CLARENCE KEITH WILLIAMSON,
Plaintiff,
v. Vance County
No. 96 CVD 324
JUANITA HUNT WILLIAMSON,
Defendant.
Melissa C. Lemmond, for defendant-appellant.
No brief filed for plaintiff-appellee.
HUDSON, Judge.
In April 1996, plaintiff brought an action for divorce against
defendant seeking an equitable distribution of their marital
property. The trial court entered a judgment of distribution on 23
April 2001, awarding defendant $106,361.99 of the marital property,
awarding plaintiff $46,237.22 of the marital property, and ordering
plaintiff to pay defendant an additional net distributive amount of
$5,718.17 plus a setoff reimbursement of $1,920.66.
Plaintiff filed a motion for relief pursuant to North Carolina
Rules of Civil Procedure 59(a)(9) and 60(a) and (b), alleging
“clerical errors,” “arithmetic errors.” and an “oversight or
omission” in the trial court's judgment. The trial court deniedthe motion by order entered 11 September 2002. On 11 October 2002,
defendant filed notice of appeal “from the Order rendered on
September 11, 2002, . . . which denied Defendant's Motion for
Relief Pursuant to Rules 60 and 59 of the Rules of Civil Procedure
filed on May 7, 2001.”
In her brief to this Court, defendant avers that the district
court's judgment of distribution contains “[a]t least three” errors
that are “so obvious and substantial” as to entitle her to an
amendment or correction thereof. However, defendant gave notice of
appeal only from the order denying her motion for relief under
Rules 59 and 60, not from the judgment of distribution. See N.C.
R. App. P. 3(d) (requiring notice of appeal to “designate the
judgment or order from which appeal is taken”). Her notice of
appeal "does not also specifically appeal the underlying judgment,
[and, therefore,] does not properly present the underlying judgment
for our review." Von Ramm v. Von Ramm, 99 N.C. App. 153, 156, 392
S.E.2d 422, 424 (1990).
The scope of defendant's appeal is further “confined to a
consideration of those assignments of error set out in the record
on appeal.” N.C. R. App. P. 10(a). Defendant assigns error as
follows:
1. To the Court's Order Denying Defendant's
Motion to Set Aside the Previous Judgment.
2. Court's Order Denying Defendant's Motion
for Relief to Correct the Judgment.
Such broadside, conclusory language “raises no issue of law for our
determination, . . . since 'the basis upon which error is assigned'is not stated in the assignment, as Rule 10(c) of our Rules of
Appellate Procedure requires.” McManus v. McManus, 76 N.C. App.
588, 590, 334 S.E.2d 270, 272 (1985) (citing Town of Burnsville v.
Boone, 231 N.C. 577, 58 S.E.2d 351 (1950)). Therefore, the
arguments found in defendant's appellate brief are not properly
before this Court, and we decline to address them. Nadeau v.
Employment Sec. Comm'n of North Carolina, 97 N.C. App. 272, 277,
388 S.E.2d 145, 148 (1990); Mayhew Elec. Co. v. Carras, 29 N.C.
App. 105, 107-08, 223 S.E.2d 536, 538 (1976). “However, the appeal
itself constitutes an exception to the [order] and brings forward
any error of law apparent on its face.” Wade v. Wade, 72 N.C. App.
372, 376, 325 S.E.2d 260, 266 (1985), disc. review denied, 313 N.C.
612, 330 S.E.2d 616 (1985).
A trial court's denial of a motion for relief under Rules 59
and 60 is reviewed only for manifest abuse of discretion. Ollo v.
Mills, 136 N.C. App. 618, 624, 525 S.E.2d 213, 217 (2000). The
court's ruling should not be disturbed on appeal unless it
"amounted to a substantial miscarriage of justice." Worthington v.
Bynum, 305 N.C. 478, 487, 290 S.E.2d 599, 605 (1982).
Nothing on the face of the district court's order, which
simply denied defendant's motion, reflects an abuse of the court's
discretion or a substantial miscarriage of justice. We note that
the court was not required to enter findings of fact in support of
its ruling. Nations v. Nations, 111 N.C. App. 211, 214, 431 S.E.2d
852, 855 (1993) (Rule 60); Strickland v. Jacobs, 88 N.C. App. 397,
399-400, 363 S.E.2d 229, 230 (1988) (Rule 59). Accordingly, we affirm the order.
Affirmed.
Chief Judge EAGLES and Judge MCCULLOUGH concur.
Report per Rule 30(e).
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