Court Opinion

ID: 9580298
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:03:49.423617+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:36:11.561347
License: Public Domain

Beasley, Judge,
dissenting.
The majority is concerned about injustice being done the plaintiff if the order continuing the case is allowed to be considered invalid or of no effect because inadvertently entered. It is urging, as I understand it, that the trial court had no discretion to give such effect to its previous order or that it was an abuse of discretion to do so.
The order appealed from ruled that the continuance order should not have been granted because of a defect in procedure occasioned by plaintiff himself. The court’s order implied that a continuance would not have been given had the court realized that the opponent was not notified of the request and had no opportunity to object to a further delay of the already six-year-old lawsuit which had been inactive for four years.
The failure to give such an opportunity lies totally at plaintiff’s *866doorstep. The injustice feared for him is entirely of his own making. But as Presiding Judge Banke points to, what about the injustice rendered the defendant, who was not informed of any activity in the case during a period in excess of five years, and who is faced now with defending against a claim arising out of a business transaction which occurred over ten years ago?
Decided July 13, 1987
Rehearing denied July 30, 1987
Don E. Snow, for appellant.
Ronald Barfield, David B. Dunaway, for appellee.
Even if the court below had discretion to give effect to plaintiff’s ex parte continuance order, the decision not to do so does not amount to an abuse as a matter of law.
I am authorized to state that Presiding Judge Deen joins in this dissent.