Civil Procedure – Permissive Joinder – Immediate Appealability

Orders granting permissive joinder are not immediately appealable.

We dismissed an interlocutory appeal by Plaintiffs challenging the trial court’s order consolidating multiple car-accident lawsuits.

Appellants appealed a circuit court order granting a motion for permissive joinder and consolidation filed by Respondents. The underlying dispute involved a multi-vehicle accident on Interstate 26 in Newberry County, resulting in multiple lawsuits: two in Newberry County and one in Sumter County. Respondents sought to consolidate the two Newberry County actions with the Sumter County case, arguing that the requirements of Rule 20(a) of the South Carolina Rules of Civil Procedure were satisfied. The circuit court granted the motion and denied Appellants’ motions to reconsider.

The central issue on appeal was whether the order granting permissive joinder and consolidation was immediately appealable. South Carolina law generally limits appeals to final judgments. Section 14-3-330 of the South Carolina Code outlines the limited circumstances in which an interlocutory order may be appealed. These include orders affecting the merits of a case, orders impacting substantial rights that effectively determine the action, final orders in special proceedings, and certain orders involving injunctions or receiverships.

Appellants argued the order was appealable because it either involved the merits or affected a substantial right. They relied on out-of-state and South Carolina precedent, including Wosepka v. Dukart, Morrow v. Fundamental Long-Term Care Holdings, LLC, and Neeltec Enterprises, Inc. v. Long, to support the claim that certain joinder or consolidation orders could be appealed immediately. However, we distinguished these cases, noting that they involved situations where plaintiffs were forced to sue certain defendants or were otherwise deprived of the ability to maintain claims against particular parties, circumstances not present here. In the present case, Appellants were already parties to the litigation, and the consolidation did not prevent them from asserting their claims.

We further rejected Appellants’ argument that the order interfered with their substantial right to a particular mode of trial, such as pursuing a workers’ compensation claim, because the consolidation did not create new claims nor force employees to pursue tort actions against their employers. The appellate court also dismissed reliance on Simon v. Strock, noting the case did not address appealability and therefore was not controlling.

Ultimately, we concluded that the order granting permissive joinder and consolidation was interlocutory and did not satisfy the criteria for immediate appeal under South Carolina law. As a result, the appeal was dismissed as premature. The decision reinforces the principle that orders regarding joinder or consolidation generally cannot be appealed until a final judgment has been rendered, and interlocutory appeals are narrowly construed.

Dismissed.

Arender v. Oliver (Lawyers Weekly No. 001-007-26, 7 pp.) (Paula H. Thomas, J.) Appealed from Newberry County, Sumter County (R. Kirk Griffin, J.) Mark Steven Barrow and Marshall Collin Crane, both of Sweeny Wingate & Barrow, PA, of Columbia, for Appellants Dean A. Arender, US XPRESS Leasing, Inc., and US XPRESS, Inc. James David George, Jr. and Jacob Born, both of Columbia, for Appellants Dean A. Arender and Tamala Arender. G. Murrell Smith, Jr., of Smith Robinson Holler DuBose Morgan, LLC, of Sumter, Frederick Newman Hanna, Jr., of Smith Robinson Holler DuBose Morgan, LLC, of Columbia, Carl Everette Pierce, II, and Daniel Francis Lynch, IV, both of Pierce, Sloan, Wilson, Kennedy & Early, LLC, of Charleston, all for Respondents Kent H. Oliver and Thompson Construction Group, Inc. Justin Joaquin Arenas, of Derrick Law Firm, of Conway, and Joseph V. Camerlengo and Jessica L. Lanifer, both of Jacksonville, FL, all for Respondent Kent H. Oliver. South Carolina Court of Appeals