Illinois Appellate Lawyer Blog
Nearly five years after their divorce, Mary Gutman filed a motion to continue and modify her maintenance award. Two months later, Daniel filed a motion to terminate maintenance. One month after that, Mary filed a petition to hold Daniel in contempt for having stopped the maintenance payments.
The trial court twice set a date for hearing on the competing maintenance petitions, but Mary did not attend either time. On the second hearing date, the court granted Daniel’s petition to terminate maintenance, dismissed Mary’s maintenance petition, and did nothing on the contempt petition. The trial court’s order did not contain language under Illinois Supreme Court Rule 304(a) that would have made the maintenance dismissals appealable interlocutory orders.
After her motions to vacate and to reconsider were denied, Mary appealed. But her Notice of Appeal was filed well more than 30 days after the trial court ruled on the maintenance petitions.