Preserving Error

On June 9, 2017, the Supreme Court of North Carolina issued a unanimous opinion holding that when an employer admits the compensability of an injury under the Worker’s Compensation Act,
Continue Reading That Didn’t Last Long: General Assembly Nullifies Supreme Court Opinion With Record Speed, While The Supreme Court Grapples With Error Preservation Problems.

Last Friday was a blockbuster appellate day for the Supreme Court of North Carolina. Not only did it effectively declare an appellate jurisdiction statute unconstitutional (see Matt’s blog post
Continue Reading Supreme Court Reverses Court of Appeals Application of Appellate Rule 2

Yesterday, the Court of Appeals published an opinion serving as a reminder that attorneys must always be mindful of preserving their trial court arguments for appeal. In State v. Walker
Continue Reading Court of Appeals Reiterates Importance of Preserving Arguments on Appeal

Protecting the attorney-client and work-product privileges can be painstaking at the trial court level. To preserve the right to seek appellate review of any adverse privilege determinations, however, the lawyer’s
Continue Reading Practice Tips for Preserving Privilege Issues for Appeal

If you have never had to deal with an appellate trial transcript that is missing deposition testimony, consider yourself lucky.  When deposition testimony is being read or a video deposition
Continue Reading Videotaped Depositions Played at Trial–What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

No tattling allowed if someone buys scalped tickets to attend this event. For the first time since the Civil War era, the Supreme Court of North Carolina is preparing a
Continue Reading Westward Bound: Supreme Court to Hold Two Sessions of Court in Morganton (Psst! A Showdown on an Important Issue of Appellate Procedure Could Occur)

The state appellate rules are clear: your notice of appeal must “designate the judgment or order from which appeal is taken.”  N.C. R. App. P. 3(d).  So, if you want
Continue Reading You Can’t Have One Without The Other: Court of Appeals Dismisses Notice of Appeal That Designates Interlocutory Order But Not Final Judgment

I can’t pass up the opportunity to blog about an appellate case titled Don’t Do It, [Sic] Empire, LLC v. Tenntex, COA 15-938 (Mar. 1, 2016) ([sic] in original)—especially
Continue Reading Rule 9(b)(5) Supplements and Issues Raised for the First Time On Appeal: Don’t Do It!

Holidays, snowstorms, vacations, workloads—mixed in with the winter blahs—have resulted in us getting a little behind on our blogging duties. The appellate courts, however, have not suffered from the same
Continue Reading Ketchup, Catsup, Catch-Up: A Hodgepodge Of Important Appellate Decisions We Were Behind In Sharing

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals issued two opinions last week clarifying issues relating to notices of appeal.

In Jackson v. Lightsey, the Fourth Circuit addressed 1) whether a notice
Continue Reading Merry Christmas To Appellate Practitioners from the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals