Ashely Keith v. Susan Jane Callahan

• Court: Court of Appeals of Georgia
• Decided: January 28, 2020
• Docket: A20D0226
• Status: Published

Opinion

Court of Appeals of the State of Georgia

ATLANTA,____________________ January 13, 2020

The Court of Appeals hereby passes the following order:

A20D0226. ASHLEY KEITH et al. v. SUSAN JANE CALLAHAN.

In 2014, the trial court awarded Susan Jane Callahan visitation rights to her granddaughter, the minor child of Ashley and Michael Keith. In 2019, the Keiths filed an action to revoke or amend Callahan’s grandparent visitation rights and sought summary judgment. The trial court denied their motion for summary judgment, granted attorney’s fees to Callahan, and reserved the issue of the apportionment of fees for a future hearing. The Keiths seek discretionary review of the trial court’s denial of their motion for summary judgment seeking the revocation of Callahan’s visitation rights and the award of fees. Under OCGA § 5-6-34 (a) (11), direct appeals are permitted from “[a]ll judgments or orders in child custody cases awarding, refusing to change, or modifying child custody or holding or declining to hold persons in contempt of such child custody judgment or orders.” See Moore v. Moore-McKinney, 297 Ga. App. 703, 705 (1) (678 SE2d 152) (2009) (“a change in visitation amounts to a change in custody in legal contemplation since visitation rights (sometimes called visitation privileges) are a part of custody [Cits.]”). Thus, the order the Keiths seek to appeal is directly appealable, and pursuant to OCGA § 5-6-34 (d), we can address other orders in the case. See OCGA § 5-6-34 (d) (“Where an appeal is taken under any provision of subsection (a), (b), or (c) of this Code section, all judgments, rulings, or orders rendered in the case which are raised on appeal and which may affect the proceedings below shall be reviewed and determined by the appellate court, without regard to the appealability of the judgment, ruling, or order standing alone and without regard to whether the judgment, ruling, or order appealed from was final or was appealable by some other express provision of law contained in this Code section.”). Under OCGA § 5-6-35 (j), this Court will grant a timely discretionary application if the lower court’s order is subject to direct appeal. Accordingly, this application is hereby GRANTED. The Keiths shall have ten days from the date of this order to file a notice of appeal with the superior court, if they have not already done so. The clerk of the superior court is DIRECTED to include a copy of this order in the record transmitted to the Court of Appeals.

Court of Appeals of the State of Georgia Clerk’s Office, Atlanta,____________________ 01/13/2020 I certify that the above is a true extract from the minutes of the Court of Appeals of Georgia. Witness my signature and the seal of said court hereto affixed the day and year last above written.

, Clerk.