Dumas v. Brooks

201 A.3d 1273

Lori A. DUMAS, Appellee

v.Tracy M. BROOKS, Appellant

No. 2007 EDA 2016

Superior Court of Pennsylvania.

Submitted March 5, 2018

Filed December 31, 2018

Jonathan P. Newcomb, Philadelphia, for appellant.

Walter J. McHugh, Philadelphia, for appellee.

BEFORE: STABILE, J., DUBOW, J., and FORD ELLIOTT, P.J.E.

OPINION BY STABILE, J.:

Appellant, Tracy M. Brooks ("Father"), appeals from an order entered May 26, 2016 in the Court of Common Pleas of Philadelphia County, Family Court, modifying the amount of child support owed by Father after the trial court granted a motion for reconsideration filed by Appellee, Lori A. Dumas ("Mother"), of its previous support order of September 17, 2015. We vacate the May 26, 2016 order and reinstate the prior support order entered on September 17, 2015.

Mother and Father were married, but divorced in 2012. In 2015, Mother filed a complaint seeking child support. Mother was the primary custodian of the parties' only child, while Father had custody every other weekend and for dinner visits.

On September 17, 2015, following an evidentiary hearing, the trial court entered an order directing Father to pay child support to Mother. On October 2, 2015, Mother filed a motion for reconsideration to increase the amount of support. On October 15, 2015, the trial court signed an order granting Mother's motion for reconsideration. The prothonotary received the signed order the same day, a fact demonstrated by the time-stamp on the order. The next day, October 16, 2015, Mother appealed the September 17, 2015 order to this Court at No. 3360 EDA 2015. On October 28, 2015, the prothonotary entered the October 15, 2015 order granting reconsideration on the docket.

On April 8, 2016, more than 120 days after the prothonotary received the order granting reconsideration, the trial court, seeking to clarify the status of Mother's motion for reconsideration, sent a letter to this Court advising that it had granted Mother's motion for reconsideration and requested that we remand the matter to the trial court for further proceedings. In an order filed on April 18, 2016, this Court dismissed Mother's appeal at No. 3360 EDA 2015, on the basis that the grant of reconsideration rendered Mother's appeal from the September 17, 2015 support order inoperative. This Court further directed the trial court to schedule a hearing on the motion for reconsideration within the next thirty days.¹

On May 4, 2016 and May 23, 2016, the trial court held hearings relating to Mother's motion for reconsideration. On May 26, 2016, the trial court issued an order increasing Father's support obligations. Father filed a timely appeal, and both Father and the trial court complied with Pa.R.A.P. 1925.

Father raises three issues in this appeal:²

1. Did the lower court have jurisdiction to enter a reconsidered decision under Pa.R.C.P 1930.2 when the lower court neither requested additional testimony nor entered a reconsidered decision, within 120 days from the date reconsideration was granted[?]

2. Did the trial court err and commit an abuse of discretion when, after initially granting Father credit for all his business deductions in a [f]inal [o]rder, the trial court then entered a reconsidered decision that granted him none, when no new evidence, no new arguments, and no new testimony was provided on the issue of deductions, and where no evidence exists that Father took the deductions to shelter disposable income available for child support[?]

3. Did the trial court err and commit an abuse of discretion when, after initially entering an [o]rder that gave neither party a credit for health insurance coverage, the trial court entered a reconsidered decision that granted Mother a credit for health coverage, even though evidence had been ruled to be credible by the [j]udge in two separate hearings that Father provided health coverage for the child, and the trial court gave no reason for why it granted the credit to mother in the reconsidered decision[?]

Father's Brief at 4.

In his first argument, which we find dispositive of this appeal, Father contends that the trial court lacked authority to modify the September 17, 2015 support order by failing to enter a new decision within 120 days after granting Mother's motion for reconsideration. This issue implicates several of our procedural rules.

Pennsylvania Rule of Civil Procedure 1930.2 provides in relevant part:

(a) There shall be no motions for post-trial relief in any domestic relations matter, including Protection of Victims of Sexual Violence or Intimidation matters.

(b) A party aggrieved by the decision of the court may file a motion for reconsideration in accordance with Pa.R.A.P 1701(b)(3). If the court does not grant the motion for reconsideration within the time permitted, the time for filing a notice of appeal will run as if the motion for reconsideration had never been presented to the court.

