Opinion ID: 2313529
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Record Reviewable on a Writ of Certiorari

Text: The scope of review on a common law writ of certiorari drives our determination of what is properly considered to be the record in these cases. [53] Maddrey argues that failing to review the entire record would frustrate the certiorari process. Indeed it would, depending on what constitutes the record for review on certiorari as opposed to functional intermediate appellate review. However, as the Superior Court wrote in Rodenhiser v. Department of Public Safety in 1957, [i]t is settled in this jurisdiction that the evidence before the lower tribunal is not a proper part of the record in a common law certiorari proceeding. [54] It is the common law writ of certiorari that the Superior Court issues to the Justice of the Peace Court in summary possession cases. Accordingly, in these cases the evidence presented to the Justice of Peace Court, including the testimony reflected in the transcript, is not a proper part of the record subject to Superior Court's review. The General Assembly did not design the Justice of the Peace Court, a statutory court, to be reviewed on a full record. Indeed, in all civil actions except summary possession, an appeal de novo is available. Therefore, only the record appropriate for common law certiorari review need be returned to Superior Court in response to the writ. That record is nothing more than the initial papers, limited to the complaint initiating the proceeding, the answer or response (if required), and the docket entries. Thus, the official record delivered by the Justice of the Peace Court to the Superior Court in response to the issuance of a common law writ of certiorari does not properly include a transcript of the evidentiary proceedings. In this case, the Justice of the Peace Court sent a transcript, together with the other papers, to the Superior Court. Apparently that court has done so routinely ever since it has had the capability to make a transcript. However, what is actually put in the box does not make the record; the record is what legally should be in the box. The Justice of the Peace Court must not send evidentiary hearing transcripts to the Superior Court, because the Superior Court may not properly consider hearing transcripts in performing its limited duty on common law certiorari. In Castner v. State [55] , we noted that reviewing the transcript to evaluate the basis for the lower tribunal's decision necessarily contemplates that the Court will weigh and evaluate the evidence. Castner implies that it would enlarge certiorari as a device to circumvent the requisites of the appellate jurisdiction of this Court as established by the Constitution. [56] In later cases, we have also explained that certiorari review is limited to errors which appear on the face of the record and does not embrace an evaluation of the evidence considered by the inferior tribunal. [57] Further, [t]he transcript of the evidence below is not part of the reviewable record and the Court cannot examine the transcript in order to evaluate the adequacy of the evidence which supports the Superior Court's conclusion rendered below. [58] Castner's explanation of narrow review on common law certiorari drives our conclusion today to limit the actual record to a necessarily, correspondingly limited record for return to Superior Court.