## Facts

- A collection agency sued Shelly L. Seele (then Shelly L. Calkins) and her then-husband in 1992 to recover multiple marital debts assigned to the agency by creditors.
- An answer was filed in 1992 bearing Seele’s typewritten name.
- Seele did not appear at the summary-judgment hearing; the magistrate entered judgment for $1,957.46.
- In 1997, after the agency could not locate Seele for several years, the magistrate renewed the judgment.
- In 2000, after locating Seele (who had remarried), the agency began garnishing her wages.
- Seele filed a wage-exemption claim and moved to vacate the judgment and quash the continuing garnishment; the magistrate denied Seele’s motions and sustained the agency’s challenge to the exemption.
- The district court (acting as an appellate court) affirmed and awarded costs and attorney fees to the agency; Seele appealed again.

## Issues

1. Whether the 1992 judgment was void for lack of personal jurisdiction over Seele.
2. Whether Seele’s motion to vacate the judgment under Idaho Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b) was timely.
3. Whether Seele’s wages, allegedly community property with her new spouse, were exempt from garnishment for the judgment.
4. Whether Seele could collaterally challenge the underlying suit as “unlawful” and assert due process violations in the 1992 proceedings.
5. Whether attorney fees were properly awarded to the agency on the intermediate appeal and on the further appeal.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeals affirmed the district court’s decision upholding the magistrate’s orders.
- The court held the 1992 judgment was not void for lack of personal jurisdiction.
- The court held Seele’s non-voidness grounds for relief from judgment were untimely under Rule 60(b).
- The court upheld the continuing wage garnishment despite Seele’s community-property arguments.
- The court affirmed the intermediate appellate attorney-fee award and awarded the agency attorney fees and costs on appeal.

## Legal Principles

- A defendant’s general appearance (including filing an answer or otherwise participating in the case) confers personal jurisdiction and waives service defects that would otherwise support a jurisdictional challenge.
- A void-judgment claim may be raised without the ordinary Rule 60(b) time limits, but non-jurisdictional grounds for relief are subject to Rule 60(b)’s time restrictions and cannot be asserted years after judgment.
- A valid judgment against an individual debtor may be enforced by wage garnishment under Idaho execution and garnishment law, even when the debtor’s wages are part of a later community estate, at least where the wage earner is personally liable on the judgment.
- Attempts to relitigate matters that could have been raised in the original action or by direct appeal are barred as improper collateral attacks and may also be precluded by claim/issue preclusion and procedural time limits.
- A judgment debtor receives due process in enforcement proceedings when given notice, an opportunity to claim exemptions, and a hearing on objections and motions to quash.
- A prevailing party may recover attorney fees on appeal when authorized by statute and/or the governing obligations and when the appeal seeks to revisit barred or meritless challenges.

## Conclusion

The court sustained enforcement of a renewed collection judgment by continuing wage garnishment, rejected a belated Rule 60(b) effort to set aside the underlying judgment, and affirmed (and extended) attorney-fee awards to the prevailing collection agency.


Action Collection Serv., Inc. v. Seele, 138 Idaho 753, 69 P.3d 173 (Idaho Ct. App. 2003)