(c) The court shall render its reconsidered decision within 120 days of the date the motion for reconsideration is granted, except as set forth in subdivision (e). If the court's decision is not rendered within 120 days, the motion shall be deemed denied.

(d) If the court does not enter a reconsidered decision within 120 days, the time for filing a notice of appeal will begin to run anew from the date of entry of the reconsidered decision or from the 121st day after the motion for reconsideration was granted.

(e) If the court grants the motion for reconsideration and files its order within the 30-day appeal period, the court may issue an order during the applicable 120-day period directing that additional testimony be taken. If the court issues an order for additional testimony, the reconsidered decision need not be rendered within 120 days, and the time for filing a notice of appeal will run from the date the reconsidered decision is rendered.

Pa.R.C.P. 1930.2 (emphasis added).

Rule 1930.2(b) incorporates the timeliness requirements within Pa.R.A.P. 1701(b)(3). Rule 1701(b)(3) provides that after an appeal is filed, the trial court may:

[g]rant reconsideration of the order which is the subject of the appeal ... if:

(i) an application for reconsideration of the order is filed in the trial court ... within the time provided or prescribed by law; and

(ii) an order expressly granting reconsideration of such prior order is filed in the trial court ... within the time prescribed by these rules for the filing of a notice of appeal³ ... or within any shorter time provided or prescribed by law for the granting of reconsideration.

A timely order granting reconsideration under this paragraph shall render inoperative any such notice of appeal ... theretofore or thereafter filed or docketed with respect to the prior order. The petitioning party shall and any party may file a praecipe with the prothonotary of any court in which such an inoperative notice or petition is filed or docketed and the prothonotary shall note on the docket that such notice or petition has been stricken under this rule. Where a timely order of reconsideration is entered under this paragraph, the time for filing a notice of appeal or petition for review begins to run anew after the entry of the decision on reconsideration, whether or not that decision amounts to a reaffirmation of the prior determination of the trial court[.]

Id. (emphasis added).

Read together, Pa.R.C.P. 1930.2 and Pa.R.A.P. 1701(b)(3) provide that a notice of appeal becomes inoperative when, during the thirty-day appeal period, a party "files" a motion for reconsideration and the trial court "files" an order expressly granting reconsideration of the order that is the subject of the appeal. If both "filing" conditions are satisfied, the trial court must either render a reconsidered decision or issue an order for additional testimony within 120 days after filing the order granting reconsideration. Pa.R.C.P. 1930.2 (c), (e). If 120 days elapse without a reconsidered decision or order for additional testimony, the motion for reconsideration is deemed denied, and the appeal period begins to run from the 121st day. Pa.R.C.P. 1930.2(d).

The question we first must decide is when the trial court's "filing " of its reconsideration order took place under Rule 1930.2(e), as that date determines here whether the trial court had jurisdiction to reconsider its September 17, 2015 support order. The prothonotary received the reconsideration order on October 15, 2015, but did not docket it until October 28, 2015. The last day to file an appeal from the September 17, 2015 order was October 17, 2015, thereby placing the "filing" of the reconsideration order within and the docketing of the reconsideration order outside of the 30-day appeal period.

We find guidance from other procedural cases and conclude that an order is "filed" for purposes of Rule 1930.2(e) when the prothonotary receives it from the trial court, regardless of when the prothonotary dockets the trial court's order.⁴

In Griffin v. Central Sprinkler Corp. , 823 A.2d 191, 197 (Pa. Super. 2003), we addressed whether, under Pa.R.C.P. 205.1, the appellant's praecipe for writ of summons to the Montgomery County prothonotary's office dated April 13, 1999, but not time-stamped until April 20, 1999—the day after the statute of limitations expired—properly permitted the granting of summary judgment on the basis the action was time-barred. Rule 205.1 provides in relevant part that any legal paper sent by mail shall not be deemed filed until received by the appropriate officer. In Griffin, the prothonotary's first deputy testified that the office had been backed up, and that the time-stamp on the praecipe did not necessarily indicate that the praecipe had arrived on that date. Based on a survey of case law, we held that the trial court erred in concluding the statute of limitations expired because the appellant's praecipe was not filed until it was time-stamped. We cited with approval Commonwealth v. Castro, 766 A.2d 1283, 1287 (Pa. Super. 2001...