Amendments to the Rules of Practice and Procedure became effective today.

The amendments concern changes to the rules of appellate procedure, civil procedure, and juvenile procedure. Many of the adopted changes would make simple clarifications, target inconsistencies, or account for renumbering of rules. There are, however, a few substantive changes to existing rules and two new rules.

• New rules (Civ.R. 43 and Juv.R. 41) allow live open court testimony from a location outside the courtroom. The new civil rule relates to amendments to two Ohio Revised Code statutes in 2011. Those amendments required a court to permit a parent on active duty in the Armed Forces to participate in custody or visitation proceedings and to present evidence electronically. Similar to Civ.R. 43, the new juvenile rule avoids conflict with the Confrontation Clause because it does not allow the remote contemporaneous testimony in adjudicatory hearings in delinquent, unruly, and juvenile traffic cases and adult criminal trials.
• Amendments to App.R. 3, App.R. 9, and App.R. 11.2 address expedited appeals. App.R. 3 provides notification currently lacking in some appellate districts to alert the court that there needs to be a priority disposition in a case. App.R. 9 recognizes that in an expedited judicial bypass appeal from the juvenile court, there is no requirement of a written transcript if an audio recording is available. App.R. 11.2 adds prosecutorial appeals from suppression orders under criminal and juvenile rules to the list of expedited appeals.
• Amendments to Civ.R. 23 update the rule concerning procedures in class action lawsuits. The Ohio rule had not been updated since the early 1970s. The changes include defining the class and appointing class counsel in the certification order; additional detail for the initial notice to Civ.R. 23(B)(3) class members and for the notice of a proposed settlement, voluntary dismissal, or compromise, and new provisions addressing the appointment of class counsel and the awarding of attorney fees and nontaxable costs.

Access the text of the amendments.