Tag: Restrictive Covenants

Mississippi Court of Appeals Decisions of February 18, 2025

The Mississippi Court of Appeals handed down nine opinions today and one bonus opinion Thursday of last week. There are a few real property cases including a restrictive covenants case. There are two interesting speedy trial cases among several other direct criminal appeals.

February 13, 2025

Johnson v. Cleveland, 2023-CA-01011-COA (Civil – Real Property)
Reversing the chancery court’s decision in a tax sale and forfeited tax land patents, holding that a potential adverse possession claim did not confer standing, that the plaintiff lacked standing per section 29-1-21, and that the chancellor erred in declaring the tax sale void and ordering that the forfeited tax land patents be cancelled.
(6-4: Westbrooks dissented, joined by Barnes, McDonald, and Lawrence)

February 18, 2025

Wallace v. State, 2023-KA-00721-COA consolidated with 2023-KA-00723-COA, consolidated with 2023-KA-00888-COA (Criminal – Felony)
Affirming convictions of three brothers who were tried together of capital murder, holding that the convictions were supported by sufficient evidence, that the trial court’s decision to allow an investigator to testify about a witness’s prior statement was harmless error, that the trial court did not in error for allowing testimony of prior bad acts to which there was no timely objection, that there was no violation of the constitutional right to a speedy trial under the totality of the circumstances, and that one brother’s ineffective assistance of counsel argument was without merit.
(7-3-0: Lawrence and McCarty concurred in part and in the result without writing; Westbrooks concurred in result only without writing)

Note – The speedy trial discussion is worth reading if that is in your wheelhouse.

1st Step Sober Living LLC v. Cleveland, 2023-CA-00665-COA (Civil – Other)
Affirming the chancellor’s decision granting residents’ request for injunctive relief preventing a home in a subdivision from being used by individuals recovering from substance abuse disorder, holding that the sale of the subject property did not render the case moot because damages were sought, that the proposed use was a commercial endeavor that was prohibited by restrictive covenants, and the chancellor did not err in determining that the rehab home did not sufficiently prove that the tenants would fit the “handicap” criteria for FHA purposes.
(10-0)

Brooks v. State, 2023-KA-01081-COA (Criminal – Felony)
Affirming conviction of possession of a controlled substance and being a felon in possession of a firearm, holding that the evidence was sufficient to support both convictions.
(10-0)

Chambers v. State, 2023-KA-00626-COA (Criminal – Felony)
Affirming conviction of one count of capital murder and two counts of felonious child abuse, holding that the trial court did not err in denying the defendant’s motion to suppress her statement to investigators where she voluntarily, knowingly, and intelligently waived her Miranda rights and that the State presented sufficient evidence for all convictions.
(9-1-0: Wilson concurred in part and in the result without writing)

LoanMax, LLC v. Castle Columbus I, LLC, 2023-CA-00790-COA (Civil – Contract)
Affirming in part and reversing in part the chancery court’s rulings in a claim for declaratory and injunctive relief involving a commercial lease renewal, holding on direct appeal that the chancellor did not err in finding that lessee did not provide notice required to effectively renew the lease, on cross-appeal that the chancellor did not err in finding that the owner is not entitled to damages for roofing or HVAC or to attorney’s fees, and on cross-appeal that the chancellor erred in her findings on holdover rent and remanded for a determination of what back rent may be owed.
(9-0: Barnes did not participate)

Taylor v. State, 2023-KA-00245-COA (Criminal – Felony)
Affirming conviction of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, holding that the defendant’s right to speedy trial was not violated.
(7-4*-0: McCarty specially concurred, joined by McDonald and St. Pe (who also joined the majority); Lawrence concurred in part and in the result without writing)

Note – The constitutional right to speedy trial got a lot of air time today. Here is how McCarty’s special concurrence on the subject kicks off:

Spearman v. State, 2023-KA-01091-COA (Criminal – Felony)
Affirming conviction of aggravated assault, holding that there were no arguable issues for appeal after reviewing counsel’s Lindsey brief and the record.
(10-0)

Fears v. State, 2023-KA-00174-COA (Criminal – Felony)
Affirming conviction of capital murder, armed robbery, conspiracy to commit armed robbery, and aggravated assault against victims responding to a fake Facebook Marketplace ad, holding that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying an accomplice jury instruction.
(10-0)

Johnson v. State, 2023-KA-00369-COA (Criminal – Felony)
Affirming convictions of capital murder and felony child abuse, holding that the defendant abandoned his motion to server the counts against him when he failed to pursue a motion to hearing a decision and, further, that the trial court did not abuse its discretion denying the motion to sever.
(10-0)

Other Orders

  • Johnson v. SW Gaming, LLC, 2023-CA-00505-COA (denying rehearing)
  • Simmons v. State, 2023-KA-00518-COA (denying rehearing)

Hand Down Page – February 18, 2025

Hand Down Page – February 13, 2025

Mississippi Supreme Court Decisions of November 14, 2024

The Mississippi Supreme Court handed down five opinions today. There is an ESLA case, a restrictive covenants case, two direct criminal appeals with reversals, and a significant defamation case.

