FILED

April 11, 1997

Cecil W. Crowson

Appellate Court Clerk

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF TENNESSEE

MIDDLE SECTION AT NASHVILLE

 SAMUEL TYRONE BRYANT, )

)

Plaintiff/Appellant, )

) Davidson Chancery

) No. 95-710-III

VS. )

) Appeal No.

) 01A01-9509-CH-00398

MICHAEL C. GREENE, )

Commissioner of the Tennessee )

Department of Safety, )

)

Defendant/Appellee. )

APPEAL FROM THE CHANCERY COURT FOR DAVIDSON COUNTY

AT NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE

THE HONORABLE ROBERT S. BRANDT, CHANCELLOR

For the Plaintiff/Appellant: For the Defendant/Appellee:

Francis X. Santore, Jr. Charles W. Burson

SANTORE AND SANTORE AttorneyGeneral and Reporter

Greeneville, Tennessee

Rebecca Lyford

Assistant Attorney General

AFFIRMED AND REMANDED

WILLIAM C. KOCH, JR., JUDGE
1The notice of seizure listed Mr. Bryant’s address as “257 W. Market St. Apt. 3.” Mr.

Bryant asserted in a later affidavit that he actually resided at 257 W. Market Street, Apt. 4. The

(continued...)

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O P I N I O N

This appeal involves the forfeiture of an automobile under the Tennessee

Drug Control Act. The automobile’s owner filed a petition for judicial review of

the forfeiture order in the Chancery Court for Davidson County, asserting that the

forfeiture proceeding was unconstitutional because he did not receive a notice of

seizure or a copy of the department’s forfeiture order. The trial court dismissed

the petition because it was not timely filed. We affirm. 

On May 5, 1994, Samuel Bryant was driving several children to a local

skating rink when he was pulled over by two members of the First Judicial Circuit

Drug Task Force. After searching Mr. Bryant’s 1985 Nissan Maxima, the officers

arrested Mr. Bryant on charges of evading arrest, child neglect, and driving on a

revoked license. After they arrived at the jail, one of the arresting officers

informed Mr. Bryant that his car was subject to forfeiture because the authorities

had found three tenths of a gram of crack cocaine in it.

What transpired after this point is disputed. The officer asserted that he

gave Mr. Bryant the required notice of seizure form and that Mr. Bryant refused

to sign the acknowledgment on the form that he had received it. Mr. Bryant, who

claims to be functionally illiterate, maintains that he was never read or shown the

form. Mr. Bryant later pleaded guilty to driving on a revoked license and evading

arrest but was never charged with possession of the crack cocaine.

Mr. Bryant did not file a timely claim for his automobile, and on August 12,

1994, the Department of Safety entered a final order forfeiting the automobile and

a compact disc player. The department mailed a copy of its forfeiture order to Mr.

Bryant at the address listed on the notice of seizure,1 but the letter was later
1

(...continued)

discrepancy in the addresses might be significant in other circumstances, but it is not signifiicant

in this case.

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returned marked “undeliverable as addressed: forwarding order expired.” The

department made no other attempts to deliver the notice. Mr. Bryant claims that

he did not learn of the forfeiture until October 1994 when he discharged his

lawyer and took his file to a new lawyer. The record contains no explanation

concerning how a copy of the department’s August 12, 1994 order came to be

found in Mr. Bryant’s former attorney’s file. Mr. Bryant and his new lawyer did

not filed a petition for judicial review of the August 12, 1994 order until March

7, 1995. 

Petitions for judicial review must be filed within sixty days after the entry

of the final administrative order. Tenn. Code Ann. § 4-5-322(b)(1) (Supp. 1996).

This time limitation is mandatory and jurisdictional. Bishop v. Tennessee Dep’t

of Correction, 896 S.W.2d 557, 558 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1994). Thus, in the absence

of an equitable ground similar to those found in Tenn. R. Civ. P. 60.02, the trial

court must dismiss untimely petitions for judicial review.

Mr. Bryant attempts to justify his failure to file a timely petition for judicial

review by asserting that he is functionally illiterate and that he never received a

copy of the notice of procedure or a copy of the Department of Safety’s August

12, 1994 forfeiture. The record contains proof that both substantiates and refutes

Mr. Bryant’s claims. We need not analyze this evidence in detail, however,

because Mr. Bryant admits that he had actual notice of the department’s forfeiture

order by no later than early October 1994 when he and his new lawyer discovered

the order in the file obtained from Mr. Bryant’s former lawyer. Mr. Bryant offers

no explanation for his failure to file a petition for judicial review within sixty days

after “discovering” the order. Thus, even if we give Mr. Bryant every benefit of

the doubt, his petition for judicial review must still be dismissed because it is

untimely.

We affirm the judgmentdismissing Mr. Bryant’s petition for judicial review

and remand the case for whatever further proceedings may be required. We also
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tax the costs of this appeal to Samuel Tyrone Bryant for which execution, if

necessary, may issue.

____________________________

WILLIAM C. KOCH, JR., JUDGE

CONCUR:

________________________________

HENRY F. TODD, P.J., M.S. 

________________________________

SAMUEL L. LEWIS, JUDGE