Appellate Law

Doesn?t anybody read the rules?

By Greg May

When is a brief written by a lay person likely to be of comparable quality to a brief written by lawyer for the other side in the same case? When both briefs stink:

Brooks’s opening brief on appeal includes a statement of facts without any citation to the record. In the argument portion of the brief, references to facts are occasionally, but not consistently, supported by citations to the record. ECG’s respondent’s brief, which relies extensively upon facts developed at trial, does not include a single citation to the record. The failure to include citations to the record violates rule 8.204(a)(1)(C) of the California Rules of Court: Briefs must ?[s]upport any reference to a matter in the record by a citation to the volume and page number of the record where the matter appears.? Although these failures subject the briefs to being stricken, we have elected to disregard the noncompliance. (Cal. Rules of Court, rule 8.204(e)(2)(C).)

(In re Marriage of Brooks and Robinson (2008) 169 Cal.App.4th 176, 180 fn. 1.) Maybe stink is a strong word. It’s possible the briefs made excellent points and were terrible only in their failure to comply with the rule requiring citations to the record. But still . . . the odds that neither side would comply with such a basic rule strike me as being quite low. Here, one of the parties (Brooks) was self-represented, but I’m betting that somewhere out there are cases with lawyers on both sides of the appeal filing non-conforming briefs.

This sounds like the beginning of a pitch urging you to employ an appellate attorney, doesn’t it?

You know what I do when I have a question about procedure? This is a really radical concept for some . . . I look up the applicable rule. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist ? or even an appellate lawyer ? to realize that’s a good idea.

Full post as published by The California Blog of Appeal on July 02, 2014 (boomark / email).