Title: Ex Parte Phillips
Citation: 900 So. 2d 412
Docket Number: 1031513
State: Alabama
Issuer: Alabama Supreme Court
Date: November 5, 2004

900 So. 2d 412 (2004)
Ex parte Delaine PHILLIPS and Emmanuel L. Phillips, Sr., individually and d/b/a Phillips Enterprises.
(In re Delaine Phillips et al.
v.
Bredero Price Company, Inc., et al.)
1031513.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
November 5, 2004.
*413 Michael Gillion and Scott W. Hunter of Michael Gillion, P.C., Mobile, for petitioners.
Charles L. Miller, Jr., Mobile, for respondents.
STUART, Justice.
Delaine Phillips and Emmanuel L. Phillips, Sr., individually and d/b/a Phillips Enterprises (hereinafter referred to collectively as "the Phillipses"), petition this Court for a writ of mandamus directing the Mobile Circuit Court to vacate its order setting aside a default judgment entered against Bredero Price Company, Inc., and other defendants and to strike the answers filed by Bredero Price Company, Inc., and the other defendants. We grant the petition and issue the writ.
On September 17, 2003, the Phillipses sued Bredero Price Company, Inc.; Bredero-Shaw, LLC; Doug Snyder; John Sullivan; Charles Brown; and Buddy Patteson. In the complaint, the Phillipses asserted claims of breach of contract and negligence against Bredero Price and Bredero-Shaw (hereinafter referred to collectively as "Bredero"), a claim of trespass against Patteson, and claims of interference with business/contract and property rights against Snyder, Sullivan, and Brown.
On September 24, 2003, Bredero was served by certified mail. The registered agent for Bredero Price and Bredero-Shaw, CT Corporation, accepted service of the complaint for those entities; however, CT Corporation refused to accept service for the individual defendants. On October 24, 2003, a private process server left the summons and complaints at the Bredero plant for the individual defendants, who were current or former employees of Bredero.
On September 25, 2003, Charles L. Miller, Jr., telephoned the Phillipses' counsel and told him that he occasionally acted as local counsel for Bredero and that he had seen the notice of the Phillipses' lawsuit in The Mobile Record. Miller asked the Phillipses' counsel for a copy of the complaint, which counsel faxed to Miller that day. On October 5, 2003, the Phillipses' counsel received a letter from Miller, stating:
On November 19, 2003, the Phillipses moved for a default judgment with leave to prove damages against Bredero. On November 26, 2003, in open court, after hearing testimony regarding the damages, the trial court noted that the individual defendants were also in default and entered a default judgment against Bredero and the individual defendants. On December 1, 2003, the trial court entered the default judgment against all defendants and awarded the Phillipses $117,500.
On April 1, 2004, the Phillipses filed a garnishment action against an account of Bredero Price Company, Inc., at Compass Bank. On April 22, 2004, Bredero moved to set aside the default judgment. As grounds for the motion, Bredero argued that the Phillipses did not comply with the three-day notice required by Rule 55(b), Ala. R. Civ. P., for a default-judgment hearing; that Bredero had meritorious defenses to the Phillipses' claims and that it would be severely prejudiced by a default judgment but that the Phillipses would not be prejudiced by the setting aside of the default judgment; and that entry of the default judgment was not the result of any culpable conduct on Bredero's part. Bredero further maintained that because it did not receive notice of the default judgment until four months after it was entered, its motion could also be viewed as being made pursuant to Rule 60(b)(2) and (6), Ala. R. Civ. P.
After a hearing conducted on May 21, 2004, the trial court granted Bredero's motion and set aside the default judgment. On June 9, 2004, Bredero, Brown, Patteson, and Sullivan filed an answer to the complaint; Snyder filed an answer to the complaint on April 22, 2004.
The Phillipses then filed this petition, seeking a writ of mandamus directing the Mobile Circuit Court to vacate its order *415 setting aside the default judgment and to strike the answers filed by the defendants.
Ex parte King, 776 So. 2d 31, 33-34 (Ala. 2000).
The Phillipses contend that the trial court exceeded the scope of its discretion when it set aside the default judgment against Bredero because, they maintain, Bredero did not timely appear in this action and the Phillipses were therefore not required to provide Bredero with three days' notice of the hearing on the application for a default judgment as required by Rule 55(b), Ala. R. Civ. P.
In its motion to set aside the default judgment, Bredero argued that the correspondence between its counsel and the Phillipses' counsel constituted an appearance. Consequently, Bredero argued that the Phillipses' failure to give Bredero and its counsel three days' notice of the hearing on the application for a default judgment as required by Rule 55(b)(2), Ala. R. Civ. P., required that the default judgment be set aside. Additionally, Bredero argued that because it did not receive notice of the default judgment until four months after it was entered, its motion to set aside the judgment could be considered as having been made pursuant to Rule 60(b)(2) and (6), Ala. R. Civ. P., which provides that a trial court may relieve a party from a final judgment based on "newly discovered evidence which by due diligence could not have been discovered in time to move for a new trial" or for "any other reason justifying relief from the operation of the judgment."
