Justia Ohio Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Appellant filed a motion to suppress in his criminal action. Judge Deena R. Calabrese overruled the motion in open court and indicated that she would journalize an entry on the same day. Appellant later filed this action for a writ of mandamus to compel Judge Calabrese to journalize her decision denying the motion to suppress, alleging that the entry was never filed and that he had a right to have the oral decision reduced to writing. The court of appeals granted Judge Calabrese’s motion for summary judgment. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the court of appeals (1) correctly found that Appellant failed to comply with Ohio Rev. Code 2969.25(C); and (2) properly granted summary judgment because Judge Calabrese had, in fact, filed an entry on the motion to suppress that sufficiently journalized her decision overruling Jackson’s motion and therefore rendered Jackson’s action in mandamus moot. View "State ex rel. Jackson v. Calabrese" on Justia Law

Christopher Reeves, a federal inmate, sued in mandamus seeking a writ compelling the production of certain records. In his complaint, Reeves alleged that he made a public-records request of the chief of police of the Cedar Point Police Department. Along with his complaint, Reeves filed an affidavit of indigence. The court of appeals dismissed the case because Reeves’s affidavit of indigence was not notarized or accompanied by the certificate of a prison officer verifying Reeves’s lack of funds. The Supreme Court affirmed on the basis that Reeves failed to file a notarized affidavit in support of his request for a waiver of fees and because his complaint for a writ of mandamus was not verified. View "State ex rel. Reeves v. Chief of Police" on Justia Law

Appellant, an inmate, was convicted of robbery, aggravated robbery, felonious assault, and other charges. Judge David Fais first sentenced Appellant in 2001. In 2002, the court of appeals reversed and remanded for resentencing. In 2003, Judge Fais again sentenced Appellant. The court of appeals again remanded for resentencing after Appellant’s second and third appeals. In 2006, Judge Fais issued a judgment entry sentencing Appellant for a fourth time. Appellant did not appeal but, instead, filed this action in procedendo, requesting a writ ordering Judge Fais to hold a sentencing hearing in compliance with the court of appeals’ 2002 judgment. The court of appeals granted summary judgment for Judge Fais, concluding that Appellant had an adequate remedy in the ordinary course of law by way of appeal of Judge Fais’s 2006 judgment entry. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that Appellant was not entitled to a writ of procedendo, as Judge Fais’s 2006 judgment entry sentencing Appellant to prison was an appealable order. View "State ex rel. Elkins v. Fais" on Justia Law

In 1970, Appellant pleaded guilty to aggravated assault and was sentenced to an indeterminate period. Appellant was placed in the custody of the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (ODRC), which treated his sentence as a one-to-five-year term authorized by former Ohio Rev. Code 2901.241. The Adult Parole Authority (APA) and the Bureau of Sentence Computation (BOSC) made decisions regarding Appellant’s parole eligibility and release based on the one-to-five-year term. Appellant filed this action in mandamus requesting that Appellees - the ODRC, APA, and BOSC - remove the invalid sentence from their records and no longer make decisions based on it because the sentencing entry did not explicitly set forth the maximum and minimum length of his sentence and that the ODRC, not a court, imposed a sentence of one to five years. The court of appeals dismissed the petition. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that Appellant had adequate remedies in the ordinary course of the law to challenge the sentence and ODRC’s interpretation of the sentence. View "Turner v. Dept. of Rehab. & Corr." on Justia Law

Appellant, an inmate, was convicted of aggravated burglary and rape. Appellant filed this action in habeas corpus alleging that his convictions and sentence were invalid and he must be released. Specifically, Appellant alleged that the trial court had declared a mistrial in a third retrial but failed to place that declaration in a journal entry, and therefore, the trial court did not have jurisdiction over him for a fourth trial. The court of appeals dismissed the action. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) res judicata barred Appellant’s habeas corpus petition because Appellant had filed at least one previous petition for habeas corpus; and (2) Appellant had an adequate remedy in the ordinary course of the law. View "Bevins v. Richard" on Justia Law

