Posted by Nydia Streets of Streets Law in Florida Child Support
When a party appeals a Florida family law case, if the opposing party “confesses error”, the appeal is usually granted. This means the opposing party admits the appeal is correct and should be granted. Is the appellate court required to abide by a confession of error? This was an issue in the case Perez v. DOR, 1D22-798 (Fla. 1st DCA October 12, 2022).
In this administrative child support case, the father was mailed notice that the Department of Revenue intended to pursue administrative child support. A proposed order on support was eventually filed and served on the father, and it notified him he could request a hearing if he disagreed with the order. The father did not request a hearing and the order was therefore affirmed. The father appealed the order, noting in his brief to the court that while he acknowledged a legal duty to pay support for his child, he could not pay the amount ordered because he had another child to support. The Department of Revenue responded by confessing error, noting that it had erroneously included in the order that paternity had been established by an order for DNA testing.
The appellate court rejected the confession of error, holding “‘The appellate court will usually reverse on a confession of error if it appears from the record, or the appellant’s brief, that the point or error relied on is well taken.’ [internal citation omitted]. In other words, an appellee confessing error has found the error asserted by the appellant is well taken and should result in reversal. The Department did no such thing here. Instead, the Department ignored the issue actually raised by [the father] and simply alerted this Court to an alleged error in the support order that it had discovered on its own. If the Department detects an error in its own order, it is free to correct it as it sees fit, in accordance with the law. It need not involve this Court. It is the function of this Court to determine whether an appellant has demonstrated reversible error, not to ratify an appellee’s own discovery that an order contains a mistake. Nor can it be ignored that [the father] explicitly admitted paternity in this appeal and that a DNA test indisputably establishes his paternity, regardless of whether an order of paternity is in the record. For this reason, we reject the Department’s confession of error.”
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