Masheter v. Hughes

263 N.E.2d 794, 25 Ohio Misc. 121, 54 Ohio Op. 2d 129, 1970 Ohio Misc. LEXIS 296
CourtPaulding County Court of Common Pleas
DecidedNovember 13, 1970
DocketNo. 20042
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 263 N.E.2d 794 (Masheter v. Hughes) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Paulding County Court of Common Pleas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Masheter v. Hughes, 263 N.E.2d 794, 25 Ohio Misc. 121, 54 Ohio Op. 2d 129, 1970 Ohio Misc. LEXIS 296 (Ohio Super. Ct. 1970).

Opinion

Hitchcock, J.

Plaintiff, Director of Highways, filed his petition herein on September 17, 1969. Summons correctly specifying October 27, 1969, as the answer date, was served upon defendant Hughes on September 23, 1969.

On November 17, 1969, defendant Hughes by his counsel filed a motion herein requesting leave to file an answer stating that “Defendant’s attorney says that by reason of inexperience an answer had not been filed herein within the time prescribed by R. C. 163.08.”

At the hearing on this motion held January 8, 1970, it was disclosed that defendant Hughes delivered his summons to his attorney, a solo-general practitioner, on September 24 or October 2, 1969, and that defendant was the first client said attorney ever had in respect to an appropriation proceeding, the attorney having been admitted to the Ohio Bar on May 8, 1967; that the attorney received his legal education at the University of Detroit and had never read R. C. 163.08; that although he noted the answer date of October 27, 1969, he was acquainted with the practice of the incumbent judge of this court, in matters of general litigation to grant upon first request by any party from seven to thirty days leave in which to plead. Finally that he first discovered R. C. 163.08 in November after the answer date had passed.

Consequently, the question for decision is whether or not the first paragraph of the syllabus of Cincinnati v. Bossert Machine Co. (1968), 16 Ohio St. 2d 76; cert. den. 394 U. S. 998, 89 S. Ct. 1592, 22 L. Ed. 2d 776 (1969), reading: “The mandate of Section 163.08, Revised Code, that ‘no extension of time for filing of an answer shall be granted’ to a defendant whose property is the subject of a petition for appropriation by a public agency must be obeyed by the trial court. The statute does not violate due process nor trench on any judicial prerogative,” requires that the court overrule defendant’s motion as the plaintiff Director of Highways maintains.

[123]*123Before answering that question the court will discuss the issues raised in light of the facts.

If this court could conceive that in discharging its duties its proper attitude would be that of the British soldiers at Balaldava where it was “Theirs not to reason why, Theirs but to do and die,” it would long ago have overruled defendant’s motion.

On the facts as revealed in Bossert—indicating the landowners ignored the summons until after answer day had passed—only for the purpose of obtaining informed appraisals of the value of their property—this court agrees with the judgment of the majority. Nevertheless, this court notes that only four justices approved the mentioned syllabus of law, two would have added to the penultimate sentence of the first full paragraph of the opinion to make it read re comment approving prior cases—“We held that the trial court had no power to extend the statutory time, where as in each of those cases, the landowner advanced no reasonable justification for failure to file his responsive pleading within the time provided by the statute”—and would modify the syllabus accordingly. Yet one justice dissented that even this narrowness was an improper abridgement of judicial power.

The majority, however, in addition adhered to the prior ruling that the time for filing the answer is jurisdictional and that the inviolate constitutional right to have a jury fix the compensation for the property taken may be waived, as it was held to be, by complete inaction on the part of the landowners in filing an answer. Again, I do not quarrel with this decision as I find many of my fellow trial judges vexed, as I am, by persons who feel free to ignore court summons or orders and I perceive a necessity for maintaining a basic stability in social organization through law which can be known. There is of course no occasion to mitigate the rigors of implied conditions for those who fail to respond to appropriation proceedings for reasons well within their control.

Still this court can not help noting that in respect to the waiver of constitutional rights by those charged with predatory conduct it is held that there is no waiver unless [124]*124the same be informed and intelligent and clearly shown in the record, as there is a presumption against such waiver. See Brookhart v. Janis (1966), 384 U. S. 1, 86 S. Ct. 1245, 16 L. Ed. 2d 314, 7 Ohio Misc. 77, reversing Brookhart v. Haskins (1965), 2 Ohio St. 2d 36. As a result “three consecutive sentences of from one to 20 years * * * upon convictions of forgery and uttering forged instruments” imposed upon accused who was represented by well informed counsel were set aside in a habeas corpus proceeding. In the trial in Common Pleas Court Brook-hart’s counsel entered pleas of “not guilty” but stated in open court that the state would only be required to establish a prima facie case while defendant said, “I would like to point out in no way am I pleading guilty to this charge.” Brookhart was also convicted of breaking and entering and grand larceny but the sentences on these convictions were made to run concurrently with his sentence for forgery and uttering forged instruments.

The defendant here is a young doctor of chiropractic just well launched in his profession who did exactly what he should have done with his summons upon receipt thereof. He gave it to his lawyer and at least 25 days—perhaps 32 days—before the answer date written thereon. His attorney read the words found therein reading: “* * * for appropriation of property and must answer by the 27th day of October A. D., 1969, or the petition (which asserted a value of $150) of said plaintiff will be taken as true, and judgment rendered accordingly. ”

The attorney, however, had not been either specially schooled or experienced in Ohio appropriation proceedings and was then, as I perceive are all the competent attorneys in Paulding and adjacent counties, busily occupied with a substantial general practice. Until he had read the current provisions of the Ohio Revised Code he could not have known of this special requirement unless he had read Bossert and had some special reason to clearly remember the rule announced there for more than nine months. Nor did the summons warn either the landowner or his attorney that this was a proceeding wherein usual rules applicable to default judgments did not apply.

[125]*125Had the words of the summons mentioned above been followed by a sentence to this effect:11 This is a proceeding wherein the statute (B. G. 163.08) deprives the court of jurisdiction to extend the, time for answer, ” I would surely not now be writing this opinion, nor have the feeling that both an upright, responsible, unoffending layman and his attorney, two diligent young men, had been accorded something less than justice by our law.

In short, I cannot for one moment be of the opinion that the landowner here ever made any “informed and intelligent waiver” of his right to have a jury assess the compensation due him as guaranteed by Section 19 of Article I and Section 5 of Article XIII of the Constitution of Ohio, or showed any disregard of his rights by conduct such that his waiver thereof might be properly implied.

The two Ohio cases cited in Bossert in support of the proposition that jury trial might be waived, were Bethesda Hospital Assn.

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Bluebook (online)
263 N.E.2d 794, 25 Ohio Misc. 121, 54 Ohio Op. 2d 129, 1970 Ohio Misc. LEXIS 296, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/masheter-v-hughes-ohctcomplpauldi-1970.