In 2005, Petitioner was convicted of first-degree-felony aggravated burglary and sentenced to six years in prison. After Petitioner was released an placed on postrelease control, he was found guilty of violating the conditions of his release and sentenced to a 150-day prison term. Petitioner subsequently filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus. The court of appeals dismissed the petition sua sponte for failure to comply with the requirement that Petitioner file a copy of his commitment papers with his petition. Petitioner appealed. Thereafter, Petitioner was released from prison under supervision. The Supreme Court affirmed the dismissal by the court of appeals, holding that, because Petitioner was no longer incarcerated, his petition was moot. View "Holloman v. Mohr" on Justia Law

The Metamore Elevator Company filed complaints with the Fulton County Board of Revision (BOR) seeking to reduce the property value of two parcels and to remove grain storage bins from the real property assessment, claiming that they were business fixtures and thus should be classified as personal property not subject to real estate tax. The BOR left the assessed valuation unchanged. The Board of Tax Appeals (BTA) reversed, concluding that the storage bins were temporary structures and should be classified as personal property. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the BTA correctly applied the statues when it found that the grain storage bins were personal property. View "Metamora Elevator Co. v. Fulton County Bd. of Revision" on Justia Law

In 1989, Petitioner, a prisoner at Grafton Correction Institution, was convicted of aggravated murder and other crimes. After a hearing in 2005, the parole board denied Petitioner parole. The board later determined that it should not have held the parole hearing because Petitioner had not yet served his minimum sentence at that time. Therefore, the board vacated its 2005 decision and continued Petitioner’s parole eligibility to 2015. In 2014, Petitioner filed this original action against the warden, claiming that the parole board violated his due process rights by vacating its 2005 decision. The warden filed a motion for summary judgment under Ohio R. Civ. P. 56(C). The court of appeals granted the motion for summary judgment. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the court of appeals (1) did not err by ruling on Petitioner’s motion for summary judgment under the Rules of Civil Procedure; and (2) properly granted summary judgment to the warden based on res judicata, as a habeas corpus action filed by Petitioner in 2013 was virtually identical to the complaint in this case. View "Brooks v. Kelly" on Justia Law

In 1986, Appellant was convicted of several sex-related crimes. Appellant was classified as a sexually oriented offender when Megan’s Law was enacted. In 2007, after Appellant was released on parole, he was convicted of failure to verify. In 2008, after Ohio enacted the Adam Walsh Act, Appellant was reclassified as a Tier III offender and convicted of failure to notify under the Act. In 2012, Appellant filed motions for de novo resentencing in the 2007 and 2008 cases, arguing that portions of the Adam Walsh Act were held unconstitutional in State v. Bodyke and thus that he had improperly been reclassified. Judge Frances McGee denied both motions. In 2013, Appellant filed this action seeking writs of mandamus and procedendo, asserting that the Judge McGee must vacate his conviction in the 2008 case, reclassify him, and reinstate the community-control sanctions imposed in the 2007 case. The court of appeals dismissed the action. The Supreme Court affirmed the dismissal of Appellant’s petition for writs of procedendo and mandamus because Appellant had an adequate remedy in the ordinary course of the law. View "State ex rel. Smith v. McGee" on Justia Law

In 2009, Kent Cunningham filed an “Affidavit of Non-Ohio Domicile” for tax year 2008 declaring that he was “not domiciled in Ohio” at any during during the tax year. The tax commissioner issued Kent and his wife an assessment based upon the nonfiling and nonpayment of Ohio income tax for 2008. The Cunninghams filed a petition for reassessment. Noting a 2008 filing of an Ohio homestead-exemption application declaring that the Cunninghams’ Cincinnati, Ohio house was their principal place of residence, the commissioner concluded that the Cunninghams’ Affidavit of Non-Ohio Domicile contained a false statement and that the Cunninghams failed to rebut the presumption of Ohio domicile. The Board of Tax Appeals (BTA) reversed the commissioner’s determination with regard to Kent, concluding that Kent complied with the requirements of Ohio Rev. Code 5747.24(B)(1) and was, therefore, “irrefutably presumed to be not domiciled in Ohio for Ohio individual income tax purposes.” The Supreme Court reversed, holding (1) Kent’s explicit claim under section 5747.24(B)(1) to be domiciled outside Ohio did not bind the commissioner without regard to other statements and actions by Kent that indicated a domicile inside Ohio; and (2) the BTA erred by reversing the tax commissioner’s denial of the irrebuttable presumption created under section 5747.24(B)(1). View "Cunningham v. Testa" on Justia Law