IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF TENNESSEE

AT KNOXVILLE

May 14, 2024 Session

JAMES V. HOLLEMAN v. BARBARA J. HOLLEMAN

Appeal from the Chancery Court for Knox County

No. 163466-1 Clarence E. Pridemore, Jr., Chancellor

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No. E2022-01396-COA-R3-CV

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After many years of contentious post-divorce litigation, the trial court ordered the court 

clerk’s office to distribute property-sale proceeds to the parties. The trial court also ordered 

that the wife’s portion of the sale proceeds be taxed in an amount sufficient to satisfy a 

previous sanctions award against the wife and an award of attorney’s fees to the husband. 

The wife appeals to this Court. Discerning no error, we affirm. 

Tenn. R. App. P. 3 Appeal as of Right; Judgment of the Chancery Court Affirmed; 

Case Remanded

KRISTI M. DAVIS, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which D. MICHAEL SWINEY,

C.J., and ANDY D. BENNETT, J., joined.

Barbara J. Holleman, Knoxville, Tennessee, Pro Se appellant. 

William A. Mynatt, Jr. and Robyn J. Askew, Knoxville, Tennessee, for the appellee, James 

V. Holleman.

OPINION

BACKGROUND 

This is a post-divorce dispute arising from the sale of the parties’ real property on 

March 18, 2022. It is the parties’ third time before this Court. Barbara Holleman (“Wife”) 

and James Holleman (“Husband”) divorced in 2006 and entered into a marital dissolution 

agreement (“MDA”) providing that the parties’ real property (“the Monterey Road 

property”) in Loudon County would be placed on the market for sale. The parties, however, 

had difficulty effectuating the sale. Eventually, Wife filed a petition for contempt arising 

out of Husband’s handling of the sale. She also alleged that Husband failed to disclose all 

of his assets prior to the parties executing the MDA. In her petition,

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Wife also alleged that Husband had been unjustly enriched by his rental of 

the property and that Husband was guilty of misrepresentation and fraudulent 

concealment. Wife sought an award of compensatory and punitive damages, 

as well as attorney’s fees, but she did not ask that the MDA be held invalid. 

Husband filed an answer, stating that he had inadvertently failed to disclose 

his interest in two business entities at the time of execution of the MDA. 

Husband also admitted that he had rented the Monterey [Road p]roperty, but 

he averred that the expenses related to the property exceeded the rental 

income. The trial court conducted a hearing concerning Wife’s petition over 

four non-consecutive days in August, September, and November 2011.

Holleman v. Holleman, No. E2018-00451-COA-R3-CV, 2019 WL 2308066, at *1 (Tenn. 

Ct. App. May 30, 2019) (hereinafter, “Holleman I”). The trial court entered an order on 

January 31, 2012, concluding that Wife’s claims regarding the MDA were either without 

merit or untimely. Id. at *2. Regarding the Monterey Road property, 

the trial court found that the parties owned this property as tenants in 

common following entry of the divorce judgment. The court discussed the 

MDA’s provision concerning the Monterey [Road p]roperty, which stated 

that the property “shall be placed on the market and sold as soon as possible” 

and “shall be listed with a realtor.” The MDA provided that until the 

Monterey [Road p]roperty was sold, Husband would be responsible for 

paying all debt and expenses associated with the property. The court 

ultimately concluded that Wife was entitled to a judgment in the amount of 

$7,500 for her share of the rents collected from November 2007 to April 

2010. All other claims were dismissed.

Id. (footnote omitted). The order in which the trial court awarded Wife $7,500 for her 

share of the rents was entered on March 8, 2012. The parties then engaged in more 

protracted litigation surrounding the Monterey Road property sale. Wife attempted several 

times to have the original trial court judge, Chancellor John Weaver, recused. In August 

of 2016, Chancellor Weaver recused himself, explaining that Wife’s claims of bias lacked 

merit but that “the Court’s recusal may serve to facilitate the reaching of the merits on any 

issues that may come before the Court.” Id. at *5. The case was then assigned to 

Chancellor Clarence Pridemore. After Chancellor Pridemore took over the case, however, 

Wife filed several motions for his recusal. Finally, after several more filings by Wife, the 

trial court entered an order on August 18, 2017, denying Wife’s remaining motions for 

recusal, ordering the clerk and master to select a realtor to list and sell the Monterey Road 

property, and assessing Rule 11 sanctions against Wife in the amount of $20,006.50. The 

trial court ordered the sanctions award be taken from Wife’s share of the Monterey Road 

property-sale proceeds. Wife appealed to this Court, resulting in Holleman I. This Court 

affirmed the trial court’s ruling, concluding, inter alia, that Wife failed to timely appeal 

“the trial court’s previous orders enforcing the terms of the parties’ MDA[.]” Id. at *1. 
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We also awarded Husband his attorney’s fees incurred on appeal pursuant to the MDA. 

