District Court and the sixteen individual county Probate Courts. We hear as a

Transcription

1 DIRECT APPEAL PRACTICE IN THE MAINE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT Some Observatios about Hearig Direct Appeals from the Trial Courts 1 America Academy of Appellate Lawyers Sprig Meetig: Bosto April 7, The Maie Supreme Judicial Court hears directly, as a matter of right, almost all appeals from judgmets of our trial courts: the Superior Court, the District Court ad the sixtee idividual couty Probate Courts. We hear as a matter of discretio appeals from post-covictio judgmets i crimial cases, M.R.App. P. 19; appeals of the propriety of seteces of oe year or more, M.R. App. P. 20 (challeges to the legality of seteces are heard directly); ad appeals from decisios of the Appellate Divisio of our Workers Compesatio Board, M.R. App. P. 23. Prior to 2001, the Maie Superior Court acted as a itermediate appellate court, hearig appeals i may types of civil ad crimial judgmets from the Maie District Court. The appeals were heard by sigle justices of the Superior Court, ofte as part of motio lists where other o-testimoial matters, like motios to dismiss ad motios for summary judgmet, were heard. The Superior 1 Prepared by Doald G. Alexader, Associate Justice, Maie Supreme Judicial Court.

2 2 Court cotiues to serve as a itermediate appellate court for most appeals from state or local admiistrative agecy decisios. The 2001 chage was promoted by cocer that the itermediate appeal process caused uacceptable delays betwee trial court judgmets ad fial resolutio o appeal, particularly i family matters ad crimial matters. Although the chage i the rules did icrease substatially the umber of family ad crimial matters preseted o direct appeal, a cocurret shift i other case types meat that the chage to direct, as of right, appeals from the District Court did ot result i a sigificat chage i the umber of opiios cosidered ad published by the Court. I 2000 we published 374 opiios, followed by 322 i 2001 (the trasitio year), 360 i 2002, ad 361 i (We published 342 opiios i 2016, 341 i appellate review ad oe judicial disciplie decisio.) Although the umbers of published opiios did ot icrease substatially at after 2001, the Court s workload to publish those opiios chaged sigificatly, particularly i family cases. Most family cases had bee heard i the District Court. 2 Whe family cases came to us o appeal from the decisio o the itermediate appeal to the Superior Court, the files were usually well orgaized ad the issues were ofte cosiderably arrowed from what had bee preseted to 2 As part of the 2001 chage, the District Court was give exclusive jurisdictio of family cases. Previously, the Superior Court had cocurret jurisdictio of such cases, though the vast majority of family cases had bee heard ad decided i the District Court.

3 3 the Superior Court. With the oset of direct appeals from the District Court, the records we received o the direct appeal were ofte poorly orgaized, sometimes missig importat exhibits or trascripts that had to be located or ordered before the appeal could be ready for our preparatio ad cosideratio. Further, the briefs ad argumets o appeal, rather tha focusig o opposig or supportig the Superior Court decisio, ofte saw appellats preset a wide rage of challeges to the trial court process ad decisios. The result was a dramatic icrease i the amout of work required of law clerks reviewig the record ad writig bech memos ad required of assiged justices i preparig the particular appeal for discussio ad coferece o a o briefs day or followig oral argumet. 3 I recet years, the share of our appeal caseload that ivolves family, paretal rights, ad domestic relatios cases has grow, icreasig the work for our law clerks ad justices, eve whe overall appeal umbers have remaied flat or eve declied i the years sice the recessio. For example, prior to 2013 we issued approximately 30 to 35 opiios a year resolvig child protective appeals, 3 Our practice for preparig appeals to be cofereced is to radomly assig appeals to idividual justice s chambers betwee four weeks ad eight weeks prior to the time that the appeal is scheduled to be cosidered at oral argumet or at a o briefs coferece. A law clerk with the assiged chambers the prepares a bech memo describig the trial court decisio, the procedural ad factual history of the case o appeal, the ature of the evidece i the record, the legal argumets preseted by the parties, a aalysis of those argumets, ad a recommedatio for decisio. Sometimes, bech memos may referece other legal issues ot addressed i the briefs, most ofte justiciablity questios such as failure to preserve a poit, isufficiecy of the record, stadig, mootess, or timeliess. The bech memo is circulated to all justices who will be sittig o a appeal two weeks prior to the time the appeal is to be heard. Idividual justices chambers do ot prepare bech memos for appeals other tha the memo prepared by the assiged justice s chambers.

