Court Opinion

ID: 9549005
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:11:53.494854+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:19:43.778616
License: Public Domain

HOWE, Justice,
dissenting:
I concur with the conclusion in the majority opinion that U.C.A., 1953, § 63-37-1 pertaining to the filing of reports, claims, tax returns, statements and other documents with the State of Utah or its political subdivisions is not applicable to the filing of notices of appeal to this Court. I further concur that under Rule 73(a), mailing within the prescribed time is not the equivalent of filing within the prescribed time. This contention was rejected by the court in Sanchez v. Board of Regents, 625 F.2d 521 (5th Cir.1980). There the court said:
Deposit of a notice of appeal in the mail is not equivalent to filing it, and appellant’s notice was therefore untimely. [Citations omitted.]
Id. at 522. In that case the court was construing Rule 4(a) FRAP, which at the time that case was decided was very similar to our Rule 73(a). Although the dissenting opinion of Justice Stewart cites that case for the proposition that an appellant may rely “on the normal course of delivery of the mail to effectuate the filing of a notice of appeal” that statement relates to another matter, as I will hereafter point out. Both in that case and in Evans v. Jones, 366 F.2d 772 (4th Cir.1966) the appellant mailed his notice of appeal in what he thought to be ample time, only to find that it arrived at the clerk’s office one or two days late. In neither case was it held that the filing of the notice of appeal was timely.
However, in Sanchez v. Board of Regents, supra, the court treated the late-filed notice of appeal as a motion to extend the time for filing the notice of appeal, and remanded the case to the district court for it to consider whether there was excusable neglect which under Rule 4(a) would allow that court to extend the time for filing the notice of appeal.
This practice has been adopted and followed in at least four of the circuits where a finding of excusable neglect by the district court before or after expiration of the *853original period for taking an appeal will validate a late filing, provided filing was made within the sixty-day maximum.1 See Stirling v. Chemical Bank, 511 F.2d 1030 (2d Cir.1975) where the court stated that the trial court could treat the late-filed notice of appeal as “the substantial equivalent” of a motion to extend time due to excusable neglect; Evans v. Jones, supra; Lashley v. Ford Motor Co., 518 F.2d 749 (5th Cir.1975) where the court remanded the case to the district court to give the appellant thirty days to move for an extension of time to file his notice of appeal because of his excusable neglect; Reed v. People of State of Michigan, 398 F.2d 800 (6th Cir.1968).
In Sanchez v. Board of Regents, supra; the court noted that its construction of Rule 4(a) had been criticized as clearly contrary to the text of the rule, citing C. Wright, Law of Federal Courts, § 104, at 522, n. 19 (3d Ed.1976). The court further observed that in 1979 amendments had been made to Rule 4 which now make it clear that a motion to extend the time for filing a notice of appeal must be filed not later than thirty days after the expiration of the original time for appeal, and hence, in the future, a late-filed notice of appeal could no longer be treated as a motion to extend the time for filing a notice of appeal.
Since our Rule 73(a) still reads like the old Federal Rule 4(a), I would follow the above cited federal cases and hold in the instant case that the appellant’s appeal was not timely filed and treat his notice of appeal as a motion to extend the time for filing a notice of appeal. Consequently, I would remand the case to the district court to determine whether it was excusable neglect for appellant’s counsel to rely on the mail to deliver his notice of appeal to the clerk’s office in Sanpete County within the one month period. This practice could afford relief to an attorney who resides in one part of the state and who must file a notice of appeal by mail in another part and relies upon usual delivery times.

. Under Rule 4(a) FRAP, an appellant usually has thirty days to appeal but may request an extension of another thirty days, whereas under Utah’s Rule 73(a) the period of time is one month with the right to request an additional one month.