We remanded the case to the trial court for a determination on an amount of reasonable 

attorney’s fees for Husband. 

On remand, Husband filed a motion requesting a hearing on his reasonable 

attorney’s fees, which the trial court set for October 15, 2019. Holleman v. Holleman, No. 

E2019-02163-COA-R3-CV, 2020 WL 3481697, at *1 (Tenn. Ct. App. June 25, 2020) 

(hereinafter, “Holleman II”). Wife filed several motions in response. However, we noted

in Holleman II that the relief sought in those filings was “from proceedings and orders that 

were previously reviewed and adjudicated in Holleman I.” Id. Wife did not appear at the 

hearing on Husband’s attorney’s fees, and the trial court entered an order awarding 

Husband his fees. Wife appealed to this Court again, resulting in Holleman II. While Wife 

raised a host of issues, this Court determined that “most of the questions raised appear to 

be an attempt to reargue issues that were fully adjudicated in Holleman I, or in subsequent 

orders filed by this Court.” Id. at *2. Citing the law of the case doctrine, this Court 

narrowed the issues on appeal in Holleman II to 1) whether the trial court violated Wife’s 

due process rights; and 2) whether the trial court erred in awarding Husband $11,260.00 in 

attorney’s fees and expenses. Id. at *3. This Court affirmed the trial court’s ruling in 

Holleman II. 

The Monterey Road property sold on March 18, 2022, and the proceeds were 

deposited with the trial court clerk’s office. On May 26, 2022, Husband filed a motion to 

distribute his portion of funds. Husband also requested $32,516.50 from Wife’s portion to 

account for the Rule 11 sanctions and his awarded attorney’s fees and expenses. It is from 

these proceedings that the present appeal arises. Wife answered Husband’s motion, 

arguing that the trial court lacked jurisdiction and that the March 8, 2012 order concluded 

this case. Wife urged that any orders or judgments entered after that point are invalid. 

Wife also filed a motion for recusal based on “incompetence and bias.” The allegations 

therein are primarily based on events that occurred prior to this Court’s opinions in both 

Holleman I and Holleman II. 

The trial court held a hearing on Husband’s motion for disbursement on July 13, 

2022, at which it denied Wife’s latest motion for recusal and heard testimony from the 

clerk and master. The trial court entered an order on September 7, 2022, granting each 

party one-half of the funds held by the clerk and taxing from Wife’s half the fees, expenses, 

and sanctions owed to Husband. The trial court denied Wife’s remaining motions, 

determining that Wife raised no issues that were not addressed in Holleman I or Holleman 

II. Wife timely appealed to this Court. 

ISSUES 

Wife raises the following issues on appeal which we take verbatim from her 

appellate brief: 
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I. Whether this Court is in agreement with Appellant and grants her 

“Motion...”, filed on March 21, 2024, and remands the case to the lower court for a Motion 

to be filed, requesting the entry of a Judgment Nunc Pro Tunc effective March 8, 2012, 

since the Court failed to follow the filing procedures for a Rule 58 Judgment after the Judge 

signed it on March 8, 2012 and then allows the Record on Appeal to be supplemented with 

the Judgment Nunc Pro Tunc effective March 8, 2012 and to allow Appellant to File an 

Amended Brief once the record has been supplemented with the newly entered Judgment 

Nunc Pro Tunc effective March 8, 2012.

II. Whether this Court believes that exhibits A-M, as provided in Appellant’s 

“Motion...”, filed on March 21, 2014, warrant the entry of a Judgment Nunc Pro Tunc 

effective March 8, 2012, as the remedy for the Court’s failure to adhere to the filing 

instructions for a Rule 58” Judgment after the Judge signed it on March 8, 2012 - as allowed

in Blackburn v Blackburn, 270 SW 3d 42 (Tenn. 2008). 

