RODRIGUES VS. RODRIGUES (FAMILY)

Key holdings

• -The Nevada Supreme Court "has jurisdiction to consider an appeal only when the appeal is authorized by statute or court rule."
• -An appeal challenging a district court's alleged failure to resolve motions, without identifying an appealable order under NRAP 3A(b), must be dismissed for lack of jurisdiction.

Practitioner summary

The supreme court conducted its standard jurisdictional review of the notice of appeal and the NRAP 3(g) documents and identified a jurisdictional defect: appellant failed to identify an appealable order under NRAP 3A(b). The appeal purported to challenge the district court's alleged failure to resolve several motions - i.e., inaction rather than an order or judgment.

Applying the rule that "[t]his court has jurisdiction to consider an appeal only when the appeal is authorized by statute or court rule," citing Taylor Constr. Co. v. Hilton Hotels Corp., 100 Nev. 207, 209, 678 P.2d 1152, 1153 (1984), the court concluded that no statute or court rule provides for an appeal in this instance and dismissed for lack of jurisdiction. Given the dismissal, the court took no action on the amended motion for waiver of costs associated with preparation and delivery of transcripts filed July 27, 2026. The order was entered by Justices Pickering, Parraguirre, and Bell.

In plain language

Eduardo Rodrigues filed an appeal without a lawyer (known as appearing "pro se") in a family-law matter against Monica Rodrigues. His complaint was not about something the district court decided, but about something it allegedly had not done: he claimed the court had failed to resolve several motions he had filed.

The Nevada Supreme Court dismissed the appeal without reaching the merits. The problem was jurisdictional - meaning the court lacked the legal authority to hear the appeal in the first place. Under Nevada law, an appellate court can only hear an appeal when a statute or court rule specifically authorizes one, and the appeal must be from an identifiable, appealable order. Here, the court found that Rodrigues "fails to identify an appealable order" and that "[n]o statute or court rule provides for an appeal in this instance."

Because the appeal was dismissed, the court noted in a footnote that it would take no action on Rodrigues's pending amended motion seeking a waiver of the costs of preparing and delivering transcripts.