In Re Validation of up to $27,600,000 Trust Certificates Evidencing Proportional Interests in a Lease by The Simpson County School District: Floyd v. Simpson County School Board, 2023-CA-01126-SCT (Civil – Other)
Affirming the chancellor’s decision validating of trust certificates for a lease/leaseback transaction to fund construction of a school, holding that nunc pro tunc amendment to the June 10, 2021 minutes was lawful, that the Board’s notice satisfied statutory requirements of the ESLA, that the objecter was afforded adequate due process as required by the ESLA, that the Board had authority to create a nonprofit corporation, and that the ESLA is still applicable.
(8-0: Griffis did not participate.)

Smith v. Brockway, 2023-CA-01027-SCT (Civil – Real Property)
Affirming the chancery court’s denial of a petition for injunction and declaratory relief related to restrictive covenants and manufactured housing, holding that the restrictive covenants were unenforceable because they were not signed by the grantor.
(9-0)

Toler v. State, 2023-KA-00712-SCT (Criminal – Felony)
Affirming in part and reversing in part after the defendant was convicted of four counts of aggravated assault, one count of shooting into a motor vehicle, four counts of aggravated assault against officers, and failure to stop a motor vehicle for law enforcement, holding (1) that there was sufficient evidence to support the three challenged convictions of aggravated assault against officers who were shot at but not struck, (2) that the indictment was multiplicitous for charging the defendant with for counts of aggravated assault based on firing one shot at four individuals such that merger applied warranting a remand to vacate, merge, and resentence, and (3) that the trial court did not abuse its discretion excluding evidence of the defendant’s peaceful character.
(9-0)

Fagan v. Faulkner, 2022-CT-00130-SCT (Civil – Torts)
Affirming the Court of Appeals and reversing the judgments of the circuit court and county court in a defamation case, holding that the circuit court and county court erred by denying the defendant’s motion for directed verdict because as atrocious as the vulgarity was, it was non-actionable “name calling” that did not defame the plaintiff’s professional abilities.
(5-4: Randolph dissented, joined by Kitchens, King, and Ishee)

Ratcliff v. State, 2022-CT-00690-SCT (Criminal – Felony)
Reversing the Court of Appeals and the conviction of possession of a stolen firearm, holding that the State failed to present sufficient evidence of the defendant’s guilty knowledge to merit a jury question on that charge.
(8-0: Randolph did not participate)

Other Orders

  • In Re: Advisory Committee on Rules, 89-R-99016-SCT (appointing or reappointing as members of the Advisory Committee on Rules: Hon. Latrice A. Westbrooks, Hon. Carter Bise, Hon. W. Ashley Hines, Hon. Carol Jones Russell, William M. Gage, Esq., Justin T. Cook, Esq., Graham P. Carner, Esq., and Nicholas K. Thompson, Esq.)
  • Estate of Green v. Michini, 2022-CT-00365-SCT (denying cert)
  • Chatman v. State, 2023-KA-00583-SCT (denying rehearing)
  • In Re Validation of up to $27,600,000 Trust Certificates Evidencing Proportional Interests in a Lease by The Simpson County School District: Floyd v. Simpson County School Board, 2023-CA-01126-SCT (granting motion for leave to file a corrected reply brief)

Hand Down Page

Mississippi Supreme Court Decisions of August 17, 2023

The Mississippi Supreme Court handed down four opinions today. One is a direct criminal appeal and one was a real property case addressing the applicability of restrictive covenants after a foreclosure sale. Then there are two decisions on interlocutory appeals of summary judgment denials – a med mal/MTCA pre-suit notice case against a hospital and a construction zone MVA case against the road contractor and MDOT.

