Opinion highlights for the week of September 27, 2026

 

The Arkansas Court of Appeals handed down nineteen opinions on September 30, 2026; the next day, the Arkansas Supreme Court issued ten opinions.  Two opinions are noted here, one from each court.

The Supreme Court decision is Simpson v. Porter, 2026 Ark. 127.  The court discovered a citation to a nonexistent case in a pro se petition for a writ of mandamus.  This caused some concern that the case was "hallucinated by artificial intelligence." Id. at 1.  Citation of a nonexistent case is a dereliction of the duty imposed by Ark. R. App. P.-Civ. 11(a).  The petitioner was ordered to either produce the case or provide good cause for why he should not be sanctioned.

Turning to the Court of Appeals, Jefferson v. Scott Equipment Co., 2026 Ark. App. 456 deserves mention.  The trial court granted Scott Equipment's motion for summary judgment by a "blanket" order finding that no genuine issues of material fact existed.

On appeal, Jefferson did not specifically address all of Scott Equipment's arguments.  This was fatal to his appeal.  The trial court's blanket ruling, under applicable precedent, encompassed the issues presented to the trial court by the parties' briefs and arguments.  "In other words, with this blanket ruling, the circuit court is deemed to have accepted all the arguments advanced by" Scott Equipment. Id. at 16.

The Court of Appeals then applied the rule "that when the circuit court bases its decision on two independent grounds and an appellant only challenges one ground on appeal, this court will affirm without addressing the merits of either argument." Id. at 17.  Because Jefferson did not challenge every independent ground raised by Scott Equipment, which the trial court accepted by its "blanket ruling," the Court of Appeals summarily affirmed.

Thanks for reading.

Appellate Law Section meeting

The Arkansas Bar's Appellate Law Section met this afternoon in an hour-long Zoom call.
There seemed to be a consensus that the section should host an appellate CLE program next April at the Justice Building in Little Rock. Several ideas for sessions were mentioned: a presentation by the Clerk of the Court's office on common mistakes, a panel of appellate judges similar to those hosted at the 2023 Annual Meeting, a speaker from the Attorney General's Office to address their appellate strategy and practice, a comparison of Arkansas and Eighth Circuit practice and rules, and so forth.  Stay tuned!
Turning to the section's budget, funds were allocated to the CLE program for the 2026-2027 year. Assuming that a CLE program would be hosted every other year, funds for the 2027-2028 year were allocated to planning and sponsoring a program at the 2028 annual meeting. The idea would be to attract a known speaker of some national reputation.
Finally, a new secretary was elected, completing the list of officers for the 2026-2027 year. Tory Lewis will serve as Chair; Frank Arey will serve as Chair-Elect; and Noah Watson was elected Secretary.
If you have ideas for that CLE program, please let us hear from you.

Opinion highlights for the week of September 20, 2026

 

The Arkansas Supreme Court's September 24, 2026, nine-page syllabus primarily disposed of various petitions for review and motions.  No opinions were handed down, but seven cases were submitted for decision.

The Arkansas Court of Appeals produced seventeen opinions on September 23, 2026.  Yet again, there are several candidates for discussion here, but we'll focus on two of them.

Birotte v. State, 2026 Ark. App. 428, considered a sufficiency of the evidence challenge to an aggravated assault conviction.  At trial, Birotte did not challenge the aggravated assault charge in his motion for a directed verdict - nothing in that motion alerted the trial court to a sufficiency of the evidence challenge to aggravated assault.  But on appeal, Birotte based his challenge on language used in the context of another challenge below to a different charge.

The Arkansas Court of Appeals affirmed because Birotte did not preserve this argument in compliance with Ark. R. Crim. P. 33.1.

Rule 33.1 requires more than the use of language that might also bear upon an element of another offense. The motion must sufficiently identify the particular deficiency in the State’s proof to alert the circuit court to the issue being raised. Here, counsel specifically identified the charges of fleeing and criminal mischief and articulated the alleged deficiencies in the State’s proof as to those charges. He did not do so with respect to aggravated assault.

Birotte, 2026 Ark. App. 428, at 4 (citation omitted).

Southern Farm Bureau v. Arvie, 2026 Ark. App. 433, contains a couple of interesting points.  This case involved a Pulaski County Circuit Judge's decision to transfer this declaratory judgment case to Phillips County Circuit Court.  A related auto accident case was already pending in Phillips County.  Southern Farm Bureau ("SFB") appealed the trial court's transfer order.

The Court of Appeals determined that the transfer order was a final, appealable order for purpose of appellate jurisdiction. Id. at 4 n.7.  The Arkansas Supreme Court found a similar order to be final, but there were other cases pointing in the other direction.  This order, like the one found to be final by the Supreme Court, "effectively transferred the entire action to another county. Thus, pursuant to the supreme court’s most recent declarations, we find this order to be a final, appealable order and that we have jurisdiction over the matter." Id. 5 n.7.

The transfer order did not indicate the basis for the transfer decision, but at the hearing stated a reason.  The Court of Appeals relied on that oral reason in its decision.

Here, there was no conflict or discrepancy between the circuit court’s oral ruling and its written order. Rather, the oral ruling merely explained the simple denial in the written order, and we routinely rely on a circuit court’s oral statements from the bench to inform or to explain the reasoning behind a written order.

Id. at 6 n.8.  The trial court's decision was reversed.

Thanks for reading - enjoy your weekend.