Title: Spear v. Omary
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: 180224
State: Virginia
Issuer: Virginia Supreme Court
Date: April 11, 2019

VIRGINIA: 
 
 
In the Supreme Court of Virginia held at the Supreme Court Building in the 
City of Richmond on Thursday the 11th day of April, 2019. 
 
Present:  All the Justices 
 
James B. Spear, Jr., 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Appellant, 
 
 against 
 
Record No. 180224 
 
 
 
Court of Appeals No. 0064-17-4 
 
Nawara T. Omary, 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Appellee. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Upon an appeal from a judgment 
rendered by the Court of Appeals of 
Virginia. 
 
 
This appeal arises from a Court of Appeals decision affirming a judgment of the circuit 
court, which held that the juvenile and domestic relations district court (“JDR court”) had no 
jurisdiction to modify an award of child support because the case had never been expressly 
remanded to the JDR court for this purpose.  On appeal, James Spear argues that the JDR court 
did have jurisdiction because he had earlier withdrawn an appeal from the JDR court to the 
circuit court.  The remand, Spear contends, happened automatically by operation of law.  We 
agree and reverse. 
I. 
 
Spear and Nawara Omary were divorced by an order of the circuit court in 2010.  The 
final order of divorce incorporated their Support, Property and Custody Agreement, in which 
Spear agreed to pay $3,500 per month in child support for the parties’ two children.  In 2011, the 
circuit court granted a motion by the Department of Social Services, Division of Child Support 
Enforcement (“DCSE”) to reopen the case, intervene in the matter, and transfer the case to the 
JDR court.  The order stated “[t]hat the establishment, modification and enforcement of child 
support and maintenance . . . shall be transferred forthwith to the [JDR court] which is hereby 
found to be an appropriate forum.”  J.A. at 21. 
In 2013, Spear noted an appeal to the circuit court after the JDR court had denied his 
request to modify child support that had alleged a material change in circumstances.  He 
subsequently withdrew that appeal, and the circuit court’s order stated, in its entirety, “Defendant 
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JAMES B. SPEAR, JR. hereby withdraws his appeal in the above captioned matter; it is 
therefore ORDERED AND ADJUDGED, that the appeal in the above captioned matter is hereby 
withdrawn.”  Id. at 24. 
In 2015, DCSE filed a motion in the JDR court to modify the child support order, also 
alleging a material change in circumstances.  In March 2016, the JDR court granted the motion 
and reduced Spear’s child support obligation to $1,088 per month, finding that Spear’s “income 
ha[d] been decreasing” while Omary’s had “increased.”  Id. at 32-34 (the “2016 Order”).  Omary 
noted her appeal to the circuit court and argued that the JDR court had never possessed 
jurisdiction to enter the 2016 Order.  The circuit court agreed, vacated the 2016 Order, and 
dismissed the case — thereby leaving the child support obligation in the divorce decree “in full 
force and effect.”  Id. at 45.  Spear appealed to the Court of Appeals, which affirmed the circuit 
court’s ruling in an unpublished opinion. 
II. 
 
Spear argues on appeal that Code § 16.1-106.1(F), by “operation of law,” effects an 
“automatic remand” whenever a circuit court enters an order noting the appellant’s withdrawal of 
an appeal from the JDR court.  Appellant’s Br. at 9, 11-16, 19-20.  For this reason, Spear 
contends, both the Court of Appeals and the circuit court erred by concluding otherwise and by 
holding that the circuit court, not the JDR court, had jurisdiction to modify the child support 
order.  We agree. 
 
Code § 16.1-106.1(F) states, in relevant part, that when a party withdraws an appeal from 
the JDR court, “[u]nless the circuit court orders that the case remain in the circuit court, the case 
shall be remanded to the [JDR] court for purposes of enforcement and future modification and 
shall be subject to all the requirements of § 16.1-297.”  Code § 16.1-297, in turn, states in 
relevant part that “[u]pon the rendition of final judgment upon an appeal from the [JDR] court, 
the circuit court shall cause a copy of its judgment to be filed with the [JDR] court within 
twenty-one days of entry of its order” and that “[i]n the event such circuit court does not dismiss 
the proceedings or discharge [the] child or adult, the circuit court may remand the child or adult 
to the jurisdiction of the juvenile court.” 
 
