Summary:
It is possible to correct a party name incorrectly written in a court judgment through “clarification.”
A final judgment cannot be restricted, expanded, or altered in terms of content through “clarification.”
Republic of Turkey
Supreme Court of Appeals
General Assembly of Law
Case No: 2010/0
Decision No: 2010/138
Date of Decision: 10.3.2010
(“…The plaintiff claimed that the defendant did not pay the debt owed to him and objected to the initiated enforcement proceedings, and requested that the objection be dismissed and that 40% compensation be collected.
The defendant requested the dismissal of the case.
The court decided to accept the case; after the judgment became final, the plaintiff learned that the defendant’s surname was Dalkiç, not Dalgıç, according to the population registry, and requested that the defendant’s surname be corrected to Dalkiç, stating that he could not enforce the final judgment despite initiating enforcement proceedings; the court rejected the request for clarification on the grounds that the defendant’s surname was shown as Dalgıç, not Dalkiç, in the enforcement request and the lawsuit petition, and that the judgment was made accordingly; the judgment was appealed by the plaintiff.) (It has been stated.)
While the judge cannot issue a clarifying decision that would alter the original judgment and overturn the final judgment, according to Article 455 of the Code of Civil Procedure, if there are ambiguous and contradictory provisions in the decision, he/she can issue a corrective decision to eliminate this ambiguity and contradiction. The plaintiff, in his/her clarification petition, stated that the defendant’s real surname is actually Dalkiç, not Dalgıç, and requested clarification of this ambiguous aspect. Therefore, the court should investigate the defendant’s real surname, determine whether this surname belongs to two different people or to the defendant, and make a decision accordingly. The court’s failure to conduct any investigation or research in this regard and its rendering of a written judgment is contrary to procedure and law and necessitates reversal.
The case was reversed and returned to the lower court, and after a new trial, the court upheld its previous decision.
(This is a reasoning that is incorrect and warrants reversal.) DECISION OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF LAW
After the General Assembly of Law examined the case and determined that the appeal against the resistance decision was filed within the time limit, and after reviewing the documents in the file, the following was considered:
The case concerns a request for the annulment of an objection; the plaintiff requested clarification of the defendant’s surname, which is alleged to be incorrect in the court decision.
From the decision subject to clarification, it is understood that the plaintiff requested the annulment of the objection to the enforcement proceedings initiated against the defendant K. Dalgıç; the court decided to accept the case, and the judgment became final without appeal; and that the defendant’s name is written as Dalkic in the heading of the final decision.
The plaintiff’s attorney stated that during the enforcement proceedings for the final decision, they learned that the defendant’s surname in the population registry was Dalkiç, and requested clarification on the grounds that the surname error in the court decision made the enforcement of the judgment impossible.
The local court’s decision to reject the request on the grounds that the case was concluded based on the surname Dalgıç as stated in the enforcement proceedings and the petition was overturned by the Special Chamber for the reasons explained above.
The court decided to uphold its previous decision on the grounds that no material error was made, there was no contradiction in the judgment, and the execution of the judgment had begun. The plaintiff’s attorney appealed the judgment.
The dispute centers on whether the judgment is ambiguous regarding the defendant’s surname and whether the conditions for the application of Article 455 of the Code of Civil Procedure have been met.
Article 455 of the Code of Civil Procedure No. 1086 states that “if the judgment is ambiguous and unclear or contains contradictory clauses, either party may request clarification of the judgment and removal of the contradiction until its execution.”
As stated in the aforementioned article, clarification of the judgment; Clarification is a legal method used to reveal the true meaning of a judgment when it is unclear (ambiguous) or contains ambiguous and contradictory clauses.
Through clarification, the judgment cannot be limited, expanded, or altered. Unless a retrial is ordered or the judgment is appealed and overturned, it is not possible to change the judgment. Clarification of judgments cannot be considered an exception to this. The judge is obligated to reveal the truth to prevent the judgment from being misinterpreted.
Clarification, as a rule, only applies to the clauses of the judgment. It cannot be used to clarify the reasoning behind the judgment. However, if there is a contradiction between the operative clause and the reasoning, clarification may be sought to resolve this contradiction (Supreme Court of Appeals’ decision dated 14.06.1967, no. 1967/9-462 E: 300 K).
Clarification can also be sought regarding Supreme Court decisions like this one. While an appeal can be filed claiming that the judgment has been altered by the clarification decision, an appeal to the General Assembly of the Supreme Court is not possible against decisions of the Supreme Court Chambers regarding the clarification of their own decisions (Supreme Court General Assembly of the Supreme Court’s decision dated 15.03.1969, no. 1969/2-466 E.178 K.).
It is not necessary to wait for the judgment to become final in order to seek clarification. Clarification can be requested even for judgments that have not become final, until the judgment is executed. However, the appeal period does not stop upon requesting clarification. Even after the judgment has been executed, it is possible to request clarification until the judgment is fully executed. The judgment can only be clarified by the court that rendered it.
A judge cannot add to their judgment, through clarification, any claims they forgot to address in the original judgment. Similarly, they cannot include, through clarification, any forgotten attorney’s fees or interest payments. Likewise, contradictions between the summary judgment and the reasoned judgment cannot be resolved through clarification.
The conclusion drawn from all these explanations is that a final judgment cannot be restricted, expanded, or altered through clarification (Prof. Dr. Baki Kuru, Law of Civil Procedure, Sixth Edition 2001, Volume 5, pages 5270 et seq.).
In light of the above explanations, when the specific case is examined, it is clear that the judgment could not be enforced due to the confusion in the defendant’s surname; the court’s judgment is not enforceable; and the decision is ambiguous.
Therefore: The court should have determined that the person whose name, surname, and especially father’s name and date of birth are written in the power of attorney, the petition, the judgment, and especially in the land registry records; It is necessary to investigate whether the person in the population registry is the same person, and whether these names refer to the same individual, and to make a decision based on the outcome of this investigation. However, the decision to reject the request for clarification of the ambiguous judgment, which is currently unenforceable, is not in accordance with procedure and law.
The court should have complied with the reversal decision pointing to the same issues. Instead, the court’s insistence on rejecting the request on the grounds that no material error was made is contrary to procedure and law.
Therefore, the resistance decision should be overturned.
CONCLUSION: The appeal of the plaintiff’s attorney is accepted, and the resistance decision is OVERTURNED in accordance with Article 429 of the Code of Civil Procedure, for the reasons stated in the Special Chamber’s reversal decision and the reasons shown above, by unanimous decision on March 10, 2010.