Mitchem v. Melton

Miller, Justice:

The principal issue on this appeal is the trial court’s ruling that precluded the appellant from proceeding as a class action under Rule 23 of the West Virginia Rules of Civil Procedure. A collateral question is whether an order denying class status under Rule 23 is an appealable order.

The basis for the trial court’s rejection of the class status was that it conceived the appellant’s suit as a writ of habeas corpus. The court reasoned that since Rule 81(a) (5) 1 excludes writs of habeas corpus from the ambit of the Rules of Civil Procedure, except as to Rules 5(b), 5(e) and…