LaQuanda M. Wannamaker v. Raymond L. Wannamaker
Annotate this Case
Download PDF
REL: 08/03/2007 Notice: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the advance sheets of Southern Reporter. Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Alabama Appellate Courts, 300 Dexter Avenue, Montgomery, Alabama 36104-3741 ((334) 2290649), of any typographical or other errors, in order that corrections may be made before the opinion is printed in Southern Reporter. ALABAMA COURT OF CIVIL APPEALS SPECIAL TERM, 2007 _________________________ 2060390 _________________________ LaQuanda M. Wannamaker v. Raymond L. Wannamaker Appeal from Montgomery Circuit Court (DR-05-1584) BRYAN, Judge. LaQuanda M. Wannamaker ("the wife") appeals an order ("the visitation order") granting Raymond L. Wannamaker ("the husband") visitation with the parties' two minor children. We 2060390 dismiss the appeal and instruct the trial court to set aside the visitation order. The wife previously appealed a default divorce judgment the trial court had entered in the underlying action on October 19, 2006. See Wannamaker v. Wannamaker, [Ms. 2060207, June 29, 2007] ___ So. 2d ___ (Ala. Civ. App. 2007). While Wannamaker was pending in this court, the trial court entered the visitation order on December 21, 2006, and the wife then appealed the visitation order. "[B]ecause '"jurisdictional matters are of such magnitude that we take notice of them at any time and do so even ex mero motu,"'" Horton v. Horton, 822 So. 2d 431, 433 (Ala. Civ. App. 2001), we first consider whether we have jurisdiction over this appeal. "'Once an appeal is taken, the trial court loses jurisdiction to act except in matters entirely collateral to the appeal,'" Horton, 822 So. 2d at 434, because "jurisdiction of a case can be in only one court at a time." Foster v. Greer & Sons, Inc., 446 So. 2d 605, 608 (Ala. 1984). Thus, the filing of the wife's notice of appeal in Wannamaker divested the parties' trial court of jurisdiction to act divorce action, which 2 encompassed the in issue the of 2060390 visitation, until that appeal was resolved. Indeed, the trial court acknowledged in the visitation order that it did not have jurisdiction to enter a visitation order in the divorce action because that action was on appeal. However, the trial court asserted that, despite its lack of jurisdiction to enter a visitation order in the divorce action, it nonetheless had jurisdiction to enter a visitation order because (1) in its capacity as a responding tribunal of an interstate childsupport case under the Alabama Uniform Interstate Family Support Act, § 30-3A-316 et seq., Ala. Code 1975, it had before it an interstate child-support action the wife had initiated against the husband in New York in 1999, and (2) that interstate child-support action was not on appeal. However, nothing in § 30-3A-316 et seq. purports to confer upon a trial court jurisdiction to enter a visitation order in an interstate child-support case when the issue of visitation is vested in an appellate court by virtue of an appeal of a divorce action involving the same parties. Accordingly, we conclude that the trial court did not have jurisdiction to enter the visitation order. See Horton. Because the trial court lacked jurisdiction to enter the visitation order, that 3 2060390 order is a nullity. Id. Therefore, we dismiss the appeal and instruct the trial court to set aside the visitation order. The wife's request for an attorney's fee on appeal is denied. APPEAL DISMISSED. Thomas and Moore, JJ., concur. Thompson, P.J., and Pittman, J., concur in the result, without writing. 4
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
