[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as Reid 

v. Cleveland Police Dept., Slip Opinion No. 2017-Ohio-7527.] 

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. 2017-OHIO-7527

REID, APPELLEE, v. CLEVELAND POLICE DEPARTMENT ET AL., APPELLANTS. 

[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it 

may be cited as Reid v. Cleveland Police Dept., Slip Opinion No. 

2017-Ohio-7527.] 

Law-of-the-case doctrine applies only to rulings in the same case. 

(No. 2016-1122—Submitted June 20, 2017—Decided September 12, 2017.) 

APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Cuyahoga County, 

No. 103781, 2016-Ohio-3466. 

_____________________ 

O’CONNOR, C.J.

{¶ 1} In this appeal, we address whether the law-of-the-case doctrine 

requires a court to follow a superior court’s decision in a prior appeal involving one 

of the parties but in the context of a different case. We hold that it does not. The 

law-of-the-case doctrine applies only to rulings in the same case. Accordingly, we 

reverse the judgment of the Eighth District Court of Appeals. 

 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO

2

RELEVANT BACKGROUND 

{¶ 2} Appellee, Tobias Reid, pled guilty to petty theft in the Cuyahoga 

County Common Pleas Court pursuant to a negotiated plea agreement. The plea 

agreement included the provision that Reid’s motor vehicle, which had been seized 

when he was arrested for stealing from a construction site, would be returned to 

him. 

{¶ 3} The trial court accepted Reid’s plea and ordered the Cleveland police 

department (which was not a party in that case) to return Reid’s vehicle. But the 

department had already disposed of the automobile. 

{¶ 4} Reid moved to vacate his sentence because the police department had 

failed to return the vehicle. The trial court denied the motion. Reid appealed his 

criminal conviction to the Eighth District Court of Appeals. The appellate court 

recognized that “the trial court ordered in the journal entry that the vehicle be 

returned to Reid.” State v. Reid, 8th Dist. Cuyahoga No. 102536, 2015-Ohio-4185, 

¶ 11. But it held that vacating his sentence was not the remedy: 

If the police department did in fact scrap the vehicle without order 

of the court, the department violated R.C. 2981.11, which governs 

the safekeeping of property in custody of the police. However, this 

would not have voided Reid’s plea, but would have entitled him to 

compensation for the value of the vehicle, that is, assuming he could 

prove ownership of [it]. See Kimmie v. Ohio Dept. of Rehab. & 

Corr., Ct. of Cl. No. 2005-03849-AD, 2005-Ohio-4612, ¶ 6, citing 

Berg v. Belmont Corr. Inst., Ct. of Cl. No. 97-09261-AD (1998) (a 

plaintiff “may recover the value of confiscated property destroyed 

by agents of defendant when those agents acted without authority or 

right to carry out the property destruction”). 
January Term, 2017 

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Reid at ¶ 11. 

{¶ 5} The Eighth District affirmed the conviction. 2015-Ohio-4185, ¶ 15. 

{¶ 6} Reid thereafter filed the underlying civil suit against the police 

department and two police officers seeking $1,000,000 in compensatory damages 

related to the disposal of his vehicle. The police department and the officers moved 

for summary judgment, claiming, among other things, statutory immunity. The 

trial court granted summary judgment without a written opinion, and Reid appealed 

to the Eighth District, which reversed the trial court’s judgment. 

{¶ 7} The appellate court held that even though sovereign immunity 

generally bars claims against a police department for the wrongful disposition of 

vehicles, summary judgment was improper in this case because the law-of-the-case 

doctrine applied. According to the Eighth District, the judge in the civil case was 

bound by the ruling of the appellate court in Reid’s criminal case. Thus, it held, 

summary judgment was improper because the appellate court in the criminal case 

stated that Reid was entitled to compensation and upheld his guilty plea despite the 

breach of one of the plea agreement’s material terms (return of the vehicle). 

