ALFRED L. WILLIAMS AND JOANNE M. WILLIAMS, HIS WIFE; AND SAFECO TITLE INSURANCE COMPANY, APPELLANTS,
v.
DAVID NUSSBAUM, SR.; DAVID NUSSBAUM, JR.; LACY MAHON, JR.; GEORGE R. REGISTER, JR.; AND GRAHAM-JONES PAPER COMPANY, A DIVISION OF THE MEAD CORPORATION, FORMERLY GRAHAM-JONES PAPER CO., A FLORIDA CORPORATION, APPELLEES

Fla. 1st DCA | 1982-09-10
No. AG-448
LARRY G. SMITH, JOANOS and THOMPSON, JJ., concur.
419 So. 2d 715 Florida District Court of Appeal, First District (1982) Caution
Cited by 14 cases

AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.

Synopsis

In a foreclosure case involving competing claims to real property, the appellate court reversed the amended summary final judgment because it improperly modified the original judgment's protective provisions for a third party's interest in the foreclosure proceeds, and it properly allowed intervention by new parties with interests in the property.


Holding

The court reversed the amended summary final judgment and the foreclosure sale ordered pursuant to it, finding the amended judgment improperly modified the original judgment's protective provisions. The court held that intervention should be permitted after a final decree when the interests of justice require it, and that the appellants are entitled on remand to have their interests fully determined. The court clarified that appellees, as personal creditors of Sams, have no interest superior to Sams's interests as a beneficiary of the Chavis estate.


Headnotes

[1] A court may permit intervention after a final decree has been entered if the interests of justice require it.

[2] A party seeking an amended judgment must provide notice and process to other parties, absent waiver.

Previewing 2 of 6 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

Key Quotes

“Should the sale ordered hereby result in an excess of funds above the sums adjudicated to be due plaintiff, any interest in said sums of the defendant, Joseph Gardener Sams, Jr., as later determined by the court, shall be divided pro rata between Nussbaum and Graham-Jones, based upon the above total amount of their respective judgments with interest, and any excess above the amounts due those defendants shall be paid to the defendant, Joseph Gardener Sams, Jr.”

Original judgment's protective provision requiring court determination of Sams's interest in excess proceeds

Previewing 1 of 3 key quotes on this case — the court’s exact language, pinpointed for members.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

Facts & Procedural History

The original foreclosure judgment dated July 23, 1981 contained specific provisions requiring any excess proceeds from the sale to be held pending cou…

The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.


Opinion of the Court
PER CURIAM.

PER CURIAM.

We reverse the amended summary final judgment dated September 4, 1981, and that portion of the order denying appellants’ motion to set aside or stay the amended summary final judgment and foreclosure sale.

The original summary final judgment of foreclosure dated July 23, 1981 provided in paragraph 7 that appellees’ judgment-creditors’ liens against the undivided one-half interest of Joseph Gardener Sams, Jr. in the foreclosed real property would be paid under the following conditions:

Should the sale ordered hereby result in an excess of funds above the sums adjudicated to be due plaintiff, any interest in said sums of the defendant, Joseph Gardener Sams, Jr., as later determined by the court, shall be divided pro rata between Nussbaum and Graham-Jones, based upon the above total amount of their respective judgments with interest, and any excess above the amounts due those defendants shall be paid to the defendant, Joseph Gardener Sams, Jr. (emphasis supplied)

Jurisdiction was retained by the court to enter “further orders as are proper .... ”

Although appellees were clearly entitled to notice of the foreclosure plaintiffs’ post-judgment application to another circuit judge to set aside the judgment and dismiss the foreclosure action, their remedy was to promptly move for a rehearing, or to set aside the order entered without notice, and to have the original final judgment reinstated. Instead, without additional pleadings, notice, or process, appellees applied to yet another circuit judge for entry of a new and different summary final judgment in their favor. Furthermore, although appel-lees’ motion for an amended summary final judgment requested a judgment “making the same determinations” as contained in paragraph 7 of the original judgment, the judgment they prepared and submitted to the court departed substantially from the original. The amended summary final judgment omitted any requirement that any excess remaining from the proceeds of the foreclosure sale be held, pending a determination by the court of the interest of appellees’ judgment-debtor, Sams, and instead, placed appellees in the position of foreclosing mortgagees with respect to an undivided one-half interest in the property itself, with no provision for determination by the court of the amount, if any, representing the interest of Sams in the sales proceeds. The new judgment also provided that appellees could become bidders and receive credit on their bids based on the amount of their liens, contrary to the original judgment.

We note that the personal representative of the Chavis estate, from which Sams derived any interest he might then or later have in the property, moved for rehearing as to the amended summary final judgment, pointing out that appellees had obtained a judgment that gave appellees rights superior to those acquired under the original foreclosure judgment. Notwithstanding this, the motion for rehearing was denied. This was error. The personal representative of the estate had standing, under the original judgment, to have the court determine the disposition of the proceeds of the foreclosure sale, so long as the property or the funds derived from the sale remained within the control of the court. Indeed, by the express wording of the original foreclosure judgment, the interest of Sams in the proceeds of sale was a matter to be determined by the court after the sale, and the Clerk of the court was specifically ordered by that judgment to retain any amount remaining (after payment of the costs and the judgment of the plaintiffs) “pending further order of this court.”

