Background
Scott D. Weaver filed a March 5, 2026 motion in a Franklin County common pleas case seeking to alter or amend judgment under Civ.R. 59(A)(1) and (9). On April 1, he brought this original procedendo action against Judge Carl A. Aveni, requesting an order compelling the judge to rule on that motion.
Two days later, on April 3, Judge Aveni issued a decision and entry in the underlying case that denied Weaver’s March 5 motion. Judge Aveni then moved to dismiss the procedendo action for failure to state a claim. A magistrate recommended dismissal as moot, and Weaver did not object.
The Court’s Holding
The Tenth District adopted the magistrate’s decision, with a correction to the appendix caption reflecting that the matter was in procedendo rather than mandamus. It granted the respondent’s motion to dismiss and dismissed Weaver’s procedendo complaint as moot.
A writ of procedendo may require an inferior court to act when it has refused or unnecessarily delayed ruling, but it cannot direct the content of the ruling. The court held that the trial judge had already performed the only act Weaver sought: ruling on the March 5 motion. The court could take judicial notice of the publicly available trial-court docket to determine that fact.
Key Takeaways
- Procedendo is unavailable once the trial court has ruled on the matter the relator asked it to address.
- A court deciding mootness in a procedendo action may consider the underlying trial-court record.
- The absence of objections permitted adoption of the magistrate’s decision after review for facial legal error.
Why It Matters
The decision confirms the limited function of procedendo: it compels a court to proceed, not to reach a particular result. A subsequent ruling on the pending motion eliminates any live controversy over a request to compel that ruling.