Court Opinion

ID: 9679187
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 06:43:41.054182+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:11.130193
License: Public Domain

Tom Glaze, Justice, dissenting. After setting out Supreme Court Rule 4-2(b)(3) in full in its per curiam opinion, the court promptly fails to follow the Rule’s dictates. The Rule contains this court’s abstracting requirements, and, in pertinent part, provides the following: Whether or not the appellee has called attention to deficiencies in the appellant’s abstract or addendum, the court may address the question at any time. If the court finds the abstract or addendum to be deficient such that the court cannot reach the merits of the case or such as to cause an unreasonable or unjust delay in the disposition of the appeal, the court will notify the appellant that he or she will be afforded an opportunity to cure any deficiencies and hasffteen days with which to file a substituted abstract, addendum, and brief, at his or her own expense. (Emphasis added.) Not one justice even suggests he or she is unable to reach the merits of this case because of a deficient abstract. Why, you ask? Because they are clearly able to do so. The only unreasonable delay in this case is caused by this court’s erroneous decision to order the appellant to abstract additional material that I believe is unnecessary to an understanding of the issues presented to the court for decision. This court’s improper directive not only adds to the time this court must wait for the appellant to file a substituted brief, but the court must also further delay action in order to give the appellee additional time to respond to the appellant’s substituted brief, once it is filed. This added delay unnecessarily adds to the expense in the filing and disposing of this case on appeal. Although this court may address deficient abstract and addendum questions even though the appellee has not done so, it is telling that the appellee (the State here) did not find it necessary to raise any deficiency issue concerning the appellant’s abstract. In fact, the State was fully able to address the merits of this case and, in doing so, filed its responsive brief in timely fashion. See Ark. Sup. Ct. R. 4-2(a)(5) and (8). Finally, the court’s per curiam says the abstract or addendum is deficient because appellant did not abstract (1) his motion to suppress, (2) the briefs filed supporting his motion, or (3) the court’s order denying his motion. In fact, appellant did much more than that! This court continues to miss the obvious: when the appellant abstracted the trial court’s ruling, he complied with Supreme Court Rule 4-2(a)(8), which provides that the appellant’s brief shall contain an addendum, which shall include true and legible photocopies of the order, judgment, decree, ruling, and letter opinion from which the appeal is taken. Here, the appellant did so by abstracting the trial court’s ruling, denying appellee’s motion to suppress. In addition, appellant, when abridging the record, abstracted the entire suppression hearing, which took three separate days: September 16, 2002, September 23, 2002, and October 7, 2002. Besides testimony and video tapes of the officer involved in the suppression issue, the abstract also included twenty-four pages of colloquy between the judge, prosecutor, and the defense attorney. At those hearings, the judge and attorneys thoroughly argued the evidence and law bearing on appellant’s appeal. At the conclusion of the suppression hearing on October 7, 2002, the judge immediately ruled from the bench that appellee’s motion to suppress was denied. The appellant abstracted the judge’s findings and ruling as follows: In this case, the court has reviewed the tape of the interview with the defendant, Mr. Baker, and the court finds that his indication that he might need an attorney and then the officer asking him if he desired to have an attorney is not answered by Mr. Baker directly. It does appear that this is an equivocal situation. Motion to suppress is denied under the circumstances the defendant knew why he was asked to come to the sheriff s office, and he did not invoke his right to an attorney. The judge’s pretrial order denying appellant’s motion is also found in the record, dated October 7, 2002, as is required in Rule 3-4(a) and Administrative Order 2(b). The order does not contain as much detail as the judgment ruling from the bench. The order reads as follows: “Motion to suppress is denied . .. [T]he defendant knew why he was asked to come to the sheriffs office, and he did not invoke his right to an attorney.” (Emphasis added.) Both the appellant and appellee are afforded the option to abridge the record so as to include only those matters which they and the court believe permit them to reach and decide the merits of this case. As pointed out above, not only did the appellant and appellee believe the abstract was sufficient, my fellow justices make no suggestion that they cannot reach the merits in this appeal. In fact, this court’s clerk did not find that appellant’s abstract or addendum was deficient, as evidenced by his acceptance of appellant’s brief. Rule 4-2(a)(8). As for the motion to suppress and requested pretrial briefs, there is nothing in our rules that mandates they be included in the parties’ abstract or addendum unless they are needed to address the merits of the issues on appeal. One need only reflect for a brief minute to understand why memorandum briefs furnished to the trial judge are not needed to be abstracted on appeal: those legal points and citations and arguments are expected to be addressed in their arguments to this court on appeal. This court recently amended its abstracting requirements to make them more liberal so as to reduce the number of cases dismissed due to procedural error. Decisions like this one place attorneys in a position where they will feel compelled to abstract unnecessary material in a case because the appellate court may disagree, causing delay and added expenses they wish to avoid. It is a mistake, in my opinion, for this court to ignore the attorneys and our clerk by requiring them to add unnecessary materials to appellant’s abstract and addendum, especially when our court can readily address the merits in this appeal. Therefore, I dissent.