Court Opinion

ID: 9686957
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 16:12:07.777108+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:23.210342
License: Public Domain

REYNOLDSON, Chief Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent.
As a preliminary matter, it should be noted the nunc pro tunc order in question apparently was signed ex parte, which does not conform to our ease law. Chariton & Lucas County National Bank v. Taylor, 210 Iowa 1153, 1160, 232 N.W. 487, 490 (1930); Snyder v. Fahey, 183 Iowa 1118, 1123, 168 N.W. 117, 119 (1918). For a reason it must deem sufficient, the State has not raised this issue at any stage in this proceeding. We therefore should address the issues it does raise.
The majority concedes trial court intended at the time of the initial ruling to provide a 90-day credit on the section 321.555 one-year suspension, even though the order signed failed to carry out his intention. The issue is whether omission of this credit may be supplied by a nunc pro tunc order. I would hold that it could and proceed to the merits of the appeal.
That an order may be changed which does not express the intention of the court when the order was entered is no longer open to question. In Headley v. Headley, *124172 N.W.2d 104 (Iowa 1969), the decree entered by trial Judge Pettit awarded alimony to the wife and provided it should be paid until the husband remarried or died. Eight months later the former wife filed application for order nunc pro tunc to have the decree corrected to provide the alimony payable until her remarriage or death. The hearing on the application was before Judge McGiverin who, assuming a mistake was made, held it was not an “evident mistake” so as to permit correction under the provisions of what is now section 602.17, The Code.
When the decision was appealed, this court noted there was no evidence of what was done or said when the decision was made. It observed that Judge McGiverin “was placed in an almost impossible position of having to decide an important matter without benefit of the only evidence that under the circumstances of this ease would be material.” Headley, 172 N.W.2d at 107. The opinion further stated:
Whether there was a “mistake” depends ultimately upon the judicial intention; whether the record is “evidently” at odds with that intention, is likewise dependent, the dependency in both instances being proportionate to the required quantum of proof. The oral testimony before Judge McGiverin was silent as to Judge Pettit’s intention; and the impossible position alluded to above was resolved by denying the order.
On remand, therefore, the parties should address themselves to what the court intended rather than what the parties thought the court intended.

We must, therefore, remand this case for hearing and determination by Judge Pettit or after benefit of his testimony.
Id. at 109.
Contrary to the majority’s holding today, the Headley court determined a prior order may be changed to conform to the intent of the judge who enters it. It held the essential proof is the intention of that judge, to be included in his or her findings if he or she hears the nunc pro tunc application, or supplied by his or her oral testimony if the hearing is before a different judge. It is this finding or testimony which may make the mistake “evident.” See also State v. Harbour, 240 Iowa 705, 709-10, 37 N.W.2d 290, 293 (1949).
The stringent requirements implicit in the majority decision are not supported by other well-reasoned decisions of this court. A nunc pro tunc order is proper to make the record conform to an adjudication inferentially made but which by oversight or evident mistake was omitted from the record. See Jersild v. Sarcone, 163 N.W.2d 78, 81 (Iowa 1968). There is no requirement that there be some written evidence or a calendar entry which conforms to the provisions sought to be provided by the application for nunc pro tunc order. Harbour, 240 Iowa at 714, 37 N.W.2d at 295 (“We conclude the court did not err in ordering the correction of the record on parol evidence only and that no written evidence, entry or note was essential.”); Chariton & Lucas County National Bank v. Taylor, 213 Iowa 1206, 1209, 240 N.W. 740, 741 (1932); Cook, Corrective Entries Nunc Pro Tunc, 13 Iowa L.Rev. 241, 433 (1928) (“It would appear that the trend of the Iowa decisions is toward the general rule that parol evidence may be resorted to to establish the terms of the decision to which it is sought to make the record conform.”). Nor is it essential that there be some oral pronouncement from the bench when the original decision was made which conforms with the change sought. Headley, 172 N.W.2d at 106; Chariton & Lucas County National Bank v. Taylor, 213 Iowa at 1209, 240 N.W. at 741.
We have always held courts have inherent power to make orders nunc pro tunc, and to modify their records so as to make them speak the truth. State v. Frey, 206 Iowa 981, 984, 221 N.W. 445, 447 (1928). Existing related statutes have been characterized as “merely cumulative” to this inherent power. Harbour, 240 Iowa at 710, 37 N.W.2d at 293. Enactment of the Iowa Criminal Code brought the repeal of section 602.15 (record may be expunged or amended before it has been signed by the judge or *125within sixty days thereafter). See 1976 Sess., 66th G.A., ch. 1245(4), § 525, effective January 1, 1978. Apparently this was to accommodate new statutes relating to reconsideration of sentences. See §§ 902.4, 903.2, The Code 1979. Repeal of section 602.15 is an additional reason militating against a rigid construction of the “evident mistake” language of section 602.17.
Today’s trial courts are busy courts. Lacking support personnel, they frequently must rely on lawyers to draft rulings which often are signed in necessary haste amid unavoidable interruptions. As a matter of policy, we should avoid drawing tight little restrictive lines around the court’s subsequent power to make corrections and supply omissions to conform a ruling to the court’s intent.
I would hold trial court had the authority to sign this nunc pro tunc order and would proceed to the substantive merits of the case.
REES and ALLBEE, JJ., join in this dissent.