From Casetext: Smarter Legal Research

Brown v. Brown

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, First Circuit
Oct 12, 1982
421 So. 2d 952 (La. Ct. App. 1982)

Opinion

No. 82 CA 0579.

October 12, 1982.

APPEAL FROM SEVENTEENTH JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT, PARISH OF LAFOURCHE, STATE OF LOUISIANA, HONORABLE P. DAVIS MARTINEZ, J.

Charles R. Ryan, Houma, for plaintiff-appellee Rosemary Campbell Brown.

Randall M. Alfred, Houma, for defendant-appellant Lafourche Parish School Bd.

Before EDWARDS, WATKINS and SHORTESS, JJ.


ON MOTION TO DISMISS


This is an appeal from a judgment granting Rosemary Campbell Brown a divorce from Billy Edwin Brown, and ordering that Billy Edwin Brown pay alimony in the sum of $350.00 per month. Billy Edwin Brown has appealed. We find the appeal order was signed before judgment and that the attempted appeal, therefore, is of no effect.

The relevant dates are as follows:

Case tried and oral reasons announced May 10, 1982 Appeal order signed May 11, 1982 Judgment signed May 12, 1982

LSA-C.C.P. art. 1911 reads as follows:

"Except as otherwise provided by law, every judgment shall be signed by the judge. For the purpose of an appeal as provided in Article 2083, no appeal may be taken from a final judgment until the requirement of this Article has been fulfilled."

This article was amended into its present form by Act 618 of 1979. This article, after amendment, could not be more explicit. No appeal can be taken until there is a final judgment signed by the trial judge.

In Schiro v. Viola, 398 So.2d 1294 (La.App. 1st Cir. 1981), we stated that an appeal may be taken only from a signed judgment, not from written or oral reasons for judgment. As we noted in Schiro, the Louisiana Supreme Court reinstated an appeal from reasons for judgment In the Matter of Parker, 399 So.2d 607 (La. 1981), but because of the memorandum nature of the Supreme Court's opinion in Parker, we are unable to determine what unknown factors motivated the Supreme Court's decision. Furthermore, in the present case, a case in which both parties sought a judgment of divorce on the grounds of adultery, the decisional portion of the trial court's oral reasons for judgment simply stated, "Now I don't think that any of the evidence is so circumstantial as to preclude any other reasonable hypothesis that they were having adultery. I would let it go on that." The appeal was taken after that assertion in oral reasons, rather than after formal judgment. Unlike the situation in Parker, there was no language in the present case to suggest that the reasons for judgment constituted a formal judgment of court. No divorce had been proclaimed when the appeal order was signed, and the appeal must be dismissed, as there was no signed judgment or even definitive judgment from which to appeal.

We dismiss the appeal of Billy Edwin Brown, at appellant's cost.

APPEAL DISMISSED.


Summaries of

Brown v. Brown

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, First Circuit
Oct 12, 1982
421 So. 2d 952 (La. Ct. App. 1982)
Case details for

Brown v. Brown

Case Details

Full title:ROSEMARY CAMPBELL BROWN v. BILLY EDWIN BROWN

Court:Court of Appeal of Louisiana, First Circuit

Date published: Oct 12, 1982

Citations

421 So. 2d 952 (La. Ct. App. 1982)

Citing Cases

Williams v. Williams

We have held, in applying the amendment to the quoted article, that an appeal is subject to dismissal if the…

Todd v. Todd

Since here there was no final judgment from which an appeal could be taken, the order of appeal of May 31,…