III. Whether the Law of the Case Doctrine was established by an error of law on 

the first appeal (and followed on the second appeal) after reviewing Appellant’s 

“Motion..”, filed on March 21, 2024, because the case is still pending the entry of a valid 

Judgment in the trial court since the court failed to follow filing procedures for the entry 

of a Rule 58 Judgment after the Judge signed it on March 8, 2012.

IV. Whether the trial court’s errors and misrepresentation of the case on the first 

appeal, as brought forth in Appellant’s “Motion ...”, filed on March 21, 2024, resulted in 

the Law of the Case Doctrine being established this Court by an error of law.

V. Whether the Law of the Case Doctrine was established by an error of law on 

an issue that wasn’t raised by Appellant [ ] decided on the implication that the Judgment 

entered on March 8, 2012, was made ineffective by valid means, when the Index of the 

Technical Record on the first appeal and the Knox County Rule Docket do not match, and 

a document was improperly inserted into the file of the case and the technical record on 

appeal but not recorded on the Rule Docket or Index of the Technical Record, as presented 

on Appellant’s “Motion...”, filed on March 21, 2024.

DISCUSSION 

At the outset, we note that Wife proceeds as a pro se litigant. Nonetheless, she 

“must comply with the same standards to which lawyers must adhere.” Watson v. City of 

Jackson, 448 S.W.3d 919, 926 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2014). As we have previously explained: 

Parties who decide to represent themselves are entitled to fair and equal 

treatment by the courts. The courts should take into account that many pro se 

litigants have no legal training and little familiarity with the judicial system. 

However, the courts must also be mindful of the boundary between fairness 
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to a pro se litigant and unfairness to the pro se litigant’s adversary. Thus, the 

courts must not excuse pro se litigants from complying with the same 

substantive and procedural rules that represented parties are expected to 

observe. 

Id. at 926–27 (quoting Jackson v. Lanphere, No. M2010-01401-COA-R3-CV, 2011 WL

3566978, at *3 (Tenn. Ct. App. Aug. 12, 2011)).

Even against this backdrop, the issues Wife attempts to raise on appeal are difficult 

to decipher and appear largely related to an order the trial court entered on March 8, 2012. 

As addressed in Holleman I, the March 8, 2012 order resulted from Wife’s contempt 

petition; upon the hearing of that petition, the trial court ultimately awarded Wife $7,500 

in rents from November of 2007 through April of 2010. All other claims were dismissed 

with prejudice. Importantly, we noted in Holleman I that “[n]o appeal was filed concerning 

this judgment.” 2019 WL 2308066, at *3. 

As best we can discern, Wife takes issue with the manner in which the March 8, 

2012 order is labeled in the technical record. She notes in her brief that the trial “court 

clerks didn’t adhere to the procedures for filing a Rule 58 Judgment after the Judge signed 

it on March 8, 2012 (TCA 20-9-506) and recorded it on the Rule docket as a ‘FINAL 

ORDER.’” Wife spends the majority of her argument opining that the order entered March 

8, 2012 was not valid because it was not entered in accordance with Tennessee Rule of 

Civil Procedure 58.1 She states that in 2021, she discovered that the March 8, 2012 order 

was “recorded as a ‘Final Order’ on the Rule Docket and that the Memorandum Opinion 

 

1 Rule 58 deals with entry of judgment and provides: 

Unless otherwise expressly provided by another rule, entry of a judgment or an order of 

final disposition or any other order of the court is effective when a judgment or order

containing one of the following is marked on the face by the clerk as filed for entry:

(1) the signatures of the judge and all parties or counsel, or

(2) the signatures of the judge and one party or counsel with a certificate of counsel that a 

copy of the proposed order has been served on all other parties or counsel, or

(3) the signature of the judge and a certificate of the clerk that a copy has been served on 

all other parties or counsel.

Following entry of judgment the clerk shall make appropriate docket notations and shall 

copy the judgment on the minutes, but failure to do so will not affect validity of the entry 

of judgment. When requested by counsel or pro se parties, the clerk shall forthwith mail or 

deliver a copy of the entered judgment to all parties or counsel. If the clerk fails to forthwith 

mail or deliver, a party prejudiced by that failure may seek relief under Rule 60.

