this inherent power is justice, and therefore the courts must have some discretion in altering their records after the time when they are said to import absolute verity. Gorum v. Samuel, 274 Ala. 690, 151 So. 2d 393, and cases there cited.
To summarize, prior to the 1915 statute, now Tit. 13, § 119, the trial judge could change his mind about the result of a case anytime within the term. Under the statute, that time was limited to thirty days from final judgment. But that statute does not conflict with the court's inherent power to correct its own entries so as to make them speak the truth.
In the instant case, counsel for Tingley and counsel for the Broadcasting Company have filed affidavits that they were negotiating before and after March 7, 1966, the date of the dismissal order, and that when they jointly asked Judge Barber to enter the order of April 19, neither they nor Judge Barber were aware that the decree of dismissal of March 7 had been entered, and at no time had either side taken any position other than that the cause was still pending.
We quote from the affidavit filed by Judge Barber:
At the time Judge Barber rendered the decree setting aside the dismissal decree of March 7, 1966, the only two parties in the cause were Tingley and the Broadcasting Company. The cross-complaint to bring ACK, the petitioner, in as a party had been filed but had not been served. Thus, all the parties and the trial judge consented to the setting aside of the decree and there was no objection as there was in the case of Ex parte Alabama Fuel & Iron Co., 193 Ala. 496, 69 So. 115.
Authorities from other jurisdictions on this subject are listed in an annotation in 3 A.L.R.3d 1194, § 3, including Roin v. Checker Taxi Co., 36 Ill.App.2d 447, 184 N.E.2d 736, and Berry v. Chitwood, Mo., 362 S.W.2d 515, 3 A.L.R.3d 1185.
While we do not make the point of waiver of jurisdiction a primary reason for our holding in this case, we note the rule that the filing of a demurrer which was not based solely on the matter of jurisdiction of the person constitutes a general appearance; and a plea to the jurisdiction should be filed before a general appearance or there is a tacit admission that the court has a right to judge. W. S. Fowler Rental Equipment Co. v. Skipper, 276 Ala. 593, 165 So. 2d 375, and cases there cited.
We come now to the question of whether the court could amend nunc pro tunc. Equity Rule 63 provides:
Title 7, §§ 566 and 567, provide for amendment of decrees and judgments nunc pro tunc "when there is sufficient matter apparent on the record or entries of the court to amend by."
We have held that § 567 authorizes the amendment of a final judgment nunc pro tunc to correct a clerical error of the judge as well as that of the clerk of the court. Tombrello Coal Co. v. Fortenberry, 248 Ala. 640, 29 So. 2d 125. And in Capps v. Norden, 261 Ala. 676, 75 So. 2d 915, we said that clerical errors under § 567 and Equity Rule 63 are not those alone which the clerk makes, but they include all such errors, being matters of record, whether committed by the court or counsel, to which the judicial sanction and discretion cannot be said reasonably to have been applied. Such right exists only "when there is sufficient matter apparent on the record or entries of the court to amend by."
Here, the record showed contradictory orders in the same cause. The trial judge knew that he had not intended to dismiss this case for want of prosecution because it was being prosecuted and he was conferring with counsel for both sides about it. The register erroneously prepared the decree of dismissal and the judge erroneously signed it. We hold that these errors, not known to counsel until much later, were errors of record to which judicial sanction and discretion cannot be said reasonably to have been applied; that the trial court had inherent power to make the record speak the truth; and that it did not err in setting aside the decree of dismissal, all parties consenting and requesting such action.
Writ denied.
LIVINGSTON, C. J., and LAWSON and HARWOOD, JJ., concur.