Stuart v. State, 2022-KA-00585-SCT (Criminal – Felony)
Affirming conviction of filming a person without her knowledge and with an expectation of privacy, holding that the defendant’s right to counsel was not violated when he had been through three public defenders and his request that a fourth lawyer be appointed his counsel days before trial and for continuance was denied where the fourth lawyer was appointed to serve as advisory counsel, and that the trial court did not err in denying the defendant’s accident instruction.
(9-0)

UMMC v. Aycock, 2022-IA-00030-SCT (Civil – Med Mal)
Affirming on interlocutory appeal the denial of the hospital’s motion for summary judgment arguing that the plaintiff did not serve proper pre-suit notice on the CEO, holding that the notice requirements are mandatory–but not jurisdictional–but that there was an issue of material fact as to whether the hospital waived, or is equitably estopped from asserting, lack of compliance based on its conduct after actually receiving notice though not through its CEO.
(8-1: Griffis concurred in part and dissented in part)

NOTE – Here is the Court’s summary of some of the facts relevant to waiver and equitable estoppel:

Loblolly Properties LLC v. Le Papillion Homeowner’s Ass’n, Inc., 2021-CT-00767-SCT (Civil – Real Property)
Affirming the chancery court and court of appeals in an action to collect HOA fees, holding that the developer who purchased properties through a nonjudicial foreclosure sale owed HOA fees where it purchased the properties with notice of the restrictive covenants and holding, specifically, that the foreclosure sale did not extinguish the HOA covenants.
(7-2: Coleman dissented, joined by Griffis)

Joe McGee Construction Company, Inc. v. Brown-Bowens, 2021-IA-01405-SCT (Civil – Wrongful Death)
Reversing the circuit court’s denial of summary judgment to a road construction contractor and to MDOT, holding that there was no competent summary judgment evidence to support that any breach of duty by the contractor or by MDOT proximately caused the crash where the contractor had installed all warning signs required by MDOT and where the decedent passed multiple signs warning of a road closure and crashed into a crane on a closed portion of the highway.
(7-2: Kitchens dissented, joined by King)

DISCLOSURE – I represented the road contractor appellant in this case.

PRACTICE POINT – I think this is a useful, pithy statement to support motions for summary judgment when the arguments on causation are speculative:

Other Orders

In Re: Local Rules, 89-R-99015-SCT (approving amendment to local rule filed by Judge Irving in the 22nd Circuit Court District)

Rhea v. Career General Agency, Inc., 2021-CT-00580-SCT (granting cert)

Liberty Nat’l Life Ins. Co. v. Hancock, 2021-CT-00605-SCT (denying cert)

The Board of Supervisors for Lowndes County, Mississippi v. Lowndes County School Dist., 2021-CA-00999-SCT (denying rehearing)

Wagner v. Andreacchio, 2021-IA-01199-SCT (denying rehearing)

Bradley v. State, 2022-CT-00173-SCT (denying cert)

MS Concrete v. Harris, 2022-CT-01095-SCT (denying cert)

Howell v. State, 2023-DR-00455-SCT (remanding motion for appointment of counsel for representation of indigent capital petitioner)

Hand Down Page

Mississippi Supreme Court Decisions of October 13, 2022

The Mississippi Supreme Court handed down three opinions today. The first addresses whether the use of a residential home violated a covenant prohibiting commercial use. The second opinion contains a thorough analysis of a personal jurisdiction issue (citing classics like International Shoe and World-Wide Volkswagen). The third opinion involves the allocation of sixteenth-section funds between neighboring school districts. The Court also handed down an en banc order on a motion for leave to file successive petition for PCR that is linked below.

Scioto Properties SP-16, LLC v. Graf, 2021-CA-00525-SCT (Civil – Real Property)
Affirming the chancery court’s holding that a for-profit LLC used a home commercially, holding that the “leas[ing] of the home for the specific and sole purpose of providing the residential support services itself and being compensated for doing so through Medicaid” violated a restrictive covenant against commercial use.
(9-0)

NOTE – The Court explained that the commercial services were “integral” and “not merely incidental” to the operation of the home and summarized the holding as follows:

Dillworth v. LG Chem, Ltd., 2021-CA-00629-SCT (Civil – Personal Injury)
Reversing the circuit court’s ruling that it lacked personal jurisdiction over a South Korean battery manufacturer, holding that the manufacturer placed the batteries in the stream of commerce and purposefully availed itself of the market for batteries in Mississippi and was subject to personal jurisdiction in Mississippi and holding that the plaintiff was entitled to jurisdictional discovery as to a Georgia-based subsidiary of the manufacturer.
(9-0)

PRACTICE POINT – This decision is the latest full-bore analysis of personal jurisdiction and it comes from a unanimous Supreme Court. Go ahead and bookmark this one.

