what is a minute order?

Answer 1

From The San Francisco Daily Journal
Publication Date: May 01, 2002
There are few drop-dead deadlines in the law. One that remains is the deadline to file a notice of appeal. Thus, over the years, the courts have identified a number of "traps for the unwary" when it comes to perfecting an appeal.

Minute orders pose such a trap. Depending on the "fine print" of the order, minute orders may be meaningless for appeal purposes — or they may trigger the time to file a notice of appeal, as the 2nd District Court of Appeal's recent opinion in Cuenllas v. VRL International Ltd., 92 Cal. App. 4th 1050 (Cal. App. 2d Dist. 2001), illustrates.

In light of Cuenllas and the newly revised California Rules of Court, it is worth taking a "minute" to review the current rules of the game.

There is no specific definition of a "minute order" in the statutes or Rules of Court. Most typically, minute orders are prepared by the court's clerk and recite in cryptic terms the court's ruling in open court, e.g., "the defendant's motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict is denied."

In some cases, for example, when the court takes a matter under submission, the court writes out the substance of the minute order itself; in that case, the order may be several paragraphs or even several pages long.

Because minute orders are prepared by the court, directly or through its clerk, they are part of the court's file without the necessity of being signed and file-stamped. A minute order may direct that a written order be prepared by the clerk or a party, but there is no requirement that a minute order contain such a directive. R. Ct. 2(c)(2).

Whether a minute order is file-stamped or contains a directive that a written order be prepared by the clerk or a party is critical for appeal purposes.

Minute order without directive to prepare formal order

Rule of Court 2(c)(2) provides that the date of "entry" of an appealable order is the date that it is entered in the permanent minutes, unless the minute order directs that a written order be prepared. Accordingly, when a minute order does not contain such a directive, the appeal lies from the minute order, and the maximum period for filing a notice of appeal — 180 days from the date of entry — begins to run. R. Ct. 2(a), (f); Cuenllas.

Both points are critical, because practitioners often do not view a minute order as having the force and effect of a formal written order. But that is a dangerous misperception when the minute order contains no directive to prepare a written order. In the absence of such a directive, a minute order has the same force and effect as a formal written order.

This also means that the 180-day period in which to file a notice of appeal can be shortened considerably if the court clerk or a party prepares and serves a document titled "Notice of Entry" of the minute order, accompanied by a proof of service.

Under Rule of Court 2(a)(1) and (2) — and 2(f), which states that the timing provisions of 2(a) apply to appealable orders as well as to judgments — an aggrieved party has only 60 days from the date of service of Notice of Entry to file a notice of appeal.

An interesting complication arises under Rule of Court 2(a)(1) and (2) because these provisions further provide that, in lieu of a document titled "Notice of Entry," the court clerk or either party may mail to all parties a "file-stamped copy of the judgment," accompanied by a proof of service. Rule 2(f), in turn, states that "judgment" as used in Rule 2(a) includes an "appealable order if the appeal is from an appealable order."

As noted, few minute orders are "file-stamped." But to say that sending a copy of a minute order with a proof of service is not the equivalent of sending a "file-stamped" copy of a written order with a proof of service would seem to be an "angels dancing on the head of a pin" distinction.

When it comes to the timeliness of notices of appeal, however, the law is replete with such arcane distinctions. In Hughey v. City of Hayward, 24 Cal. App. 4th 206 (Cal. App. 1st Dist. 1994), the 1st District Court of Appeal seemed to make such a distinction when it noted that the minute order denying a motion to vacate a judgment was not file-stamped, nor did it direct that a written order be prepared. Accordingly, the court held that the appeal was timely because the notice of appeal was filed within 180 days of entry of the minute order.

Similarly, in Cuenllas, the 2nd District held that an appeal from a minute order granting a motion to quash service of summons was timely because the notice of appeal was filed within 180 days of entry, even though the court clerk had sent a copy of the minute order to the parties.

The 2nd District noted only that no document entitled "Notice of Entry" had been sent and made no mention of Rule 2(a)'s provision that mailing a "file-stamped" copy also will suffice to trigger the shorter, 60-day period.

Either the Cuenllas court overlooked that provision or simply assumed minute orders are not "file-stamped" and thus do not come within that provision of Rule 2(a).

Thus, Hughey and Cuenllas indicate that only service of a document titled "Notice of Entry" accompanied by proof of service will trigger the 60-day appeal period for a minute order. Mailing a copy of the minute order itself with proof service will not do so.

No prudent practitioner, however, should count on this distinction. A practitioner who receives a copy of a minute order that contains no directive to prepare a written order plus a proof of service should assume, out of an abundance of caution, that he or she has only 60 days in which to file a notice of appeal.

Minute order directing that written order be prepared

When a minute order directs that "a written order be prepared," the order is simply a placeholder and has no significance in terms of an appeal. That is because Rule 2(c)(2) states that, where a minute order directs that a written order be prepared, the date of entry of the order is the date that the written order is filed.

An appeal, in that case, is from the written order, not the minute order. The maximum 180-day appeal period, likewise, begins to run from the date the written order is filed. R. Ct. 2(a), (c), (f); County of Alameda v. Johnson, 28 Cal. App. 4th 259 (1994).

Again, the 180-day appeal period can be shortened to 60 days if the court clerk or a party prepares and serves a document titled "Notice of Entry" of the written order, accompanied by a proof of service. R. Ct. 2(a)(1), (2). And unlike the situation discussed above, where the minute order itself is the operative order, a formal written order must be signed and "file-stamped."

Thus, the provisions of Rule 2(a) allowing for service of a file-stamped copy, in lieu of a document titled "Notice of Entry," plainly apply.

A minute, then, should be spent on reading a minute order, since appealability and the time to appeal turn on what might seem to be fine and insignificant distinctions.

Answer 2

It is when an operation order, what the mission is going to be, has to suddenly change at the last minute and there's not time to write it up formally.

Answer 3

check this out to see if it fits:

Copied directly from the "Dictionary.com" on the internet:

Minute: (Pron: my-nyoot)
1. extremely small, as in size, amount, extent, or degree: minute differences.
2. of minor importance; insignificant; trifling.
3. attentive to or concerned with even the smallest details: a minute examination.


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[Origin: 1425–75; late ME < L minÅ«tus (ptp. of minuere to make smaller or fewer), equiv. to minÅ«- verb s. + -tus ptp. suffix. See minus, minor]

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I don't know exactly what the context it, but here is a definition for the word "minute" out of the dictionary. If this isn't the right one or the right context then you can go to the dictionary yourself and check out the different ones that would apply: