Opinion ID: 2818132
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: the disqualification issue is moot

Text: ¶9 Mr. Black argues that the associate presiding judge of the Third District Court erred when he declined to disqualify Judge Kouris. After oral argument was held in this appeal, however, the State notified this court that Judge Kouris had been transferred from the court location in which Mr. Black is being prosecuted and was reassigned to a different docket. The State asserts that because a new judge will be assigned to Mr. Black’s case, the disqualification issue is moot. We agree. ¶10 Courts generally will not resolve an issue that becomes moot. Utah Transit Auth. v. Local 382 of the Amalgamated Transit Union, 2012 UT 75, ¶¶ 14, 32, 289 P.3d 582; Navajo Nation v. State (In re Adoption of L.O.), 2012 UT 23, ¶ 8, 282 P.3d 977. An issue becomes moot “if during the pendency of the appeal circumstances change so that the controversy is eliminated, thereby rendering the relief requested impossible or of no legal effect.” Utah Transit Auth., 2012 UT 75, ¶ 14 (internal quotation marks omitted). ¶11 In this case, Judge Kouris’s reassignment to a different court docket eliminates the controversy over his disqualification since he will no longer preside over Mr. Black’s criminal case. The disqualification issue is moot because the relief Mr. Black requests— the disqualification of Judge Kouris from his case—is now meaningless and will have no effect on future proceedings. See id. ¶ 24. (“The defining feature of a moot controversy is the lack of capacity for the court to order a remedy that will have a meaningful impact on the practical positions of the parties.”). ¶12 Mr. Black contends that we should nevertheless resolve this issue because it falls within a recognized exception to the mootness doctrine. A court may resolve a moot issue if it “(1) presents an issue that affects the public interest, (2) is likely to recur, and (3) because of the brief time that any one litigant is affected, evades review.” Id. ¶ 32. This exception does not apply here because the third element 3 STATE v. BLACK Opinion of the Court has not been met. 1 Mr. Black has not produced any evidence that district court judges are transferred with such frequency that a claim that a judge should be disqualified effectively evades review by regularly becoming moot before an appellate court has an opportunity to rule on the issue. See id. ¶ 37 (“The types of issues likely to evade review are those that are inherently short in duration so that by the time the issue is appealed, a court is no longer in a position to provide a remedy.” (internal quotation marks omitted)). ¶13 Because the disqualification issue has become moot and the exception to the mootness doctrine does not apply, we do not address it.