Jones County School District v. Covington County School District, 2019-IA-00985-SCT (Civil – Real Property)
Vacating the chancellor’s ruling in a dispute over sixteenth-section income from townships shared by neighboring school districts and remanding, holding that the statute conditioning annual payment of sixteenth-section funds on the exchange of lists of educable children is constitutional and that the maintenance of the principal fund by the custodial district is subject to an action in equity for accounting.
(6-3: Justice Griffis concurred in part and dissented in part, joined by Justice Kitchens and Justice King)

Other Orders

Ware v. Ware, 2020-CA-00702-SCT (denying motions for rehearing)
Moffett v. State, 2018-DR-00276-SCT (denying motion for leave to file successive petition for PCR)
Smith v. Mississippi Department of Public Safety, 2021-CT-00020-SCT (denying cert)
Barnes v. State, 2021-CT-00404-SCT (denying cert)

Hand Down List

Summaries of the Mississippi Supreme Court opinions of March 10, 2022

The Mississippi Supreme Court handed down three opinions today. In a case of first impression, the court held that short term rentals through services like Airbnb and VRBO constitute “residential purposes” rather than “commercial purposes” and thus do not violate restrictive covenants barring use of homes for commercial purposes. The court also reversed the judgment of the Mississippi Court of Appeals and reinstated a conviction for witness intimidation in what started as a voter fraud case in Canton, Mississippi.

Ellis v. Ellis, 2020-CA-00691-SCT (Civil – Domestic Relations/Divorce)
Reversing the chancery court’s order distributing marital assets and awarding alimony and attorneys’ fees, holding that the chancery court lacked jurisdiction to enter the order that was sought by and in favor of the party who was on the receiving end of a judgment of divorce by default in Texas because the chancery court had previously dismissed a prior, Mississippi complaint for divorce and counterclaim for divorce with prejudice.
(Justice King wrote a special concurrence, agreeing fully with the Court’s decision, but writing that Redd v. Redd (In re Conservatorship of Redd),
No. 2019-CA-01281-SCT, 2021 WL 5368656 (Miss. Nov. 18, 2021) was wrongly decided. This opinion was joined by Justice Beam and joined in part by Chief Justice Randolph.)

Rainey v. State, 2019-CT-01651-SCT (Criminal – Felony/Voter Fraud/Witness Intimidation/Eighth Amendment)
Reversing the Mississippi Court of Appeals’ judgment that had reversed a conviction for witness intimidation and a fifteen-year sentence, holding that there was sufficient evidence to support the conviction where there was testimony that the defendant registered two individuals to vote and then gave them $10 for “a round of beer,” later gave one of those individuals a ride to vote and then $10 for lunch, and then, after the voter was questioned by investigators, the defendant visited and confronted the voter about the investigation. The court also held that the fifteen-year sentence did not violate the Eight Amendment.
(Justice King dissented, joined by Justice Kitchens and Justice Coleman.)

Lake Serene Property Owners Association Inc. v. Esplin, 2020-CA-00689-SCT (Civil – Real Property/Restrictive Covenants)
Affirming the chancery court’s finding in a breach of residential covenant case, holding that short-term rentals of private homes through online services such as Airbnb, VRBO, and HomeAway constitute use for “residential purposes” rather than “commercial purposes” in the absence of definitions of those terms in the covenants and holding that the association’s board of directors did not have authority to amend the bylaws in a manner that restricted the owners’ covenant rights to host short-term rentals.
(Justice Ishee concurred in part and dissented in part, joined by Justice Griffis.)

NOTE: This was a case of first impression in Mississippi on the issue of whether short-term rentals through services such as Airbnb constitute “residential purposes.” All nine justices concurred in the holding that short-term rentals do constitute “residential purposes” rather than “commercial purposes.” The court did not dwell on this, but I think it is implicit in the decision that if the covenants had defined “residential purposes” in a way that excluded short-term rentals, or if short-term rentals were otherwise specifically prohibited by the covenants, the result would have been different. In any event, this is a win for hosts and hosting platforms.

Other Orders

Knox v. State, 2014-DR-849-SCT (denying Motion for Leave to File Successive Petition for Post-Conviction Relief and Knox’s First Amended Motion for Leave to File Successor Petition for Post-Conviction Relief are dismissed and Second Amended Motion for Leave to File Successor Petition for Post-Conviction Relief is denied)

Ellis v. Ellis, 2020-CA-691-SCT (denying Motion to Take Judicial Notice of Other Relevant Court Proceedings filed by Joseph Dale Ellis, Sr. and Motion to Take Judicial Notice of Texas Court of Appeals’ Memorandum Opinion, Judgment, and Final Mandate and for Inclusion of Same in Appellate Record filed by Joseph Dale Ellis, Sr.)

Atkins v. Moore, 2021-CA-780 (denying a not otherwise not defined “motion for relief”)

Complete Hand Down List