If the trial judge made a mistake in deciding your case, you might be able to have the judge’s decision overturned on appeal. Or, perhaps the opposing party has appealed, and you wish to have the trial judge’s decision upheld. Either way, our firm is highly qualified to handle your appeal.
We at Grant Legal Group have over 60 years of combined legal experience. With a career focus in appellate practice by attorney John S. Grant IV, we have all the skills and resources required to fight for you on appeal.
There are many potential grounds for appeal. If you are the party appealing, you must prove that the trial court made a mistake. Often, this can be difficult to prove. And it is impossible to list all the possible reasons to appeal. If you believe that a judge or jury decided your case unfairly, our qualified appellate attorneys can advise you if you have grounds to appeal. Also, if the opposing party has appealed, then we can advise you on how to best defend the trial court’s judgment.
Contact Grant Legal Group PA today at (601) 827-3031 to discuss your options in a consultation.
We handle appeals from all areas of Mississippi. Unique to appellate practice, whether you live on the Coast, the Jackson area, North Mississippi, or another part of the state, location should not affect pricing. The only Mississippi appellate courts—the Court of Appeals and Supreme Court—are both located in Jackson, Mississippi. So regardless of what Mississippi County the case originates from, the case will be appealed to the appellate courts located in Jackson, close to our office and negating any travel costs.
If you want to appeal a trial court’s ruling, you need to act quickly. In most cases, the Mississippi rules require you to appeal within 30 days of the trial court’s final judgment. Sometimes, you are required to file a post-trial motion within 10 days of the judgment, before you can appeal it. Contact our experienced appeals lawyers to discuss these requirements. The appeal deadlines cannot be ignored. Generally, if you miss your appeal deadline, then your right to appeal is lost.
If you want to appeal a trial court’s final ruling, in most cases you have an unconditional right to have your appeal heard by the Supreme Court or Court of Appeals as long as you pay the appeal costs or are deemed unable to pay. If you think you want to appeal from an adverse ruling, call an experienced appellate attorney to discuss your options.
An appeal normally takes close to or over a year. First, you must wait on a court reporter to compile the trial transcript. You also wait on the trial-court clerk to compose all the pleadings, orders, and other documents. Next, once the record of the trial proceedings is completed, it is sent to the Supreme Court. The parties’ attorneys then prepare briefs for the appellate court. This can take about 3 to 6 months, as each side can ask for and receive several extensions of time. Then, once briefing is complete, the appellate court has 270 days to decide the appeal. That might be the end of the process. But, sometimes, the losing party will ask the court to reconsider its ruling (called rehearing). The rehearing process usually lasts 3 or 4 months, but can take longer. Also, if the Court of Appeals handles the initial appeal, then the losing party may request the Supreme Court to hear the case. This time, though, the Supreme Court must grant permission to appeal, known as a writ of certiorari. The Supreme Court rarely grants permission to appeal, but in the rare case, this can restart the appeal process, with another briefing period and another 270 days for a decision.
All appeals from Mississippi trial courts start off in the Supreme Court. In certain types of cases, the Supreme Court is required to retain the case. Those cases involve the death penalty, utility rates, annexations, bond issues, election contests, or a trial court’s finding a statute unconstitutional. The Supreme Court will also normally retain cases on a new or unsettled legal question, issues of broad public importance, and certain constitutional questions. In all other cases, the Supreme Court may assign the case to the Court of Appeals.
This might be of interest so that you know exactly what you are paying your appellate attorney for. First, your appellate attorney must draft a brief. The briefs are the parties’ opportunity to lay out the facts of the case and their legal arguments, in an attempt to convince the appellate court to side with their positions. Second, the appellate court may hold oral arguments, but this only occurs in a small percentage of cases. Oral arguments must be requested, and it is up to the court’s discretion whether to hold them. If there is an oral argument, the attorneys present their argument to a panel of judges, who will question the attorneys on the merits of their positions. On appeal, no witnesses are called, nor is any additional evidence taken. The appellate court’s review is strictly confined to the transcript and other papers from the trial-court file. Other than briefs and (sometimes) oral arguments, there are a few smaller tasks that will need to be performed, but the bulk of the work will go into those projects.
This depends on the facts of your specific case and the applicable law. Though we cannot guarantee success in any given case, we believe hiring experienced appellate counsel can greatly improve your chances of winning your case on appeal. Our experienced appellate attorneys have successfully argued many appeals in both the Mississippi Supreme Court and Court of Appeals. We have obtained multiple reversals of trial-court judgments (for clients who lost at trial) and affirmances of trial-court judgments (for clients who won at trial). Our published cases include:
Page v. Graves, 283 So. 3d 269 (Miss. Ct. App. 2019)
White v. Whitehead, 300 So. 3d 1078 (Miss. Ct. App. 2020)
Jennings v. State, 311 So. 3d 712 (Miss. Ct. App. 2021)
Roley v. Roley, 329 So. 3d 473 (Miss. Ct. App. 2021)
Ellis v. Ellis, 334 So. 3d 1148 (Miss. 2022)
Davis v. Davis, 360 So. 3d 196 (Miss. 2023)
At our firm, we offer flat-fee pricing for most appeals. That means we will tell you exactly what our fees will be. Because we focus on appeals as a primary practice area, we understand the amount of work required in the appeals process. So this allows us to price each case with precision, and removes the guesswork on the expected costs. Because the amount of work will vary depending on each case’s complexity, we need to discuss the specific facts of your case before providing a quote.
Our firm has experience with appeals to our state Supreme Court and Court of Appeals in a wide range of cases. The cases include those in each of our practice areas—for example, family law, real estate, and wills. We also can capably handle appeals in many other practice areas, including medical malpractice, personal injury, workers’ compensation, and criminal law.
If you will call us and ask to speak to John S. Grant IV, he can quickly advise you whether your appeal is one our firm would handle.
Contact Grant Legal Group today at (601) 827-3031 to discuss your options in a consultation.