Justia Georgia Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

The parties were divorced in Connecticut in 2010. At that time, appellant Husband’s child support obligation was $279 per week for the parties’ two minor children. A Connecticut court modified the support order to facilitate appellee Wife’s move to Georgia with the children, reducing the obligation to $100 per week. In 2016, Wife filed an action in Georgia to domesticate and modify the parties’ Connecticut divorce decree and the modified order. The complaint was served on Husband personally while he was in Coweta County visiting the children. Husband moved to dismiss the action on the ground that the Georgia trial court lacked subject matter jurisdiction to modify the Connecticut child support order under the Uniform Interstate Family Support Act (UIFSA), because the requirements of OCGA § 19-11-172 (a)2 had not been met. Wife argued that jurisdiction was proper under the Uniform Enforcement of Foreign Judgments Law (UEFJL), to both enforce and modify the Connecticut child support order. The trial court ultimately denied Husband’s motion to dismiss, reasoning that it had jurisdiction to modify the Connecticut child support order; however, it granted Husband’s request for a certificate of immediate review. The Georgia Supreme Court granted Husband’s application for interlocutory review, and, having considered the record, the parties’ arguments, and the relevant legal authorities, the Supreme Court reversed the trial court’s judgment. The Georgia trial court did not have jurisdiction; Wife had to modify the child support order in Connecticut, and her invocation of the UEFJL did not change that result. View "Ross v. Ross" on Justia Law

Rhonda Bennett (f/k/a Donley) filed an amended motion for new trial following a habeas court order discharging the payment of restitution and any arrearage for back child support by the purported biological father of Bennett’s minor child. Concluding that she was a non-party to the underlying action and therefore lacked standing to challenge its order, the court dismissed Bennett’s motion. The Georgia Supreme Court reversed, finding the habeas court erred in concluding that Bennett lacked standing. View "Bennett v. Etheridge" on Justia Law

This case involves the revocation of a will due to after-born children of the testator. The probate court determined the will did not contemplate the birth of future children, and therefore their birth revoked the will. The named beneficiary appeals. Finding no reversible error in that decision, the Georgia Supreme Court affirmed. View "Hobbs v. Winfield" on Justia Law

This case involved the expulsion of then-high school student S.G. by the Henry County Board of Education (“Local Board”) as discipline for fighting on school grounds in violation of the student handbook. Specifically, she was charged with physically abusing others, and with a violation that constituted a misdemeanor under Georgia law. Following an evidentiary hearing before a disciplinary hearing officer, S.G. was expelled from Locust Grove High School, and that decision was affirmed by the Local Board. S.G. then filed an appeal to the Superior Court. After considering the evidentiary record, briefs submitted by the parties, and oral argument, the superior court reversed the State Board’s decision and ordered the Local Board to remove the disciplinary findings from the student’s record and to amend the record to reflect the student’s innocence of the disciplinary charges brought against her. That prompted the Local Board’s appeal to the Court of Appeals, which affirmed the superior court’s reversal of the Local Board’s ruling. The Georgia Supreme Court granted the Local Board’s petition for writ of certiorari to examine two issues: whether the Court of Appeals opinion imposed an improper burden of proof upon local school boards with respect to a student’s self-defense claim to disciplinary charges for engaging in a fight; and whether, regardless of its burden of proof analysis, the Court of Appeals correctly determined that the Local Board improperly rejected S.G.’s self-defense claim. After its review, the Supreme Court reversed the Court of Appeals for “veering off courts in substituting its own findings of fact instead of remanding the case to the Local Board to apply the proper law to the record evidence and reach its own findings.” View "Henry Cty. Bd. of Education v. S.G." on Justia Law

Icon Technology Consulting, Inc. (“Icon”) filed suit seeking to enforce a default judgment it obtained from a Missouri court against Lemcon USA Corp. (“Lemcon”). A Georgia trial court rejected Lemcon’s attempt to set aside the default judgment, and the Georgia Court of Appeals dismissed Lemcon’s appeal on the ground that Lemcon: (1) could not invoke the Georgia trial court’s inherent power to set aside a judgment within the same term of court in which it was entered; and (2) had failed to file an application for discretionary appeal as was necessary to seek review of the trial court’s order to the extent it was based on OCGA 9-11-60 (d). The Georgia Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider whether the inherent power of a Georgia court to set aside a judgment within the same term of court in which it was entered extended to a foreign judgment domesticated under OCGA 9-12- 130 et seq. The Court concluded this inherent power did not extend to domesticated foreign judgments. View "Lemcon USA Corp. v. Icon Technology" on Justia Law

This appeal stemmed from a trial court order quieting title in favor of TDGA, LLC. Appellant Peter Mancuso argued, inter alia, that he did not receive proper notice from TDGA regarding the foreclosure of his right of redemption. After review of the trial court record, the Mississippi Supreme Court found the evidence showed TDGA met its burden as required by OCGA 48-4-45(a)(2) by sending notices to Mancuso's known addresses via certified mail. Accordingly, the Court affirmed the trial court's order. View "Mancuso v. TDGA, LLC" on Justia Law