We find that Code § 16.1-106.1(F) does not require a circuit court to expressly remand a 
matter to the JDR court upon a withdrawn appeal.  Instead, that statute states that “[u]nless” the 
circuit court specifically articulates in its withdrawal order that the case will remain within its 
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jurisdiction, “the case shall be remanded to the [JDR] court.”  Code § 16.1-106.1(F).  This 
provision gives the circuit court the power to order that the case “remain” within its jurisdiction, 
id., but requires that the case be remanded to the JDR court if the circuit court fails to exercise 
that power.  The requirement in Code § 16.1-297 that the circuit court, “[u]pon the rendition of 
final judgment,” file a copy of its judgment with the JDR court does not affect our conclusion 
that Code § 16.1-106.1(F) operates to remand the case by operation of law, without more.  No 
such final judgment was rendered in this case.  Thus, when the circuit court failed to expressly 
retain jurisdiction, Code § 16.1-106.1(F) operated to remand the case to the JDR court. 
 
For this reason, the JDR court had jurisdiction to enter the 2016 Order, and the circuit 
court and the Court of Appeals erred by holding otherwise.  We reverse the judgment of the 
Court of Appeals, vacate the circuit court’s order annulling the JDR court’s 2016 Order, and 
remand the case to the circuit court for proceedings consistent with the views expressed herein. 
This order shall be published in the Virginia Reports and certified to the Court of Appeals 
of Virginia and the Circuit Court of Fairfax County.
________________  
JUSTICE KELSEY, with whom JUSTICE McCLANAHAN joins, dissenting. 
 
I agree with the circuit court and the Court of Appeals.  Both courts held that Code 
§ 16.1-106.1(F) does not, by operation of law, automatically remand a case to the JDR court 
upon the withdrawal of an appeal.  See Spear v. Omary, Record No. 0064-17-4, 2018 WL 
414222, at *3, 6 (Va. Ct. App. Jan. 16, 2018) (unpublished).  The statute provides that, unless the 
circuit court expressly retains jurisdiction, “the case shall be remanded to the [JDR] court.”  
Code § 16.1-106.1(F).  In this case, the circuit court did not comply with the “shall” command 
because the circuit court’s order — which Spear’s counsel drafted and submitted to the court — 
did not remand the case.  Spear solves this problem by postulating that the court did not need to 
expressly remand the case.  The remand happened automatically.  In other words, because the 
remand was supposed to happen, it did happen. 
It seems unlikely that the use of the passive-voice verb “shall be remanded” renders the 
remand self-executing and thus requires no action whatsoever by the remanding court.  At best, 
this interpretation would be an uncommon usage of that expression and, at worst, it would be an 
unheard-of usage.  Consider, for example, Code § 19.2-324.1, which states that a criminal “case 
shall be remanded for a new trial” if a “reviewing court determines that evidence was 
4 
erroneously admitted” at trial “and that such error was not harmless.”  No one has ever suggested 
that the mere issuance of an appellate opinion reversing an evidentiary ruling need not be 
accompanied by a remand order.  To be sure, the reason that appellate courts expressly order 
remands is because remands do not happen automatically.  The very word “remanded” 
presupposes a remanding court ordering the remand. 
Good grammar, as well as common usage, should play a role in our interpretation of 
“shall be remanded” in Code § 16.1-106.1(F).  Because courts presume “in the first instance, that 
the legislature understood the rules of grammar and the use of language,” Henry Campbell 
Black, Handbook on the Construction and Interpretation of the Laws § 55, at 148 (2d ed. 1911), 
“[w]ords are to be given the meaning that proper grammar and usage would assign them,” 
Antonin Scalia & Bryan A. Garner, Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts 140 (2012). 
“Shall be remanded” is a passive-voice verb, which means that the subject of the 
sentence, “case,” is receiving the action of the verb.1  “Shall be remanded” is also a transitive 
verb that requires an object upon which the action of the verb is exerted in order to express a 
complete thought.2  This grammatical structure in Code § 16.1-106.1(F) requires an actor (the 
circuit court) to perform the action (remanding) upon the subject of the sentence (the case).  The 
actor of a passive-voice verb may be omitted entirely from the sentence, see, e.g., The Chicago 
Manual of Style, supra note 1, § 5.115, at 235 (giving “his tires were slashed” as an example of 
omitting the actor entirely from the sentence), or can be the object of a prepositional phrase at the 
end of the sentence, see, e.g., id. (giving “the tree’s branch was broken by the storm” as an 
example of naming an actor by the object of a prepositional phrase and noting that “the subject 
branch does not break itself — it is acted on by the object storm”). 
Here, Code § 16.1-106.1(F) omits entirely the actor of the action “shall be remanded.”  
However, this omission does not mean that the remand occurs automatically.  Rather, the 
omission means only that the actor of the remand is understood from the context of the 
sentence.3  The case cannot remand itself.  An actor — the remanding authority — must perform 
                                                          
