Volume 170 — Ohio State Reports, Third Series

Mandamus—Elections—R.C. 3513.04—R.C. 3513.31(I)—Candidate nominated by her political party's central committee under R.C. 3513.31(I) to run for general election to fill a common-pleas-court judgeship that was vacated by resignation of the sitting judge 100 days before the general election not allowed to have her name placed on the ballot under R.C. 3513.04 because she lost a bid for her political party's nomination in the preceding primary election for a different judicial office—Writ denied.

R.C. 301.22 and 305.12—An unchartered county is not sui juris and therefore must be sued in the name of its board of commissioners—Cause remanded to the trial court to determine whether to allow plaintiff to amend its complaint or to dismiss the action.

Mandamus—Writ sought to compel board of election to remove a recall election from the ballot—East Cleveland City Charter—Mandamus is proper when relator seeks to compel board of elections to perform an affirmative act—Laches—Board of elections has no authority under city's charter to assess the validity of a recall election—Motion to intervene denied—Writ denied.

Insurance—Contracts—Businessowners insurance policy—When contractual language is clear, the writing itself determines the parties' intent—Electronic-equipment endorsement requires direct physical loss of or damage to media—Computer software cannot experience direct physical loss or physical damage, because it does not have a physical existence—When insurance policy covers "physical damage," there must be direct physical loss or physical damage of the covered media containing the computer software for the software to be covered under the policy.

Court of appeals' judgment affirmed on the authority of State v. Brasher.

Mandamus—Inmate lacked a clear legal right to have his second parole hearing take place four years sooner than the time provided in Ohio Adm.Code 5120:1-1-10(B)(2)—Court of appeals' dismissal of complaint for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted affirmed.

Habeas Corpus—Appellant's habeas claim became moot when he was released from prison—Court of appeals' dismissal of petition affirmed.

Criminal law—Aggravated murder—Findings of guilt and death sentence affirmed.

Habeas corpus—Inmate has been transferred to a prison not located in the district in which he filed his petition—Court of appeals' judgment dismissing petition for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted affirmed.

Juvenile court—Transfer to adult court—A juvenile court's probable-cause determination at a mandatory-bindover hearing is not subject to manifest-weight review on appeal—Court of appeals' judgment affirmed.

Workers' compensation—Ohio Bureau of Workers' Compensation assigns each Ohio employer to a classification based on the degree of hazard in the employer's business—A writ of mandamus will issue when the bureau does not explain its decision well enough to inform the parties and a court why a particular classification most closely describes the business with respect to its degree of hazard—Court of appeals' judgment reversed and limited writ granted.

R.C. 2945.71—Speedy trial—New charges against a defendant added after the defendant's arrest get a new speedy-trial period if at the time the initial charges were filed, the state did not have all the information necessary to bring the additional related charges.

Elections—Mandamus—R.C. 3513.31(B)—If a person nominated in a primary election as a party candidate withdraws as that candidate, the vacancy in the party nomination may be filled by a district committee of the major political party that made the nomination—Democratic Party's sole candidate in the 2022 primary election for state representative of a House district gave notice of his withdrawal after the primary election but before he was certified as the winner and party nominee for the general election—Withdrawing candidate's anticipated withdrawal as the certified party candidate permitted the district committee's nomination process to occur before certification of the primary-election result—Relator, the replacement nominee, had a clear legal right to have her name placed on the November 8, 2022 general-election ballot, and respondents, the Ohio secretary of state and boards of elections, had a clear legal duty to place her name on the ballot—Writ granted.

Mandamus—Public records—Private entities may be subject to public-records law under quasi-agency test—Under Civ.R. 12(B)(6), a court must presume that a complaint's factual allegations are truthful and draw all reasonable inferences in the nonmovant's favor—Court of appeals departed from the Civ.R. 12(B)(6) standard—Judgment reversed and cause remanded.

Appeal dismissed as moot.

Agreement made in 1997 between two city school district boards of education is valid and enforceable—Former R.C. 3311.06 is not applicable to 1997 agreement, because no territory was transferred from one school district to the other—Neither former R.C. 5705.41 nor former R.C. 5705.412 required that a fiscal certificate be attached to the 1997 agreement, because the agreement does not involve the expenditure of money.

