How to Handle Appellate Court's Refusal to Rule on a Motion
My question involves traffic court in the State of: CA
I'm going to keep this short. Happy to provide more details if anyone wants that.
I'm appealing a traffic court verdict. I filed two motions in the appellate division in December 2010. It is almost May 2011 now and they still have not ruled on either motion. They have scheduled my appeal for final oral argument on May 20, so it seems they are going to ignore the motions.
What can I do here?
Re: How to Handle Appellate Court's Refusal to Rule on a Motion
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guerneca
I'm appealing a traffic court verdict. I filed two motions in the appellate division in December 2010. It is almost May 2011 now and they still have not ruled on either motion. They have scheduled my appeal for final oral argument on May 20, so it seems they are going to ignore the motions.
What can I do here?
You can attend the hearing on May 20th.
The time delay likely has nothing to do with the court's opinion of your motion and everything to do with scheduling and workload.
Show up at the scheduled hearing and make your argument.
Re: How to Handle Appellate Court's Refusal to Rule on a Motion
Re: How to Handle Appellate Court's Refusal to Rule on a Motion
Two points in response:
1. The normal time frame for this particular court to rule on a motion is 7 to 10 days (according to the clerk). They've ruled on a couple of other motions I've filed for the same case within 10 days: motion for extension and motion to augment the record.
So, the 5 month delay is highly unusual. The court clerk has said the same thing.
2. My motions are not frivolous. They were drafted based on examples in the book "Fight your Ticket and Win" by attorney David Brown. Specifically, the motions were:
a) Motion to reconsider motion to augment the settled statement on appeal (they denied the original motion because they misinterpreted the sequence of events leading up the preparation of the settled statement). In the alternative, I asked the court to issue a stay in the proceedings for me to seek writ review by the district court of appeal.
b) Motion for extension of time (the extension request is moot now as the court took too long - so I went ahead and filed my opening brief) and request to file supplemental brief once the record on appeal is corrected.
I will certainly attend the hearing. What's unclear is what to do with the motions because they are vital to the appeal. It really makes no sense to decide the appeal without an adequate record of the trial court proceedings.
The whole point of the motions was to correct the record on appeal so the appeal can be properly considered. And to allow time to seek writ review if the court decides not to amend the record on appeal by denying the motion. Appeals typically get decided on the same day as oral argument in this court, so I'm afraid it won't leave me any time to have these motions enforced if I wait until that date.