Court Opinion

ID: 9383990
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-03-31 16:02:15.190721+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:17:49.430846
License: Public Domain

Rel: March 31, 2023

Notice: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the advance sheets of Southern Reporter.
Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Alabama Appellate Courts, 300 Dexter Avenue,
Montgomery, Alabama 36104-3741 ((334) 229-0650), of any typographical or other errors, in order that corrections
may be made before the opinion is published in Southern Reporter.

 ALABAMA COURT OF CIVIL APPEALS
                               OCTOBER TERM, 2022-2023
                                _________________________

                                         CL-2022-1251
                                   _________________________

                                   Ex parte James R. Allen

                      PETITION FOR WRIT OF MANDAMUS

                                     (In re: James R. Allen

                                                      v.

                                            Lucille Allen)

    (Jefferson Circuit Court, Bessemer Division: DR-13-900535)

THOMPSON, Presiding Judge.

         On August 19, 2022, the Jefferson Circuit Court ("the trial court")

entered a judgment divorcing James Allen ("the husband") and Lucille

Allen ("the wife"). The wife filed a postjudgment motion to alter, amend,
CL-2022-1251

or vacate the divorce judgment on September 1, 2022. The husband did

not file a postjudgment motion. The trial court set a hearing on the wife's

postjudgment motion for November 29, 2022. That same day, after

conducting the hearing, the trial court signed and dated an order

amending the divorce judgment. The amended divorce judgment was not

entered into the State Judicial Information System ("SJIS") until

December 2, 2022.

     On December 15, 2022, the husband filed a petition for a writ of

mandamus, requesting this court to vacate "the [trial] court['s] Amended

[Divorce] Judgment as a nullity and[,] therefore[,] void and [to] direct the

trial court to vacate the [amended divorce] judgment entered on

December 2, 2022." In his petition, the husband argues that the amended

divorce judgment is void because it was entered into the SJIS beyond the

90 days allotted for the trial court to rule upon that motion. See Rule

59.1, Ala. R. Civ. P.

     The wife argues, in response to the husband's petition, that because

the trial court signed and dated the amended divorce judgment 1 day

before the 90-day deadline in Rule 59.1, the amended divorce judgment

is not void and should not be vacated.

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           "A petition for a writ of mandamus is the proper method
     for obtaining review of a trial court's authority to rule on a
     posttrial motion beyond the time period set forth in Rule 59.1,
     Ala. R. Civ. P. See Ex parte Chamblee, 899 So. 2d 244, 244-45
     (Ala. 2004) (granting petitions for the writ of mandamus that
     "implicate[d] the authority of the trial judge under Rule
     59.1...."). See also Ex parte Davidson, 782 So. 2d 237 (Ala.
     2000), in which this Court issued the writ of mandamus
     setting aside the trial court's order, entered after posttrial
     motions had been denied by operation of law pursuant to Rule
     59.1, as void."

Ex parte Jackson Hosp. & Clinic, Inc., 49 So. 3d 1210, 1211 (Ala. 2010).

     Rule 58, Ala. R. Civ. P., provides:

            "(a) Rendition of Orders and Judgments. A judge may
     render an order or a judgment: (1) by executing a separate
     written document, (2) by including the order or judgment in a
     judicial opinion, (3) by endorsing upon a motion the words
     'granted,' 'denied,' 'moot,' or words of similar import, and
     dating and signing or initialing it, (4) by making or causing to
     be made a notation in the court records, or (5) by executing
     and transmitting an electronic document to the electronic-
     filing system.

           "….

           "(c) Entry of Order or Judgment. Upon rendition of an
     order or a judgment as provided in subdivision (a)(1-4) of this
     rule, the clerk shall forthwith enter such order or judgment in
     the court record. An order or a judgment shall be deemed
     'entered' within the meaning of these Rules and the Rules of
     Appellate Procedure as of the actual date of the input of the
     order or judgment into the State Judicial Information System.
     …"

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     Rule 59.1, Ala. R. Civ. P. states:

           "[n]o postjudgment motion filed pursuant to Rules 50,
     52, 55, or 59 [, Ala. R. Civ. P.,] shall remain pending in the
     trial court for more than ninety (90) days, unless with the
     express consent of all the parties, which consent shall appear
     of record, or unless extended by the appellate court to which
     an appeal of the judgment would lie, and such time may be
     further extended for good cause shown. … A failure by the
     trial court to render an order disposing of any pending
     postjudgment motion within the time permitted hereunder, or
     any extension thereof, shall constitute a denial of such motion
     as of the date of the expiration of the period."

(Emphasis added.)

     We note that the Committee Comments to Amendment to

Rule 59.1 Effective October 24, 2008, state:

           "In Ex parte Chamblee, 899 So. 2d 244, 248 (Ala. 2004),
     the Court 'reaffirm[ed] that for purposes of Rule 59.1 a trial
     judge 'disposes of' a pending postjudgment motion only by
     properly entering a ruling either denying or granting the
     motion.' In 2006 the Committee proposed, and the Supreme
     Court adopted, an amendment to Rule 58(c) providing that
     electronic input into the State Judicial Information System
     constitutes 'entry.' The Committee noted that the elimination
     of handwritten entries of judgments prevents judges from
     personally making such entries on the docket sheet or the
     case-action summary and to that extent 'reinstates the
     distinction between the substantive, judicial act of rendering
     a judgment and the procedural, ministerial act of entering a
     judgment.' Committee Comments to Amendment to Rule 58
     Effective September 19, 2006. This distinction also applies to
     Rule 59.1 if a judge renders an order granting a postjudgment
     motion before the 90th day but the clerk does not
     electronically enter the order until after the 90th day. Thus,

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     the Committee, at the request of the Court, has proposed this
     amendment to Rule 59.1 to cause the timely rendering of an
     order to be effective to prevent the automatic denial by
     expiration of time, but retaining the requirement that the
     order must still be entered for other purposes of these Rules,
     such as the running of the time for an appeal pursuant to Rule
     4, Ala. R. App. P. The Committee notes that with the rapid
     progression of electronic filing, many judges personally enter
     orders and judgments in the electronic system. This practice
     constitutes simultaneous rendition and entry and thereby
     avoids the problem that this amendment addresses."

     Here, the divorce judgment was entered on August 19, 2022. The

wife's postjudgment motion was filed on September 1, 2022. Under Rule

59.1, the trial court had 90 days to rule on that motion, or until November

30, 2022. The trial court validly rendered the amended divorce judgment

on November 29, 2022 -- 1 day prior to the 90-day deadline.

     Since the amended divorce judgment was rendered within 90 days

of the filing of the wife's postjudgment motion, the amended divorce

judgment is a valid judgment. Rule 59.1.

     PETITION DENIED.

     Moore, Edwards, Hanson, and Fridy, JJ., concur.

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