{¶ 8} The police department and the officers appealed to this court, 

asserting that the law-of-the-case doctrine does not require a court to apply the 

findings of a superior court in a criminal case to a civil case brought by the criminal 

defendant against individuals and entities who were not parties to the criminal case. 

We accepted jurisdiction. 147 Ohio St.3d 1505, 2017-Ohio-261, 67 N.E.3d 823. 

ANALYSIS 

{¶ 9} “[T]he law of the case is applicable to subsequent proceedings in the 

reviewing court as well as the trial court. Thus, the decision of an appellate court 

in a prior appeal will ordinarily be followed in a later appeal in the same case and 

court.” Nolan v. Nolan, 11 Ohio St.3d 1, 4, 462 N.E.2d 410 (1984). A plain reading 

of Nolan indicates that the doctrine applies only to subsequent proceedings “in the 

same case.” We reiterate our holding that the law-of-the-case doctrine is applicable 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO

4

only to proceedings within the same case and does not limit the actions of a court 

in another case, even if that case has a party in common with the other case. 

{¶ 10} The law-of-the-case doctrine exists to promote the “finality and 

efficiency of the judicial process by ‘protecting against the agitation of settled 

issues.’ 1B J. Moore, J. Lucas, & T. Currier, Moore’s Federal Practice ¶ 0.404[1], 

p. 118 (1984).” Christianson v. Colt Industries Operating Corp., 486 U.S. 800, 

816, 108 S.Ct. 2166, 100 L.Ed.2d 811 (1988). This court has long recognized that 

the law-of-the-case doctrine is necessary to “ensure consistency of results in a case, 

to avoid endless litigation by settling the issues, and to preserve the structure of 

superior and inferior courts as designed by the Ohio Constitution.” Hubbard ex rel. 

Creed v. Sauline, 74 Ohio St.3d 402, 404, 659 N.E.2d 781 (1996), citing State ex 

rel. Potain v. Mathews, 59 Ohio St.2d 29, 32, 391 N.E.2d 343 (1979). Although 

these objectives are compelling, they are less so when the case before the court is 

not the same case in which the question at issue was earlier resolved. Indeed, courts 

commonly consider the same legal issues over and over again but reach different 

outcomes because the cases involve different facts.1

 This deliberative process is a 

hallmark of our judicial system and does not impede the goals of finality, 

consistency, and efficiency. 

CONCLUSION 

{¶ 11} The law-of-the-case doctrine requires a court to follow rulings on 

issues previously resolved within the same case. In this case, the appellate court 

held that the law-of-the-case doctrine applied to force a court in a civil case to 

adhere to an earlier decision in a criminal case. This was not a proper application 

 

1

 Stare decisis and res judicata also promote finality and consistency in other contexts in the legal 

system. See, e.g., Westfield Ins. Co. v. Galatis, 100 Ohio St.3d 216, 2003-Ohio-5849, 797 N.E.2d 

1256, ¶ 43 (“The doctrine of stare decisis is designed to provide continuity and predictability in our 

legal system”); Grava v. Parkman Twp., 73 Ohio St.3d 379, 381-382, 653 N.E.2d 226 (1995) (res 

judicata involves both claim and issue preclusion). Those doctrines were not raised by the parties 

or the lower court, and we do not consider them here. 
January Term, 2017 

5

of the law-of-the-case doctrine. Accordingly, we reverse the judgment of the 

Eighth District Court of Appeals and reinstate the Cuyahoga County Common 

Pleas Court’s summary-judgment order. 

Judgment reversed. 

O’DONNELL, KENNEDY, FRENCH, FISCHER, and DEWINE, JJ., concur. 

O’NEILL, J., dissents. 

_________________ 

Tobias R. Reid, pro se. 

Barbara A. Langhenry, Cleveland Director of Law, William M. Menzalora, 

Chief Assistant Director of Law, and Janeane R. Cappara, Assistant Director of 

Law, for appellants. 

_________________