The Roswell City Council enacted a new Unified Development Code to govern land use issues; the Code included a zoning map. Several Roswell property owners filed a lawsuit to challenge the process by which the City Council enacted the Code. When the superior court ruled against the property owners, they directly appealed. The Court of Appeals dismissed their direct appeal, concluding that their lawsuit was a “zoning case” under Georgia Supreme Court decisions in Trend Development Corp. v. Douglas County, (383 SE2d 123) (1989), and O S Advertising Co. v. Rubin, 482 SE2d 295 (1997) (“Rubin”), and thus required an application for discretionary appeal under OCGA 5-6-35(a)(1). But the Mississippi Supreme Court held that a stand-alone lawsuit challenging an ordinance as facially invalid, unconnected to any individualized determination about a particular property, was not a “zoning case” under Trend and Rubin and did not require an application under OCGA 5-6-35. Accordingly, the Supreme Court reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "Schumacher v. City of Roswell" on Justia Law

In a post-divorce contempt action, the Georgia Supreme Court granted Appellant’s application for discretionary appeal to review the trial court’s order finding Appellant in contempt of three separate provisions of the parties’ divorce decree. “To be sure, this Agreement could have been more clearly drafted [. . .] the complete text of the Agreement demonstrates that the parties intended for Husband to assume all tax liabilities of the businesses. We therefore conclude that the trial court’s construction of ‘corporate income tax liability’ constituted a reasonable clarification of that term rather than an improper modification of the Agreement.” The Court affirmed the trial court’s findings as to two of provisions and reverse as to the third. View "Sutherlin v. Sutherlin" on Justia Law

Consolidated appeals arose out of a complaint filed by four Georgia taxpayers in which they challenged the constitutionality of Georgia’s Qualified Education Tax Credit, Ga. L. 2008, p. 1108, as amended (“HB 1133” or the “Bill”). HB 1133 set up a tax credit program that allows individuals and businesses to receive a Georgia income tax credit for donations made to approved not-for-profit student scholarship organizations (“SSOs”). The Bill created a new tax credit statute for that purpose. Generally speaking, the SSO is required to distribute the donated funds as scholarships or tuition grants for the benefit of students who meet certain eligibility requirements, and the parent or guardian of each recipient must endorse the award to the accredited private school of the parents’ choice for deposit into the school’s account. Plaintiffs alleged: (1) the Program was educational assistance program, and the scheme of the Program violated the Constitution; (2) the Program provided unconstitutional gratuities to students who receive scholarship funds under the Program by allowing tax revenue to be directed to private school students without recompense, and also that the tax credits authorized by HB 1133 resulted in unauthorized state expenditures for gratuities; (3) the Program took money from the state treasury in the form of dollar-for-dollar tax credits that would otherwise be paid to the State in taxes, and since a significant portion of the scholarships awarded by the SSOs goes to religious-based schools, the Program takes funds from the State treasury to aid religious schools in violation of the Establishment Clause; and (4) the Department of Revenue violated the statute that authorized tax credits for contributions to SSOs by granting tax credits to taxpayers who have designated that their contribution is to be awarded to the benefit of a particular individual, and by failing to revoke the status of SSOs that have represented to taxpayers that their contribution will fund a scholarship that may be directed to a particular individual. Plaintiffs sought mandamus relief to compel the Commissioner of Revenue to revoke the status of SSOs, and injunctive relief against the defendants to require them to comply with the constitutional provisions and statutory laws set forth in the complaint. In addition to mandamus relief and injunctive relief, plaintiffs sought a declaratory judgment that the Program was unconstitutional. The Georgia Supreme Court found no error in the trial court’s finding plaintiffs lacked standing to pursue their constitutional claims, or their prayer for declaratory relief with respect to those claims, either by virtue of their status as taxpayers or by operation of OCGA 9-6-24. Consequently plaintiffs failed to allege any clear legal right to mandamus relief. View "Gaddy v. Georgia Dept. of Revenue" on Justia Law

Lowell and Janice Register were shareholders of Register Communications, Inc. Green Bull Georgia Partners, LLC threatened to foreclose on property that had been pledged to secure the debts of Register Communications. The Registers sued Green Bull. In connection with their lawsuit, the Registers sought an interlocutory injunction to prohibit any foreclosure pending final judgment. At first, the trial court provisionally granted some injunctive relief, but after further consideration, it concluded that an injunction pending final judgment was not warranted, and it set aside the injunction that it previously had entered. The Registers appealed the order setting aside the interlocutory injunction, and they asked the trial court for an injunction at least to prohibit any foreclosure pending the resolution of their appeal. The trial court granted an injunction pending appeal, and in this case, Green Bull appealed the entry of that injunction. The Georgia Supreme Court found no abuse of discretion in the grant of the injunction, and affirmed the trial court. View "Green Bull Partners, LLC v. Register" on Justia Law