Opinion highlights for the week of November 3, 2024

The Arkansas Supreme Court didn't hand down any decisions yesterday, but it did dispose of a number of motions.  The Arkansas Court of Appeals handed down 21 decisions.  Two of them meet my rough criteria for summarizing here.

Leaf Home Solutions v. Kunkel, 2024 Ark. App. 547, is a workers' compensation case.  After briefing was completed, the worker filed a motion to dismiss arguing that the Workers' Compensation Commission's order appealed from was interlocutory so that the appellate court lacked jurisdiction.

While WCC orders are ordinarily reviewable upon awarding or denying compensation - and "interlocutory decisions and decisions on incidental matters are not reviewable for lack of finality" - appealable orders are not limited to those that finally dispose of an entire case.  "[T]he test for determining whether a Commission order is appealable is whether it puts the Commission's directive into execution, ending the litigation or a separable part of it."  Id. at 5.

In this case, the WCC reversed an order compelling the worker to undergo a functional capacity examination; no issues were reserved in the order, nor was there a remand for further proceedings.  The Court of Appeals concluded:

Nothing before us indicates that there is anything left to resolve or any further action contemplated by the order on appeal.  Thus, we have jurisdiction to address the merits of the case.

Id. at 7-8.  The motion to dismiss was denied.

In Taylor v. State, 2024 Ark. App. 555, the Appellant argued that the State didn't negate his justification defense.  The Court of Appeals determined that his argument wasn't preserved for review because it "was not specifically argued in his motion for directed verdict."  Id. at 3.  The Appellant's motion for directed verdict after the State rested claimed the State had not met its burden of proof; his renewed motion perhaps referenced self-defense.  Id. at 2.  This was not sufficient to preserve the issue for appeal: "there was no focused argument regarding any specific element that the State failed to disprove...."  Id. at 4.

Comments are welcome - have a great weekend!