Dep't of Transp. v. Greatbanc Tr. Co.

JUSTICE PUCINSKI delivered the judgment of the court, with opinion.

Appeal from the Circuit Court of Cook County. No. 06 L 050813 The Honorable Alexander P. White, Judge Presiding. JUSTICE PUCINSKI delivered the judgment of the court, with opinion.
Presiding Justice Mason and Justice Hyman concurred in the judgment and opinion.

¶ 1 In this eminent domain matter, defendants Greatbanc Trust Company, as trustee under Trust Agreement dated October 8, 1973, and known as Trust Number 996 (Greatbanc 1973), and Marquette Bank a/k/a Marquette (Marquette) filed notices of appeal from the trial court's grant of plaintiff, Department of Transportation of the State of Illinois (IDOT)'s motions in limine with respect to defendant Peter Kattos's valuation expert and the trial court's grant of summary judgment in favor of IDOT on the issue of just compensation. For the reasons that follow, we affirm.

¶ 3 Before getting into the background of this appeal, we note that, on appeal, Kattos, not Greatbanc 1973, filed an appellant's brief. Marquette joined in the arguments raised in that brief. Kattos, however, did not file a notice of appeal in the trial court. Rather, notices of appeal were filed on behalf of only Greatbanc 1973 and Marquette. It appears that this inconsistency arises out of the sloppy filing of attorney appearances in the trial court on behalf of Kattos and Greatbanc 1973. Initially, an appearance by the firm of Neal & Leroy was filed on behalf of Kattos. No appearance was filed on behalf of Greatbanc. Later, Neal & Leroy filed a motion to substitute counsel. In that motion, Neal & Leroy stated that attorney Thomas Goedert, as a compensation for the taking at $1.52 million and confirming its previous orders granting IDOT title and/or temporary easements in the taken property. In addition, the trial court explicitly stated that there was no just reason to delay either enforcement or appeal of the order. Thereafter, Greatbanc and Marquette filed their respective notices of appeal.

¶ 12 On appeal, appellants argue that the trial court erred in granting IDOT's motions in limine and, in turn, IDOT's motion for summary judgment. More specifically, they argue that any errors in Thouvenell's appraisal methods went to the weight of his opinions, not their admissibility, and that the comparable sales that Thouvenell utilized were proper. In addition, they argued that even if the trial court properly granted IDOT's motions in limine, the motions in limine did not challenge Thouvenell's opinion of the value of the part taken or Thouvenell's use of comparable sale 5A and, thus, that evidence should have been considered in assessing whether summary judgment should be granted. In response, IDOT argued, among other things, that appellants waived their contentions on appeal by failing to raise any of them in the trial court. We agree. ¶ 13 It is a well-established principle of appellate practice that contentions not raised in the trial court are waived and may not be raised for the first time on appeal. See, e.g., Haudrich v. Howmedica, Inc., 169 Ill. 2d 525, 536 (1996); Moore v. Board of Education of the City of Chicago, 2016 IL App (1st) 133148, ¶ 35 (refusing to consider issue not raised at any point in trial court). The purpose of this and other waiver rules is to preserve judicial resources by requiring parties to bring issues to the trial court's attention, thereby allowing the trial court an opportunity to correct any errors. People v. McKay, 282 Ill. App. 3d 108, 111 (1996). In other words, "[a] party cannot stand idly by and not object, and then appeal, arguing that the trial occurrence to see such a blatant example of waiver as is present in this case; it is not often that a party repeatedly and completely fails to object to pivotal motions in the trial court. It is also this blatant disregard, however, that warrants the application of the waiver rule in this case. Despite being given every opportunity to respond to IDOT's motions in limine and motion for summary judgment, appellants repeatedly failed to take advantage of those opportunities. Recall, the trial court granted appellants a total of six extensions of time in which to file their written responses to the motions in limine, which gave appellants a total of one year in which to respond. Moreover, despite having lost their opportunity to respond to the motions in limine just a couple of weeks before, appellants completely disregarded their opportunity to file a written response to IDOT's motion for summary judgment. Their failure to respond to the motion for summary judgment cannot be attributed to a sense of futility following the trial court's decision on the motions in limine because appellants argue that the motion for summary judgment should have been denied even if the motions in limine were properly granted. Further, appellants never filed any sort of motion to reconsider either of those decisions, and they have pointed to nothing in the record evidencing any attempt to register oral objections to these motions. ¶ 27 We can think of few circumstances that would better illustrate the purpose of and need for the waiver rule than the circumstances of this case. IDOT and the trial court undoubtedly spent a significant amount of time and effort on briefing, arguing, reading, researching, and deciding the motions in limine and motion for summary judgment. It would be a great waste of those judicial resources and supremely unfair for us to undo all of that work at appellants' request after they literally did nothing to object to the motions for over a year. Although we recognize that it is not a common occurrence that a party waives its entire case on appeal, we think it appropriate, necessary, and in the interests of justice to strictly apply the rule in this case.

¶ 29 For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the Circuit Court of Cook County is affirmed. ¶ 30 Affirmed.