Court Opinion

ID: 9596754
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:52:43.098687+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:01:35.921574
License: Public Domain

Beasley, Chief Judge,
concurring specially.
I agree that the appeal must be dismissed for failure to follow the discretionary appeal procedure. OCGA § 5-6-35 (a) (8) requires that permission be obtained to appeal from the denial of a motion to set aside a judgment brought pursuant to OCGA § 9-11-60 (d). See, e.g., Manley v. Jones, 203 Ga. App. 173 (416 SE2d 744) (1992). Compare Leventhal v. Moseley, 264 Ga. 891 (453 SE2d 455) (1995), which recognizes that a direct appeal lay from an order on what was in effect a motion to correct a clerical error pursuant to OCGA § 9-11-60 (g) and not, as denominated by defendants, a motion to set aside; that would have required an application.
*562MMT Enterprises’ motion was brought on the grounds that venue was improper at the outset or became lost as to the losing defendant when the jury returned a verdict in favor of the venue-providing defendant. OCGA § 9-11-60 (d) (1) allows a motion to set aside a judgment based on lack of jurisdiction over the person.
I do not agree with that portion of the majority opinion devoted to the question of the timeliness of the appeal. In Johnson v. Barnes, 237 Ga. 502 (229 SE2d 70) (1976), the Supreme Court ruled that the notice of appeal, filed within 30 days of the denial of plaintiffs motion to set aside (denominated by plaintiff as a motion to vacate), was timely. It was timely because such a motion, when overruled, is itself appealable even though it is not listed in what is now OCGA § 5-6-38. It is not a matter of “extending” the time to appeal from an earlier judgment; the ruling on the motion is appealable itself regardless of the distance timewise between the filing of the motion and the judgment it seeks to set aside. It is not infrequent that a motion to set aside will be made for lack of jurisdiction over the person, for instance, long after the judgment is rendered; it may be prompted by the judgment creditor’s efforts to enforce the judgment by levy or garnishment or some other device. It cannot accurately be said that the filing of the motion “extends” the 30-day period for filing an appeal from the judgment.
Now that an application is required, which was not the case when Johnson was decided, it is not a matter of filing a notice of appeal within 30 days but rather one of filing an application within 30 days. OCGA § 5-6-35 (d). The express provision in subsection (d) for applications from the OCGA § 5-6-38 (a) extension-creating motions does not affect the time requirement for seeking to appeal the ruling on a motion to set aside; it is listed in subsection (a) (8). MMT Enterprises acted timely in pursuing its appeal, as it filed on January 12, 1995, from an order entered December 16, 1994. The fatal error was that it filed a notice of appeal in the trial court instead of an application in this court.
The cases which follow Johnson should not be overruled, once it is taken into account that the method for appealing has changed since Johnson was decided. The court in Littlejohn v. Tower Assoc., 163 Ga. App. 37 (293 SE2d 33) (1982), however, misstated that Johnson, supra, stands for the proposition that “[a] motion to set aside will extend the time for filing notice of appeal.” Id. at 38. As indicated above, it does not extend time but rather stands alone, as an appealable ruling; the 30-day period is measured from it, unconnected with its temporal relationship to the judgment it seeks to set aside. The same statement and mischaracterization is made in Mathis v. Hegwood, 169 Ga. App. 547 (314 SE2d 122) (1984), but again the dismissal was proper. Likewise in the cases of Law Offices of Johnson & *563Robinson v. Fortson, 175 Ga. App. 706 (334 SE2d 33) (1985) and Miller v. Bank of the South, 177 Ga. App. 42 (338 SE2d 436) (1985). On the other hand, Perryman v. Ga. Power Co., 180 Ga. App. 259 (348 SE2d 762) (1986), and Bartlett v. Hembree, 177 Ga. App. 253 (339 SE2d 388) (1985), do not fail in this regard.
Decided September 20, 1995
Michael 0. Horgan, Jeffrey C. McLellan, for appellant.
Charles E. Legette, Jr., for appellee.