 
1 “Voice shows whether the subject acts (active voice) or is acted on (passive voice) — 
that is, whether the subject performs or receives the action of the verb.  Only transitive verbs are 
said to have voice.”  The Chicago Manual of Style § 5.115, at 235 (16th ed. 2010). 
2 See id. § 5.96, at 229 (defining “transitive verb”). 
3 See Bryan A. Garner et al., The Redbook: A Manual on Legal Style § 10.27, at 198 (3d 
5 
the remanding.  In this case, however, the circuit court, as the remanding authority, did not 
remand the case to the JDR court. 
Even if common usage and grammar both fail us, the last phrase of Code § 16.1-106.1(F) 
finishes the interpretative task.  That phrase adds that “the case . . . shall be subject to all the 
requirements of § 16.1-297.”  Code § 16.1-297 requires the circuit court to file a copy of its 
“judgment” with the JDR court within 21 days after the entry of a “final judgment upon an 
appeal from the [JDR] court.”  And where, as here, an appellant files an uncontested withdrawal 
request in the circuit court, Code § 16.1-106.1(C) directs the circuit court to “enter an order 
disposing of the case in accordance with the judgment or order entered in the district court.”4  
That circuit court order “disposing of the case” under Code § 16.1-106.1(C) is the “final 
judgment” to which Code § 16.1-297 applies under Code § 16.1-106.1(F).  See, e.g., Fairfax Cir. 
Ct. R. 2:28 (stating that if the circuit court approves of the withdrawal of an appeal, “the Circuit 
Court will enter an order reaffirming the judgment entered in the General District Court” but that 
“[t]he case remains in the Circuit Court”).5 
In this case, the circuit court did not reaffirm the JDR court’s judgment after the 
withdrawal of the appeal, did not file its reaffirmation order with the JDR court, and did not 
remand the case to the JDR court.  The circuit court thus completed none of the requirements 
listed in the governing statutes.  I cannot agree with Spear that one of those three 
                                                          
 
ed. 2013) (“A by-prepositional phrase often accompanies the construction; when it does not 
appear, it can be understood from the context.”). 
4 Code § 16.1-133 codifies a parallel process for the withdrawal of criminal appeals from 
the JDR court when the withdrawal occurs “more than ten days after conviction.”  Model orders 
in this context recite that the circuit court “affirms the [JDR court] judgment previously on 
appeal” and that “[t]his case and the [juvenile or adult] are remanded” to the JDR court.  See 
Office of the Exec. Sec’y, Supreme Court of Virginia, A Handbook of Standard Procedures and 
Model Orders for Virginia Circuit Court Judges and Clerks § IV, at 51-52 (2013 ed.). 
5 See also Dep’t of Judicial Servs., Office of the Exec. Sec’y, Circuit Court Clerks’ 
Manual – Civil 6-55 (Jan. 2019 rev.) (stating that, absent a timely objection, “the appeal shall be 
deemed to be withdrawn” and that “[t]he court shall order disposing of the case in accordance 
with the judgment or order entered in the district court”); Dep’t of Judicial Servs., Office of the 
Exec. Sec’y, Circuit Court Clerks’ Manual – Criminal 2-10 (July 2018 rev.) (“If the appeal is 
withdrawn more than ten days after the district court conviction date, the circuit court must enter 
an order affirming the district court judgment . . . .”); id. at 6-4 (Jan. 2019 rev.) (“If an appeal is 
withdrawn more than ten days from the date of conviction in the district court, the judgment is 
affirmed in the circuit court as a circuit court judgment.”). 
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requirements — a remand of the case to the JDR court — simply happened “automatically,” 
Appellant’s Br. at 11, 20; see also Reply Br. at 1, while the other two did not need to happen at 
all. 
I respectfully dissent. 
 
 
 
 
 
                A Copy, 
 
 
 
 
          
                    Teste: 
 
 
 
 
                        
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Douglas B. Robelen, Clerk