Opinion ID: 1100343
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Was Gnemi's circuit court petition for judicial review properly accompanied by the required cost bond?

Text: ¶ 37. Waters asserts that Gnemi's cost bonds fail to meet the statutory requirements. Miss.Code Ann. § 23-15-927 states in pertinent part: [T]he petitioner shall give a cost bond in the sum of Three Hundred Dollars ($300.00), with two (2) or more sufficient sureties conditioned to pay all costs in case his petition be dismissed, and an additional bond may be required, by the judge or chancellor, if necessary, at any subsequent stage of the proceedings. Waters's specific complaints are that none of [the cost bonds] bear the approval of the clerk, and all three bear dates different from the petition, the first being dated September 22, 2003, the third being dated September 19, 2003, and the second not being signed at all by Gnemi. Additionally, Waters asserts that Gnemi filed his cost bond in piecemeal fashion, with some of the pages being facsimile copies. Collective Exhibit 14 attached to the petition for judicial review consists of: First page  Cost Bond in the amount of $300.00, with the required statutory language, signed by Gnemi and Holt Smith as surety. The other signature line for a surety contains no signature but does have typed on the line See Attachment. This document is a facsimile copy and is dated September 22, 2003. Second page  Bond for Costs (in the amount of $300.00) setting out that Gnemi is the principal and Travelers Casualty and Surety Company of America, Hartford, Connecticut, is the surety, and again there appears the statutory requirement concerning the conditions of the bond. There is a signature line for Gnemi, with a check mark, but no signature. On the signature line for an attorney-in-fact and Mississippi Resident Agent for Travelers appears the signature of Anita Johnson. The signature line for approval by a circuit judge is blank. This document is dated September 19, 2003. Third page  This is a facsimile copy of the second page, except that Gnemi's signature appears on this page. Again, the signature line for approval by a circuit judge is blank. Fourth and Fifth pages  Power of Attorney and Certificate of Authority of Attorney(s)-In-Fact. This document authorizes three individuals, including Anita Johnson, to bind Travelers in an amount not to exceed $500,000.00 by the execution of various instruments, including bonds. This document is signed under oath by George W. Thompson, Senior Vice President for Travelers, and contains four corporate seals of the Travelers entities, along with the signature, commission expiration date and seal of a notary public. This document was also certified as remaining in full force and not revoked, as indicated by the signature of Kori M. Johnson, Assistant Bond Secretary for Travelers, and again reflecting Travelers's four corporate seals. Johnson's certificate is dated September 19, 2003. ¶ 38. With this documentation before her, Waters asserts that Gnemi failed to comply with the cost bond requirements of the statute. Waters's sole citation to authority on this issue is a quote from Pearson that [t]he statute is mandatory, using as emphatic language as could be employed, under the circumstances. 192 So. at 40. In Pearson, this Court affirmed the special tribunal's dismissal of the petition for judicial review due to the contestant's failure to strictly comply with the statutory requirement of obtaining certificates from two disinterested attorneys. We agree with the assertion that Miss.Code Ann. § 23-15-927 is mandatory and must be strictly construed; however, Pearson offers nothing by way of discussion of the cost bond requirements of the statute, and thus does little to guide us in considering the issue of whether Gnemi's cost bond was somehow statutorily deficient. From the record before us, we unhesitatingly find that Gnemi complied with the statutory requirements concerning the cost bond. ¶ 39. As an aside, we also note from the record that the circuit clerk accepted and marked as filed Gnemi's petition for judicial review, with the attached fourteen exhibits, which included the cost bond. The record is silent as to any attack of the cost bond by anyone at the trial court level. We find nothing in the record which indicates that Judge Smith was ever called upon to rule on the sufficiency of the cost bond. We have been consistent in holding that we need not consider matters raised for the first time on the appeal, which practice would have the practical effect of depriving the trial court of the opportunity to first rule on the issue, so that we can then review such trial court ruling under the appropriate standard of review. See, e.g., Triplett v. Mayor & Aldermen of Vicksburg, 758 So.2d 399, 401 (Miss.2000) (citing Shaw v. Shaw, 603 So.2d 287, 292 (Miss.1992)). If we were to adopt such a practice of considering for the first time on appeal matters not raised before the trial court, such practice would have the chilling effect of depriving the trial court of the opportunity to first rule on the issue, which would then deprive this Court of the opportunity to perform our mandated appellate review by utilizing the appropriate standard of review of the trial court's ruling. ¶ 40. For all these reasons, we find this issue to be without merit.