Justia Arizona Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Arizona’s Uniform Interstate Family Support Act (AUIFSA), by its terms, allows an obligee to contest an obligor’s statement of child support arrears notwithstanding the obligee’s failure to request a hearing within twenty days of receiving notice of the child support order’s registration.In 2014, Father registered in Arizona a 2004 child support order from Illinois. Mother subsequently accepted service of the registration documents, including Father’s statement of arrearages. Thereafter, Mother requested a hearing to contest the amount of arrears in Father’s proposed judgment. The family court determined that Mother’s request was untimely because it was filed more than twenty days after her attorney accepted service. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that AUIFSA did not prelude Mother’s objection in this case. View "Taylor v. Pandola" on Justia Law

Arizona’s Uniform Interstate Family Support Act (AUIFSA), by its terms, allows an obligee to contest an obligor’s statement of child support arrears notwithstanding the obligee’s failure to request a hearing within twenty days of receiving notice of the child support order’s registration.In 2014, Father registered in Arizona a 2004 child support order from Illinois. Mother subsequently accepted service of the registration documents, including Father’s statement of arrearages. Thereafter, Mother requested a hearing to contest the amount of arrears in Father’s proposed judgment. The family court determined that Mother’s request was untimely because it was filed more than twenty days after her attorney accepted service. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that AUIFSA did not prelude Mother’s objection in this case. View "Taylor v. Pandola" on Justia Law

Ariz. Rev. Stat. 16-957(B)’s fourteen-day time limit for an appeal of a Citizens Clean Elections Commission penalty decision applies when the appellant challenges the Commission’s personal and subject-matter jurisdiction.The Commission in this case found probable cause to believe that Legacy Foundation Action Fund violated the Citizens Clean Elections Act, Ariz. Rev. Stat. 16-940 to -961 and thus assessed a civil penalty. Eighteen days after the Commission’s final decision, Legacy filed an appeal in the superior court. The superior court dismissed the appeal because it was not filed within fourteen days of a final Commission penalty decision as required by section 16-957(B). The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the superior court correctly dismissed the appeal. View "Legacy Foundation Action Fund v. Citizens Clean Elections Commission" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court affirmed the judgment of the trial court convicting Defendant of the first degree murder of an on duty police officer and attempted first degree murder of another on duty peace officer but vacated Defendant’s death sentence and remanded for new penalty phase proceedings in light of the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Lynch v. Arizona, 578 U.S. __ (2016). The court held (1) no prejudicial error occurred during the pretrial proceedings; (2) no prejudicial error occurred during the guilt phase proceedings; but (3) during the penalty phase proceedings, the trial court’s order precluding discussion of parole ineligibility was error and not harmless. View "State v. Hulsey" on Justia Law

A homeowner’s failure to obtain injunctive relief under Ariz. Rev. Stat. 33-811(C) before a trustee’s sale results in the waiver of the homeowner’s damages claims dependent on the validity of the sale.After a trustee’s sale, Plaintiff filed this complaint seeking damages and to quiet title to the property in her name, alleging that the trustee’s deed resulting from the sale was invalidly recorded and that the sale was invalid. The trial court dismissed the complaint under Ariz. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6), concluding that under section 33-811(C), Plaintiff had waived her claims by not obtaining injunctive relief before the trustee’s sale. The court of appeals affirmed, concluding that section 33-811(C) bars claims dependent on the trustee’s sale unless an injunction is obtained before the sale. The Supreme Court agreed, holding that Plaintiff’s failure to seek injunctive relief under section 33-811(C) resulted in a waiver of her damages claims resulting from the allegedly fraudulent trustee’s sale. View "Zubia v. Shapiro" on Justia Law

The Arizona Supreme Court affirmed the denial of defendant's motion to suppress and defendant's drug-related convictions and sentences. The court held that defendant was subjected to a warrantless search that violated his reasonable expectation of privacy and thus his Fourth Amendment rights. However, the evidence obtained need not be suppressed because the good faith exception to the exclusionary rule applied. In this case, defendant was a passenger of a truck that he sometimes drove while accompanied by its owner. Police officers collected information over several days from a GPS tracking device they had placed on the truck without obtaining a warrant. The court explained that the search was conducted in objectively reasonable reliance on binding appellate precedent. View "Arizona v. Jean" on Justia Law

