Opinion ID: 1127049
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: the chancellor's refusal to allow counsel for appellant to read into the court record his attorney's fees in order to establish the necessity of said attorney's fees and the reasonableness of same was clearly erroneous.

Text: The chancellor's not reopening the case to allow counsel for Sheila Chamblee to enter evidence of their attorney's fees may have been an error. However, no objection was raised at trial and this point was not cited in Sheila's Designation of Record and Statement of Issues. Nevertheless, the fact that counsel did not raise this issue below does not preclude this court from considering it now. Supreme Court Rule 28(a)(3) states that this court may notice a plain error not identified or distinctly specified. According to Johnson v. Fargo, 604 So.2d 306 (Miss. 1992), Under this court's standard of review ... the Court retains the inherent authority to notice error, despite trial counsel's failure to preserve the error. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals addressed this aspect of appellate authority in Edwards v. Sears, Roebuck and Co., 512 F.2d 276 (5th Cir. [Miss.] 1975), in the context of improper closing argument: [Counsel accused of improper argument] maintains that since much of the argument was not objected to, this court cannot consider the error on appeal. This misconstrues the court's prerogatives on review  we always possess the power to consider errors to which no objection was made. But a healthy regard for the necessity and desirability of having errors corrected at trial rather than on appeal leads us to exercise that power only where the interest of substantial justice is at stake. Johnson, at 311 (citations omitted). The issue of attorney's fees, although not insignificant, is not one where the interest of substantial justice is at stake. Therefore, this court should not consider this issue on appeal, and the decision of the lower court on this point should be affirmed. Some of the lower court's holdings that appellant Sheila Chamblee cites as being erroneously decided, should be affirmed while others should be reversed and remanded for further findings. Due to a lack of credible evidence to the contrary, the chancellor's decision to not grant Sheila Chamblee a divorce based on habitual cruel and inhuman treatment can not be said to constitute manifest error. The same can be said about his decision to grant custody of Justin Chamblee to David, the visitation schedule and child support arrangement that he imposed on Sheila, and the awarding of the use and possession of both the former marital home and the ten acres in Leake County. However, as virtually no evidence was presented at trial that would constitute a finding that Justin's visiting Sheila in the presence of any male companion not related to her by blood or marriage would be harmful to the child, the chancellor's decision on this point constitutes manifest error and should be reversed and remanded. Furthermore, as both spouses contributed money and non-compensated time to the marriage, the chancellor's decision to award virtually all of the marital property to David should also be reversed and remanded. In addition, as David was capable of paying his own attorney's fees and costs, the chancellors' decision to make Sheila pay them should be reversed and remanded for redetermination after the couple's property is redistributed. Finally, as counsel for Sheila Chamblee failed to object to the chancellors' refusal to allow evidence of his attorney's fees into the record and as this issue is not of the type that this court should address as plain error, the chancellors' decision on this point should be affirmed. AFFIRMED IN PART; REVERSED AND REMANDED IN PART FOR PROCEEDINGS NOT INCONSISTENT WITH THIS OPINION. DAN M. LEE and PRATHER, P.JJ., and SULLIVAN, PITTMAN, BANKS, McRAE, JAMES L. ROBERTS, Jr. and SMITH, JJ., concur.