Judge Who Lost Election Must Still Provide Complete Findings in Pending Case

The husband and wife in this Knox County, Tennessee, case were married in 1991 and had two children, both of whom were over the age of majority before their divorce hearing.  The husband sued for divorce in 2018, and the case went to trial before Chancellor Clarence E. Pridemore, Jr., in 2021 and 2022.

In May, 2022, Chancellor Pridemore was defeated in a primary election, and his statutory authority expired later that year.  He did not make a ruling from the bench, but asked both parties to submit proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law.  Shortly before his authority expired, he issued a one-page order adopting the wife’s 59 pages of proposed findings and conclusions.

The husband appealed to the Tennessee Court of Appeals, which dismissed the appeal because of some outstanding issues.  These were addressed by Chancellor Richard B. Armstrong, and the husband filed a second appeal.

The appeals court vacated the judgment on the grounds that Chancellor Pridemore had not show his independent judgment on the issues.  The appeals court cited a 2014 Tennessee Supreme Court case holding that wholesale adoption of verbiage “detracts from the appearance of a hardworking, independent judge.” 

Under that case, party-prepared orders might be proper, but only if they accurately reflect the decision of the trial court.  This could be shown, for example, by a judge who alters a party-prepared order to reflect his or her own judgment.  In this case, this did not happen.

The wife argued that there might be grounds to preserve the judgment, if the appeals court can independently review the evidence.  But the appeals court found that this was not appropriate in the case.

Finally, the wife argued that any new trial should be limited to the issues raised on appeal.  But since the lower court had failed to comply with the requirement for independent findings, it held that this was not appropriate either.

For these reasons, the Court of Appeals vacated the lower court’s judgment and remanded the case.  It also assessed the costs of appeal against the wife.

No. E2023-01272-COA-R3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. July 31, 2024).

See original opinion for exact language.  Legal citations omitted.

To learn more, see The Tennessee Divorce Process: How Divorces Work Start to Finish.