Roe v. Dietrich

835 S.W.2d 289, 310 Ark. 54, 1992 Ark. LEXIS 442
CourtSupreme Court of Arkansas
DecidedJune 29, 1992
Docket92-56
StatusPublished
Cited by14 cases

This text of 835 S.W.2d 289 (Roe v. Dietrich) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Arkansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Roe v. Dietrich, 835 S.W.2d 289, 310 Ark. 54, 1992 Ark. LEXIS 442 (Ark. 1992).

Opinion

Jack Holt, Jr., Chief Justice.

This appeal involves a chancellor’s findings of preferential transfer of real property and the execution of a partnership dissolution agreement by the appellants for the alleged purpose of defrauding the appellees as judgment creditors.

Appellee Ralph Goza was a general partner with appellants, Max Roe and Dan Roe, in an entity called Buena Vista Farms. Appellee Dr. Fred Dietrich was a limited partner. Mr. Goza filed an action in the Ouachita County Chancery Court to dissolve and wind up the partnership and to equalize the capital accounts. Following a hearing before Judge Jim Gunter, a chancellor serving by special assignment, judgments were entered in favor of Mr. Goza and Dr. Dietrich and against Max Roe and Dan Roe.

On the day of the hearing, April 26, 1990, Mx and Dan Roe executed a warranty deed conveying to their parents, Otho and Marie Roe, 260 acres of timberland which Max and Dan owned under another partnership known as MDR Enterprises. On July 6, 1990, Max Roe paid the judgment entered against him. Dan Roe’s judgment remained unsatisfied.

On July 12, 1990, Dr. Deitrich and Mr. Goza, in a subsequent and separate lawsuit, filed a petition to set aside the deed to Mr. and Mrs. Roe as a fraudulent conveyance. A month later, Max and Dan Roe entered into an agreement to dissolve the MDR Enterprises partnership in the event the petition to set aside the warranty deed was upheld. Under the terms of the agreement, 35 acres of the real property and 13.72% of the capital assets were set aside for Dan Roe and 225 acres and 86.28 % of the capital assets for Max Roe. Eight days later, Dan Roe filed for bankruptcy and appellee Ben Floyd was appointed to serve as trustee representing the creditors.

The appellees later amended their petition to set aside not only the warranty deed but also the agreement to dissolve partnership, as preferential transfers and fraudulent conveyances. Judge Jim Gunter was again assigned to hear the further dispute between the parties. Pretrial motions by the appellants to continue the trial and to disqualify Judge Gunter were denied.

Following trial, the chancellor set aside both the conveyance to Otho and Marie Roe and the dissolution agreement. The trial court found that Dan Roe held two-thirds of the real estate property and Max Roe one-third and that their partnership capital accounts in MDR were equal.

On appeal, the appellants assert the trial court erred 1) in denying their motion for continuance; 2) in denying their motion for disqualification; 3) in deciding the respective interests of Max Roe and Dan Roe in MDR Enterprises and in failing to dismiss Max Roe as a defendant; and 4) in determining the capital account balances and ownership of the partnership property. We disagree with all four arguments and affirm.

I. CONTINUANCE

The appellants first argue the trial court abused its discretion by refusing to grant a continuance because Max Roe was unavailable for trial. They contend Max’s testimony was crucial to a determination of the capital contributions to the MDR partnership.

We have held such a denial will not be reversed until the trial court abused its discretion in doing so by acting arbitrarily and capriciously. Smith v. City of Little Rock, 279 Ark. 4, 648 S.W.2d 454 (1983).

The parties were notified by letter dated July 25, 1991, that trial was scheduled for September 26, 1991. The appellants claim that in August, Max Roe, who had apparently been unemployed, was offered a temporary job as environmental and safety engineer on a pipeline construction job in Connecticut. The appellants moved for a continuance on September 18, stating that due to the critical nature of Mr. Roe’s responsibilities and the mandatory deadline for completion of the pipeline, Max Roe could not be spared, even for a few days, until the project was completed late in December. The appellants proffered an unverified letter to this effect from Mr. Roe’s employer, but the chancellor declined to admit it into evidence on the basis of hearsay. The motion was denied as being untimely.

We agree since the appellants had 60 days advance notice of the trial date, yet waited until eight days from trial to file their motion. We also note the appellants made no proffer, either in their motion or at the pre-trial hearing, of what Mr. Roe’s testimony would be other than a general statement that it was important to a determination of the partnership interests. See Bolden v. Carter, 269 Ark. 391, 602 S.W.2d 640 (1980); Bone v. Bone, 12 Ark. App. 163, 671 S.W.2d 217 (1984). Lastly, as the appellees point out, Dan Roe testified at length as to what he and Max agreed upon in determining their respective interests in the partnership, and it is doubtful Max Roe’s testimony would have added anything in this regard.

Under these circumstances, we cannot say the trial court abused its discretion in denying the continuance.

II. DISQUALIFICATION

The appellants next contend the chancellor erred in refusing to recuse from the case since he presided over the previous litigation involving the dissolution of the Buena Vista Farms partnership. The chancellor ruled the motion was untimely, without merit, and that the case was properly assumed under his jurisdiction as it was simply an extension of the first lawsuit by way of a postjudgment collection proceeding.

The decision to disqualify from a case is, again, discretionary with the trial court. See Sloss v. Farmers Bank & Trust Co., 290 Ark. 304, 719 S.W.2d 273 (1986). That discretion should be exercised in light of the Arkansas Code of Judicial Conduct. Canon 3.C.(1) provides that a judge should disqualify himself in a proceeding where his impartiality “might reasonably be questioned, including. . .instances where he has a personal bias or,prejudice concerning a party or personal knowledge of disputed evidentiary facts concerning the proceeding. . . .”

We have held that this section of the code is not meant to preclude participation of a judge who has obtained knowledge of a case through previous judicial participation in it. Holloway v. State, 293 Ark. 438, 738 S.W.2d 796 (1987). In Holloway, we held that recusal was not required of a judge who earlier approved a search warrant and later had to rule on the validity of the warrant in a pretrial suppression hearing. Although we are not entirely persuaded that this case was a mere extension of the earlier case in the nature of a “post judgment collection proceeding,” as ruled by the chancellor, the same principle applies, and we will not impute improper personal knowledge to Judge Gunter simply because of his earlier participation in the first trial. Moreover, aside from pointing to various adverse rulings, the appellants have cited no evidence from the record where Judge Gunter exhibited personal bias or prejudice.

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Bluebook (online)
835 S.W.2d 289, 310 Ark. 54, 1992 Ark. LEXIS 442, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/roe-v-dietrich-ark-1992.