Tenn. R. Civ. P. 58. 
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had been omitted from the record.” According to Wife, the March 8, 2012 order was 

“falsely recorded as a ‘Final Order.’” She appears to argue that because of this purported 

error, the 2022 property sale was “illegal and property ownership is fraudulent.” According 

to Wife, the error regarding the March 8, 2012 order means that the original claims are still 

pending in the trial court, and a valid judgment for purposes of appeal has not been entered. 

Wife asks that an order be entered nunc pro tunc to March 8, 2012, so that she can support 

her argument and “file a Motion to Supplement the Record upon its entry.” Wife also 

appears to claim that the law of the case doctrine cannot apply under these circumstances, 

again due to the March 8, 2012 order’s purported mislabeling.

Wife is not entitled to relief. There is no meaningful difference in referring to the 

trial court’s March 8, 2012 order as a “judgment” or a “final order.” To the extent that 

Wife is arguing that an error occurred because the order is referred to as a “final order” in 

the record, as opposed to a “judgment,” this is inapposite because Tennessee law does not 

distinguish between final orders and judgments. See, e.g., State ex rel. Jones v. Looper, 86 

S.W.3d 189, 194 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2000) (“A judgment by default is a final order disposing 

of a case on its merits, like any other judgment.”); see also Utopia Place, LLC v. E. 

Properties, Inc.-Bellevue, No. M2014-02196-COA-R3-CV, 2016 WL 4005927, at *4 

(Tenn. Ct. App. July 20, 2016) (“Finality may be achieved through a series of orders. As 

we have noted previously, an order or judgment is final when it disposes ‘of all pending

claims.’” (quoting Edwards v. Banco Lumber Co., Inc., 101 S.W.3d 69, 75 (Tenn. Ct. App. 

2002))). More importantly, however, Wife did not appeal the order with which she now 

takes issue, and that order became final in 2012. Holleman I, 2019 WL 2308066, at *1. 

Wife states in her brief that she “is objecting to the disbursement of the proceeds 

from the sale of real property on March 18, 2022, as ordered on September 7, 2022” and 

argues that the purported 2012 error somehow taints the 2022 Monterey Road property 

sale. This assertion also lacks merit; again, the March 8, 2012 order was never appealed. 

Further, the parties sold the Monterey Road property pursuant to an MDA that this Court 

has previously found valid and enforceable. See id. Consequently, the essence of Wife’s 

argument goes to an issue that has already been squarely decided by this Court. Wife’s

claims regarding the purported errors with the 2012 order do not change the fact that this 

Court has already ruled that the parties’ MDA is valid and enforceable, and the Monterey 

Road property must be sold pursuant to that MDA. And as we explained in Holleman II, 

pursuant to the law of the case doctrine, Wife cannot continue to relitigate issues that this 

Court has already adjudicated. See Holleman II, 2020 WL 3481697, at *2–3 (“It is well 

settled that ‘when an initial appeal results in a remand to the trial court, the decision of the 

appellate court establishes the law of the case which generally must be followed upon 

remand by the trial court, and by an appellate court if a second appeal is taken from the 

judgment of the trial court entered after remand.’” (quoting Memphis Publ’g Co. v. Tenn.

Petroleum Underground Storage Tank Bd., 975 S.W.2d 303, 306 (Tenn. 1998))). The 

same principles apply here, and Wife cannot achieve an end-run around the law of the case 

doctrine by attacking the long-final March 8, 2012 order. Again, the order was never 
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appealed, and there is no error arising from the fact that the order is referenced in the record 

as both a “judgment” and a “final order.” The parties’ MDA is valid and enforceable, and 

thus there is no issue with the trial court disbursing to the parties the funds from the sale of 

the Monterey Road property. 

Accordingly, we affirm the trial court’s September 7, 2022 ruling disbursing the 

Monterey Road property-sale proceeds to the parties. 

CONCLUSION 

The ruling of the Chancery Court for Knox County is affirmed. Costs on appeal are 

taxed to the appellant, Barbara J. Holleman, for which execution may issues if necessary. 

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KRISTI M. DAVIS, JUDGE