Sometimes you fall headlong into a chorus you thought you knew by heart—only to discover the bridge is where all the action is. For appellate practitioners, that action seems to
Continue Reading Complicated: Premature Oral Notices of Appeal & Writs of Certiorari
In appeals, the general rule is that litigants cannot appeal an interlocutory order until a final judgment is entered. But in North Carolina, a major statutory exception to the general
Continue Reading “So, What’s Going on Here?” North Carolina Supreme Court Clarifies Level of Detail Required to Demonstrate Right to Interlocutory Appeal Under the Substantial Right Doctrine
It’s not every day that the Court of Appeals spends almost 12 pages talking about the appellate rules, including why rules compliance is so important. But that’s exactly what the
Continue Reading We’re Not Reading All That! The Court of Appeals Sanctions One Appellant While Warning Everyone Else Not to Use an Appendix to Violate the Court of Appeals Word-Count Limit
Morgan’s prior blog post on State v. McLean started the wheels turning on a topic I find fascinating: oral notices of appeal.
Civil lawyers love written notices of appeal. Have
Continue Reading The Lights Are Still On: Oral Notices of Appeals in Criminal Cases
Thirty years ago, Justice Scalia famously described the Supreme Court’s Lemon test as “some ghoul in a late-night horror movie that repeatedly sits up in its grave and shuffles abroad
Continue Reading Just in Time for Halloween: Has the Specter of Viar Returned?
This week, the Court of Appeals added some nuance to an issue that has plagued appellants for many years: the calculation of the appeal period when a judgment is not
Continue Reading The Countdown That Ends Before It Even Starts: The Unwritten “Actual Notice” Pathway to Losing Your Right to Appeal
This week’s batch of opinions from the Court of Appeals had several appellate issues worth a mention.
First, the en banc saga comes to a close. As you’ll recall, the
Continue Reading Appellate Grab bag: En banc, appellate sanctions, and certiorari
Last 
week, the Court of Appeals returned to a general question that this blog has addressed before: When is a Notice of Appeal Filing Deadline or Requirement Jurisdictional? In this
Continue Reading Can the Cart (Appeal) Go Before the Horse (Entry of Order Being Appealed)?
I. You Can’t Have One Without the Other: Notice of Appeal Must Designate Both Final Judgment and Intermediate Order
Approximately three years ago, I blogged on Majerske v. Majerske,
Continue Reading Notices of Appeal: Wouldn’t It Be Nice?
Back in March, the Court of Appeals in Ramsey v. Ramsey dismissed a party’s appeal for cumulative non-jurisdictional violations that the Court described as “gross and substantial noncompliance with the
Continue Reading Is Dogwood’s Bark Losing Its Bite?