Wilcox v. Hotelerama Associates, Ltd.

• Decision Date: 08 June 1993
• Docket Number: No. 93-294,93-294
• Citation: 619 So.2d 444
• Parties: 18 Fla. L. Week. D1398 Ivory WILCOX and Ana Lee Wilcox, Petitioners, v. HOTELERAMA ASSOCIATES, LTD., and Hilton Hotel Corporation d/b/a The Fontainebleau Hilton, Respondents.
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals

Page 444

619 So.2d 444

18 Fla. L. Week. D1398

Ivory WILCOX and Ana Lee Wilcox, Petitioners, v. HOTELERAMA ASSOCIATES, LTD., and Hilton Hotel Corporation d/b/a The Fontainebleau Hilton, Respondents.

No. 93-294.

District Court of Appeal of Florida Third District.

June 8, 1993.

Abramson & Magidson and John Abramson, Hicks Anderson & Blum and Bambi G. Blum, Miami, for petitioners.

Holland & Knight, Daniel S. Pearson and Lucinda A. Hofmann, Miami, for respondents.

Before SCHWARTZ, C.J., and FERGUSON and LEVY, JJ.

LEVY, Judge.

In this proceeding for Writ of Mandamus, petitioners Ivory Wilcox and Anna Lee Wilcox [hereafter "the Wilcoxes"], seek to compel the trial court to vacate an order staying a retrial pending satisfaction of an appellate cost judgment. We grant the petition for Writ of Mandamus based upon our finding that the trial court did not have authority to enter a stay conditioned upon prepayment of appellate costs where this Court had previously mandated that the case was reversed and remanded for a new trial.

The Wilcoxes were awarded a $1,365,000 judgment against respondents Hotelerama Associates, Ltd. and Hilton Hotel Corporation, d/b/a The Fontainebleau Hilton [hereafter "Hotelerama"], after the jury found that Hotelerama had committed a fraud upon the Wilcoxes by knowingly exposing Ivory, a laundry worker, to lethal levels of toxic chemicals in the hotel's unventilated laundry area. Hotelerama bonded the judgment and appealed. This Court reversed the judgment because of an erroneous jury instruction given by the trial court, and remanded the case for a new trial. See Hotelerama Assoc., Ltd. v. Wilcox, 593 So.2d 532 (Fla. 3d DCA), review denied, 602 So.2d 943 (Fla.1992).

As the prevailing party on appeal, Hotelerama was awarded its appellate costs of $55,872.91. Because the Wilcoxes did not pay the cost judgment, Hotelerama moved in the trial court for a stay of the retrial until the Wilcoxes satisfied the cost judgment. The trial court granted Hotelerama's motion and entered an order staying the retrial until the Wilcoxes paid the cost judgment or posted a cost bond. ¹ The Wilcoxes then petitioned this Court for a Writ of Mandamus or, in the alternative, for a Writ of Certiorari.

A trial court is vested with broad discretion in the handling of a case which has been reversed and remanded for a new trial. Pritchett v. Brevard Naval Stores Co., 134 Fla. 649, 185 So. 134 (1938). However, a trial court's role upon the issuance of a mandate from an appellate court becomes purely ministerial, and its function is limited to obeying the appellate court's order or decree. O.P. Corp. v. Village of North Palm Beach, 302 So.2d 130 (Fla.1974); Berger v. Leposky, 103 So.2d 628 (Fla.1958); Milton v. Keith, 503 So.2d 1312 (Fla. 3d DCA 1987). A trial court does not have discretionary power to alter or modify the mandate of an appellate court in any way, shape, or form. Nicholson v. Ariko, 565 So.2d 843 (Fla. 5th DCA 1990); Florida Power and Light v. Flichtbeil, 513 So.2d 1078 (Fla. 5th DCA 1987), review denied, 520 So.2d 585 (Fla.1988); Home Savings & Loan Association of Florida v. Epperson, 427 So.2d 246 (Fla. 4th DCA 1983); Stuart v. Hertz Corp., 381 So.2d 1161 (Fla. 4th DCA 1980); In re Vermeulen, 122 So.2d 318 (Fla. 1st DCA 1960).

In the original appeal, this Court ordered that the cause be reversed for a new trial. The holding of a new trial was not conditioned upon the Wilcoxes payment of appellate costs. In light of this Court's specific mandate, the trial court was without discretion in its obligation to proceed with the disposition of the cause without entering a stay pending the payment of the costs of appeal. See State ex rel. Burns v. Gray, 135 Fla. 826, 185 So. 843 (1939) (Florida Supreme Court granted writ of mandamus finding that stay of subsequent action pending prepayment of costs was not within discretionary powers of trial court). ²

We recognize that under Florida law a trial court has broad discretion to order stays in the proceedings before it, see Regan, Inc. v. Val-Ro, Ltd., 396 So.2d 834 (Fla. 3d DCA 1981); Neale v. Aycock, 340 So.2d 535 (Fla. 1st DCA 1976), cert. denied, 351 So.2d 405 (Fla.1977); Price v. Hernando Beach, Inc., 286 So.2d 279 (Fla. 2d DCA 1973), and that Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.420(d) provides for the stay of proceedings pending prepayments of costs in cases involving voluntarily dismissed actions as a method of deterring vexatious relitigation, see McArthur Dairy, Inc. v. Guillen, 470 So.2d 747 (Fla. 3d DCA 1985); Gordon v. Warren Heating & Air Conditioning, Inc., 340 So.2d 1234 (Fla. 4th DCA 1976). Florida courts also have the authority to require prepayment of costs in involuntarily dismissed cases based upon failure to obey court orders on discovery pursuant to Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.380. See Schade v. Brown, 375 So.2d 16 (Fla. 3d DCA 1979). However, these legal doctrines apply to cases involving a different phase of the legal proceedings, and different procedural postures. None of these cases involved the situation where the trial court was under a direct mandate from the appellate court to hold a new trial. Under these circumstances, a trial court has no discretion in carrying out the District Court of Appeal's mandate, as discussed above. See Milton v. Keith, 503 So.2d at 1314 (upon issuance of mandate by appellate court to trial court, "the trial court's role becomes purely ministerial; its function is limited to implementing the appellate court's order or decree.").

We note further that the concerns for preventing harassment and vexatious litigation which was...