The intervenors’ motion sets forth circumstances sufficient to warrant their entry into this litigation. The motion alleges, among other things, that subsequent to the original final judgment, but prior to entry of the amended final judgment, yet another circuit judge, of the Probate Division, had approved a sale by the Chavis estate to the intervenors, Williams. Copies of purported orders from the Probate Division approving and confirming the sale were attached to the motion. The interve-nors requested a stay of the impending foreclosure sale under the amended summary final judgment. This was denied. However, the motion to intervene was granted, and the intervenors were authorized to pursue such appeals as might be necessary to protect their interests.

As a general rule, it is too late to apply for intervention after a final decree has been entered. However, intervention should be permitted at such a time if the interests of justice require it. Wags Transportation Systems, Inc. v. City of Miami Beach, 88 So. 2d 751 (Fla.1956); Tallentire v. Burkhart, 150 Fla. 137, 7 So. 2d 326 (1942); F.R.C.P. 1.230. The trial court was correct in granting the motion to intervene.

We reverse the amended summary final judgment, the order denying the motion to stay that judgment, and the foreclosure sale ordered pursuant to that judgment. On remand the intervenors shall be entitled to have their interests fully determined.1 For the guidance of the trial court, appellees, as personal creditors of Sams, are entitled to no interest in the property or the proceeds of sale thereof, superior to that which Sams is entitled to as a beneficiary of the Chavis estate. In adjudicating such interest, the court shall take into account the requirements of the probate laws, as well as those pertaining to the rights of the parties as between themselves.

REVERSED AND REMANDED.

LARRY G. SMITH, JOANOS and THOMPSON, JJ., concur. . See, Miracle House Corporation v. Haige, 96 So. 2d 417 (Fla.1957); and Singletary v. Mann, 157 Fla. 37, 24 So. 2d 718 (1946). In Singletary, the court quoted the rule as stated in 39 Am. Jur. p. 950, § 79:

Frequently the statutes and rules of practice governing intervention expressly stipulate that intervention shall be in subordination to and in recognition of the propriety of the main proceeding, but aside from any such express declaration the rule is stated to be that one who intervenes in a pending action ordinarily must come into the case as it exists and conform to the pleadings as he finds them or that he must take the case as he finds it. By this it is generally meant that he cannot avail himself of or urge mere irregularities in the proceeding which the original parties have expressly or impliedly waived, or of defenses which are personal to them.

We conceive this to mean that the intervenor may not assert matters extraneous to his own interests, but that he may avail himself of any and all arguments which relate to derivation and extent of his own interests, whether or not these matters have been previously asserted by one of the original parties.


Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus


Citator

Cited By

  • In re Adoption of a Minor Child, 593 So. 2d 185 (Fla. 1991)
    …So. 2d 435, 437 (Fla.1969). The exception to the rule is that postjudgment intervention should be permitted if the interests of justice so require. Wags Transp. Sys., 88 So. 2d at 752; Dickinson v. Segal, 219 So. 2d at 437-38; Williams v. Nussbaum, 419 So. 2d 715, 717 (Fla. 1st DCA 1982). This exception, however, is limited to permitting intervention by affected persons so that an appeal can be taken. Henry P. Trawick, Jr., Florida Practice and Procedure § 4-9, at 41-42 (1986); see, e.g., Wags Transp. Sys.,…
  • Nat'l Wildlife Fed'n Inc. v. J.T. Glisson, 531 So. 2d 996 (Fla. 1st DCA 1988)
    …accept the record and pleadings as he finds them and cannot raise new issues, although he may argue the issues as they apply to him as a party. Riviera Club v. Belle Mead Development Corp., 141 Fla. 538, 194 So. 783 (Fla.1940); Williams v. Nussbaum, 419 So. 2d 715 (Fla. 1st DCA 1982). When appellants filed their motion to intervene trial was scheduled for approximately 6 months thereafter, and was eventually rescheduled for an even later date. Discovery was still underway and the pleadings had not yet closed.…
  • Omni Nat'l Bank v. Ga. Banking Co., 951 So. 2d 1006 (Fla. 3d DCA 2007)
    ….1992). The intervenor must accept the record and pleadings as they exist in the litigation and the intervenor may not raise any new issues. Nat’l Wildlife Fed’n, Inc. v. Glisson, 531 So. 2d 996, 998 (Fla. 1st DCA 1988) (citing Williams v. Nussbaum, 419 So. 2d 715 (Fla. 1st DCA 1982)); see also Coast Cities Coaches, Inc. v. Dade County, 178 So. 2d 703 (Fla.1965). Omni accepted the pleadings as they existed and did not attempt to raise any new or competing claims in the litigation. The existing issue was owne…

Previewing 3 of 7 citing cases — full citator treatment, depth of discussion, and citing context are member features.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

Authorities Cited

Full citator, related cases, and AI research tools

Open in FLexlaw