Title: Moore v. Millers Cove Energy Co.
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: 982376
State: Virginia
Issuer: Virginia Supreme Court
Date: November 5, 1999

PRESENT: Carrico, C.J., Compton, Lacy, Hassell, Keenan, and 
Koontz, JJ., and Stephenson, Senior Justice 
 
RONALD L. MOORE, INDIVIDUALLY, ET AL. 
 
 
 
OPINION BY  
v.  Record No. 982376 
SENIOR JUSTICE ROSCOE B. STEPHENSON, JR.  
 
 
 
November 5, 1999 
MILLERS COVE ENERGY CO., INC., ET AL. 
 
 
FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF LEE COUNTY 
Ford C. Quillen, Judge 
 
 
In this appeal, we decide whether a judgment creditor can 
obtain by garnishment of a court clerk funds voluntarily 
deposited with the court by a judgment debtor in a pending 
chancery suit. 
 
On April 8, 1998, Millers Cove Energy Co., Inc. and others1 
(collectively, Millers Cove) instituted a garnishment action 
against Ronald L. Moore, individually, and others2 (collectively, 
Moore) and Charles Calton, Clerk of the Circuit Court of Lee 
County (the Clerk).  Millers Cove sought to garnish $50,000 that 
Moore had voluntarily deposited with the circuit court in 
connection with a declaratory judgment proceeding Moore had 
instituted against Millers Cove.  The return date of the 
garnishment was May 26, 1998. 
                     
1 The other judgment creditors are Darrell Barnwell; Hubert D. 
Barnwell; Judy Barnwell; Carolyn B. Petrey; Susan M. Kincaid, 
Trustee under the Will of Joseph A. Kincaid, deceased; and Mt. 
Airy Farms, a Virginia general partnership. 
2 The other judgment debtors are Ruby Moore, Robert Moore, and 
Ronald L. Moore, Co-executors of the Last Will and Testament of 
Royce G. Moore, deceased. 
 
Moore is the lessee and Millers Cove is the lessor under 
two coal leases on land in Lee County.  The garnishment action 
is part of a legal dispute that began in 1989 when Millers Cove 
gave notice that it considered the leases terminated due to 
Moore's alleged breach thereof.  After receiving the notice, 
Moore instituted the declaratory judgment suit seeking an 
adjudication that the leases remained in effect.  The money that 
Moore deposited with the court was an advance of the minimum 
royalties due under the leases. 
 
The declaratory judgment action was stayed when Millers 
Cove filed a bankruptcy petition in the United States District 
Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee.  In the bankruptcy 
proceeding, Millers Cove brought an adversary proceeding against 
Moore seeking a determination that the leases were terminated 
and also an award of monetary damages.  Ultimately, in that 
proceeding, Millers Cove obtained a judgment against Moore in 
the amount of $1,453,036.50.  That judgment is currently on 
appeal before the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth 
Circuit. 
 
Millers Cove brought the judgment to Virginia and had it 
registered in the United States District Court for the Western 
District of Virginia.  Thereafter, Millers Cove (1) filed a 
motion in the pending declaratory judgment action seeking to 
 
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have the funds paid to it and (2) instituted the garnishment 
proceeding which is the subject of this appeal. 
 
The trial court denied Millers Cove's motion to have the 
funds paid to it, but the court granted the garnishment against 
the Clerk.  Moore appeals. 
 
A judgment creditor, in a garnishment proceeding under Code 
§ 8.01-511, has no rights greater than those possessed by the 
judgment debtor.  Hartzell Fan, Inc. v. Waco, Inc., 256 Va. 294, 
299, 505 S.E.2d 196, 200 (1998); Lynch v. Johnson, 196 Va. 516, 
521, 84 S.E.2d 419, 422 (1954).  Consequently, the judgment 
creditor is entitled to a judgment against a garnishee only if 
the garnishee is indebted to the judgment debtor when the 
garnishment summons is served on the garnishee or if such 
indebtedness arises between the date of service and the return 
date of the garnishment.  Virginia National Bank v. Blofeld, 234 
Va. 395, 400, 362 S.E.2d 692, 695 (1987). 
 
Code § 58.1-3177(A) imposes upon a circuit court clerk "the 
duty, unless it is otherwise specially ordered, to receive, take 
charge of and hold all moneys paid into the court and to pay out 
or dispose of these moneys as the court orders or decrees."  In 
the present case, therefore, the Clerk had neither the 
discretion, obligation, nor authority to pay the money absent an 
order of the court to do so.  At the time the garnishment 
summons was returnable, the court had not entered an order 
 
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directing the Clerk to pay the money to Moore, the judgment 
debtor.  Therefore, at that time, the Clerk owed no debt to 
Moore.  Consequently, the trial court erred in awarding the 
garnishment against the Clerk. 
 
Accordingly, we will reverse the trial court's judgment and 
dismiss the garnishment. 
Reversed and dismissed. 
 
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