4 4 cases i which the State has acted to protect childre i family situatios. Last year, 2016, we issued 78 opiios i child protective cases, followig 58 such opiios i 2015 ad 62 i Beig a appellate court that hears direct appeals from the trial court, without ay filter of a itermediate appellate court or a certificatio process, has certai impacts o the work of the seve justices of Maie Supreme Judicial Court. First, each of us is resposible for draftig ad participatig i collegial review of a lot of opiios, betwee 35 ad 50 a year per justice, ot coutig separate cocurrig or dissetig opiios some of which see the light of day, some of which do ot. I 2016, we published 342 opiios. This icluded 187 siged (or per curiam) opiios, of which 186 resolved a appeal oe was a judicial disciplie decisio. We also issued 155 memoradum decisios. 4 Secod, our cosideratio of all appeals from the trial courts lets us see the full rage of issues ad challeges beig preseted to the trial courts, ad the full rage of quality of advocacy beig preseted by cousel ad urepreseted litigats. I this review of appeals, we ca also perceive chages i the ature of 4 A memoradum decisio is a brief opiio that idetifies the trial court ad the parties, summarizes the ature of the case ad the poits asserted o appeal, ad states the established law beig applied to resolve the appeal, with citatio to relevat precedets ad statutes. Because of the eed to review sometimes volumious records ad sometimes poorly focused legal argumets to resolve appeals presetig issues such as sufficiecy of the evidece or abuse of discretio i the trial court s decisiomakig, may memoradum decisios ca require greater preparatio time tha is required for siged or per curiam opiios.

5 5 cases ad advocacy as they occur, at least as those chages are reflected i the work of the trial courts. For example, as discussed above, we see the sigificat icrease i the relative proportio of trial court cases ad appeals that preset difficult issues regardig fudametal rights to paret i the cotext of evolvig family structures. We also ote declies i use of trial courts i some areas. For example, oly three of the 342 opiios we published i 2016 addressed appeals from verdicts i civil jury trials; two of those addressed disputes betwee a sigle auto dealer ad auto maufactures ivolvig applicatio of a Maie statute addressig auto dealer/maufacturer relatioships. 5 The third civil jury verdict appeal addressed emiet domai damages arisig from a road wideig project. 6 We decided o appeals from jury verdicts ivolvig a tort claim, product liability issue, employee rights dispute, 7 or ay other types of cases that are the usual subjects of civil trial advocacy practice. Third, because the Maie Supreme Judicial Court has sigificat resposibility regardig oversight ad maagemet of the judicial brach, Darlig s Auto Mall v. Geeral Motors LLC, 2016 ME 48; Ford Motor Co. v. Darlig s, 2016 ME 6 Pikham v. Departmet of Trasportatio, 2016 ME We did address oe appeal followig a jury verdict that addressed a employee rights dispute, but the appeal did ot ivolve the jury trial or the verdict, oly the pretrial grat of summary judgmet o a claim that was ot preseted to the jury. Sulliva v. St. Joseph s Rehabilitatio ad Residece, 2016 ME 107.

6 6 icludig the trial courts, our review of all trial court appeals allows us to see how thigs are goig i the trial courts ad helps us to idetify ad support good case maagemet practices, ad to idetify ad seek to correct iefficiet case maagemet practices. Our Chief Justice has sigificat ad very time cosumig maagemet resposibilities across all areas of or courts activities. To support that, each oe of the other six of us has specific maagemet oversight resposibilities i importat areas: implemetatio of a electroic filig ad records maagemet system; developmet ad implemetatio of a more efficiet civil case maagemet processes; developmet ad implemetatio of a more efficiet family case maagemet processes that also, hopefully, will be less stressful for childre who are subject to such cases; implemetatio of improvemets i our bar exam ad bar admissio processes, icludig upcomig adoptio of the Uified Bar Exam; oversight of our attorey professioal resposibility ad bar discipliary program;

7 7 oversight of our judicial educatio, professioal resposibility ad discipliary efforts; ad oversight of costructio of a large ew courthouse. These are just some of the admiistrative resposibilities that we have that are aided ad supported by the practical iformatio we get from seeig appeals from all of our trial court decisios without ay itermediate appeal or certificatio filter o the matters that we must review o appeal. ** ed of documet **