Court Opinion

ID: 9522768
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 02:32:11.178809+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:03:54.344089
License: Public Domain

GARRARD, Judge,
dissenting.
A nunc pro tunc entry is appropriate to make the record speak the truth. It may not be used as a method to change a ruling actually made, Harris v. Tomlinson (1892), 130 Ind. 426, 30 N.E. 214, or to make timely that which was, in fact, untimely. Schiro v. State (1983), Ind., 451 N.E.2d 1047, cert. denied, — U.S. -, 104 S.Ct. 510, 78 L.Ed.2d 699. It is a familiar principle that such entries must find their basis in written memoranda contemporaneous with or preceding the date of the action described. Stowers v. State (1977), 266 Ind. 403, 363 N.E.2d 978.
It is commendable that the trial court recognized the interest of the county and its taxpayers and afforded the welfare department opportunity to present its claim. It did so by an order book entry on August 26, 1983, wherein it gave the welfare department twenty-one days within which to present its claim. No challenge to the propriety of that action has been made.
The welfare department filed a claim. The file stamp thereon is illegible as to the date of filing. The docket entry of the court states the claim was filed September 19, 1983, after expiration of the twenty-one days.
When the claim was challenged as untimely, and despite the fact that the welfare department produced no evidence whatever that the claim was filed before September 19, the court entered the following:
“Attorney Kevin Likes moves to strike the claim for reason it is untimely filed. The court being duly advised in the premises now overrules the Motion to Strike for being untimely filed for the reason the file stamp shows the claim being filed on September 19th, 1983 and now enters said entry of September 10, 1983 [sic] nunc pro tunc for September 14, 1983.”
The court was without authority to do so. The judgment should be reversed.