Ariz. R. Evid. 408 precludes use of a consent judgment to prove substantive facts to establish liability for a subsequent claim. Likewise, a consent judgment cannot be used for impeachment purposes under Ariz. R. Evid. 613.Before disciplinary proceedings were initiated against attorney Brent Phillips, the Arizona Attorney General sued Phillips for violations of the Arizona Consumer Fraud Act (CFA). To resolve the CFA action, Phillips agreed to a consent judgment. During attorney disciplinary proceedings, Phillips’ counsel moved in limine to preclude the State Bar from introducing the consent judgment into evidence for any purpose. The State Bar opposed the motion, arguing that it should be allowed to use the consent judgment to impeach Phillips’ testimony if it differed from the facts contained in the consent judgment. The presiding disciplinary judge (PDJ) concluded that Rule 408 did not render the stipulated facts inadmissible. The Supreme Court vacated the PDJ's order denying Phillips’ motion in limine, holding (1) none of the exceptions to Rule 408 allowed the State Bar to admit the consent judgment or its contents into evidence during the disciplinary proceedings; and (2) Rule 408 did not permit the use of the consent judgment to impeach Phillips. View "Phillips v. Honorable William O’Neil" on Justia Law

An order granting or denying a motion filed pursuant to Rule 85(A) of the Arizona Rules of Family Law Procedure is a special order made after final judgment under Ariz. Rev. Stat. 12-2101(A)(2), which confers jurisdiction on the court of appeals to decide whether the ruling was correct.Petitioner filed a motion pursuant to Rule 85(A) to correct a clerical error in a judgment. Specifically, Petitioner moved to replace a qualified domestic relations order (QDRO) with one that complied with the dissolution decree between him and his wife. The family court denied the motion, concluding that the decree and QDRO were clear and unambiguous because no appeal had been taken. Petitioner appealed. The court of appeals dismissed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction, concluding that Petitioner’s motion failed to assert any issues that could not have been raised in a timely appeal from the QDRO. The Supreme Court vacated the court of appeals’ decision, holding that the court of appeals had jurisdiction to decide whether the family court correctly denied Petitioner’s Rule 85(A) motion. View "Vincent v. Shanovich" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court rejected a constitutional challenge to the provision in Ariz. Rev. Stat. 36-2901.08(A) that the director of Arizona’s indigent health care program, Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS), “shall establish, administer and collect an assessment” from Arizona hospitals (the hospital assessment). The legislature added this provision to fund the costs remaining after federal monies to expand coverage under AHCCCS, as provided for in H.B. 2010, which the legislature enacted in 2013 by a simple majority vote. The Supreme Court held that the hospital assessment is not subject to Ariz. Const. art. IX, 22, which generally requires that acts providing for a net increase in state revenues be approved by a two-thirds vote in each house of the legislature, because the exception set forth in Ariz. Const. art. IX, 22(C)(2) that the above requirement does not apply to statutorily authorized assessments that “are not prescribed by formula, amount or limit, and are set by a state officer or agency” applied in this case. View "Biggs v. Betlach" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court affirmed Defendant’s conviction for first degree murder but vacated his death sentence and remanded for a new penalty phase proceeding in order to comply with the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Lynch v. Arizona, 578 U.S. __ (2016) ("Lynch II").Defendant, an inmate, killed the victim, another inmate, while the two men were in their cell. The court held (1) the trial court did not commit fundamental error by electing testimony about a statement Defendant made to a corrections officer through a juror’s question; (2) the trial court acted within its discretion by finding that the probative value of graphic photos admitted into evidence was not outweighed by any prejudicial effect; (3) sufficient evidence existed for a jury to find that Defendant murdered the victim in an especially heinous or depraved manner; (4) Lynch II compels the conclusion that the trial court erred by failing to tell the jury that Defendant was ineligible for parole, and the error was not harmless beyond a reasonable doubt; and (5) the jury did not abuse its discretion in imposing the death penalty. View "State v. Rushing" on Justia Law