Criminal law—Fourth Amendment—R.C. 2951.02(A)—Exclusionary rule—Community-control conditions—Probation officer's suspicionless search of probationer's cell phone did not violate Fourth Amendment when probationer had consented to warrantless searches of his property as a condition of his community control—Probation officer's suspicionless search did violate statute requiring probation officers to have reasonable grounds that probationer was violating the law or conditions of community control before conducting search—Incriminating evidence collected from cell phone not subject to exclusionary rule when search violated statute but not Fourth Amendment—Court of appeals' judgment reversed.

Mandamus and prohibition—Rules of Superintendence for the Courts of Ohio—Common pleas court judge's order sealing documents in a dissolution case was overbroad and was not supported by clear and convincing evidence—Writ of prohibition granted barring judge from enforcing sealing order and writ of mandamus granted ordering judge to vacate sealing order and to conduct a proper review of the documents pursuant to Sup.R. 44 and 45.

Criminal law—Sentencing—Trial court's failure to use the specific language of sentencing statute in its sentencing entry is not error when the entry conveys exactly the same meaning as the statutory language—Judgment affirmed in part and reversed in part and cause remanded.

Criminal law—Attempted aggravated murder and attempted murder—Statute of limitations—R.C. 2901.13—The statute of limitations for attempted aggravated murder and attempted murder is six years under R.C. 2901.13(A)(1)(a)—Court of appeals' judgment reversed and cause remanded to trial court to vacate judgment of conviction.

Workers' compensation—Our decision in State ex rel. Klein v. Precision Excavating & Grading Co. applies prospectively only.

Prohibition—Mandamus—Clerk of courts—Duties of office—Judges' journal entry did not merely direct clerk of courts in the performance of her duties but effectively prevented the clerk from performing her duties and thus functionally removed her from her elected office—Writs of prohibition and mandamus granted and writ of quo warranto denied as moot.

Mandamus—Elections—R.C. 3505.21—Equal Protection Clauses of the United States and Ohio Constitutions—Rational-basis review—R.C. 3505.21, which governs the process of appointing election observers, does not treat candidates who are not affiliated with a political party differently from party-affiliated candidates, and the statute serves a legitimate government interest by obviating the potential for boards of elections to become overwhelmed with too many election observers—R.C. 3505.21 does not provide election observers with permission to inspect the software, source codes, or hardware installed on automatic vote-tabulating machines, nor does it require poll workers to tabulate votes by hand—Writ denied.

Mandamus—Public Records—A police officer's dash-camera video is a public record subject to disclosure—Writ granted.

Mandamus—Relator's complaint challenging trial court's jurisdiction over his criminal case failed to state a viable claim for relief in mandamus against named respondent—Court of appeals' dismissal of complaint affirmed.

Mandamus—Public-records requests—All items listed in relator's request are not records, have been provided, and/or are no longer a basis for any claim for writ—City lacked reasonable basis to withhold all records requested simply because some of them related to a criminal investigation or prosecution and therefore were subject to R.C. 149.43(B)(8)'s requirement that requester seek court approval before submitting request—Writ denied and statutory damages awarded.

Judges—Misconduct—Violations of the Code of Judicial Conduct—Multiple violations, including improperly issuing capias warrants, engaging in improper plea bargaining and ex parte communications, issuing arbitrary dispositions, improperly using capias warrants and bonds to compel payment of fines and costs, exhibiting lack of decorum and dignity commensurate with judicial office, abusing contempt power, and failing to recuse—Indefinite suspension with conditions for reinstatement—Immediate suspension from judicial office without pay.

Mandamus—Public-records requests—Requester concedes that city provided the two records described in his complaint shortly after he filed it—Requester has failed to prove by clear and convincing evidence that city failed to comply with any obligation under R.C. 149.43(B)—Writ and statutory damages denied.

Civil law—Malpractice—Respondeat superior—Because plaintiff had failed to timely serve chiropractor with her refiled malpractice complaint and because the statute of limitations on her claim against the chiropractor had expired, plaintiff's right of action against the chiropractor was extinguished by operation of law—Chiropractor's employer could not be held vicariously liable for chiropractor's alleged malpractice—Court of appeals' judgment reversed and trial court's entry of summary judgment in favor of employer reinstated.

Attorneys—Misconduct—Violations of the Rules of Professional Conduct—Conditionally stayed one-year suspension.

On certification of default.

On certification of default.

Attorneys at law—Resignation with disciplinary action pending—Gov.Bar R. VI(11)(C).

On order to show cause.

On certified entry of felony conviction.

On application for reinstatement.

On certified entry of felony conviction.

On certified entry of felony conviction.