Both of Bredero's arguments rest on a determination of whether Bredero "appeared" before the trial court. According to Bredero, the telephone conversation between its counsel and the Phillipses' counsel and the subsequent letter from its counsel to the Phillipses' counsel constituted an appearance by Bredero in this action.
"An appearance in an action involves some submission or presentation to the court by which a party shows his intention to submit himself to the jurisdiction of *416 the court." Cockrell v. World's Finest Chocolate Co., 349 So. 2d 1117, 1120 (Ala. 1977). This Court in Western Union Telegraph Co. v. Crowder, 547 So. 2d 876 (Ala. 1989), addressed the meaning of "appearance" in a Rule 55(b)(2), Ala. R. Civ. P., setting, stating:
Western Union Tel. Co., 547 So. 2d  at 878-79.
Applying the principles and rationale set forth in Western Union, we conclude that Bredero did not make an appearance in this action. A telephone conversation and a letter between opposing counsel do not constitute a "submission or presentation to the court by which a party shows [its] intention to submit [itself] to the jurisdiction of the court." Cockrell, 349 So. 2d  at 1120. Because Bredero's counsel did not file a written document with the trial court, no appearance was made to invoke the three-day notice requirement of Rule 55(b)(2).
Because Bredero never made an appearance in this action, the trial court exceeded the scope of its discretion when it granted Bredero's motion to set aside the default judgment.
The Phillipses also contend that the trial court exceeded the scope of its discretion when it set aside the default judgment against Bredero. The Phillipses maintain that Bredero's motion to set aside the default judgment, filed more than four months after the entry of the judgment, was untimely and that, therefore, relief pursuant to Rule 60(b), Ala. R. Civ. P., is not proper. Rule 60(b), Ala. R. Civ. P., provides:
Here, Bredero did not file a timely Rule 60(b)(2), Ala. R. Civ. P., motion. The trial court entered the default judgment as to all defendants on December 1, 2003. Bredero did not file its motion to set aside the default judgment until April 22, 2004. Clearly, Bredero's motion based on Rule 60(b)(2) was not timely; it was filed more than four months after the entry of the final judgment.
We agree with Bredero that the four-month rule does not apply to its claim made pursuant to Rule 60(b)(6), Ala. R. Civ. P.; however, we need not determine whether the ground presented pursuant to Rule 60(b)(6) was timely filed because Bredero did not present "any other reason justifying relief from operation of the judgment." Bredero argued:
Wood v. Wade, 853 So. 2d 909, 912-13 (Ala. 2002).
Here, Bredero did not show "exceptional circumstances" that entitled the defendants to relief under Rule 60(b)(6). Indeed, Bredero did not support this ground with any evidence tending to establish, and the record and the answer filed by Bredero, Brown, Patteson, and Sullivan and the answer filed by Snyder do not plead, defective service of process. Therefore, the trial court exceeded the scope of its discretion in setting aside the default judgment based on Bredero's grounds presented pursuant to Rule 60(b), Ala. R. Civ. P.
The Phillipses have established a clear legal right to have the order setting aside the default judgment vacated and an imperative duty on the trial court to act. Therefore, we grant the petition and issue the writ.
PETITION GRANTED; WRIT ISSUED.
NABERS, C.J., and SEE, LYONS, BROWN, JOHNSTONE, HARWOOD, and WOODALL, JJ., concur.
HOUSTON, J., concurs specially.
HOUSTON, Justice (concurring specially).
I concurred in the opinion written by Justice Adams in Western Union Telegraph Co. v. Crowder, 547 So. 2d 876 (Ala. 1989), so I concur here. However, civility, if not the law, should compel a lawyer for a party who has been contacted by another lawyer representing an opposing party in litigation to notify that other lawyer before he or she takes steps to have the action concluded without its being decided on the merits.
More than 30 years ago, when I was practicing law and representing a plaintiff in a civil action, I moved for and obtained a default judgment against the defendant. An attorney contacted me and told me that he had orally contacted me earlier and advised me that he was representing the defendant in the litigation. I did not remember the discussion at all. Based on the attorney's affidavit, which I did not oppose, because I thought that it was unseemly to have a battle of affidavits about what was or was not said between attorneys, the default judgment was set aside. I did not seek appellate review of that decision; ultimately, my client prevailed on the merits. I was distressed that opposing counsel thought that I would seek a default judgment without first notifying him, had opposing counsel notified me that he was representing the defendant. I felt that my civility had been attacked.