Opinion ID: 1298362
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Appeal of a Case Tried Before a Jury

Text: We turn next to consideration of West Virginia Code § 50-5-12(c) (1994), the statutory provision actually applicable to this appeal of a civil case heard in magistrate court with a jury. That section specifies, as does Rule 16.11(b) of the West Virginia Trial Court Rules, that appeal proceedings in a case heard before a jury shall be concluded in the circuit court within 90 days after the case is docketed there. However, we find no express direction in section 12(c) that the 90-day limit is to be jurisdictional. Section 12(c), unlike Section 12(d), is simply silent on the jurisdictional question. We cannot conclude that there was any intention by the Legislature to deprive the circuit courts of jurisdiction in a civil appeal of a case heard by a jury 90 days after the docketing of the appeal. And, as in the matter of cases to be appealed to the circuit court de novo, Rule 16.11(b) of the Trial Court Rules must be seen as administrative, not jurisdictional. Accordingly, we conclude that the circuit court retained jurisdiction to hear and decide this case when on February 28, 2000, it entered the order here appealed.