Shauna Lyon, Appellant-Defendant v. Town of Vevay, Appellee-Plaintiff (2026)

MEMORANDUM DECISION

[1] Shauna Lyon, pro se, purports to appeal from “all orders entered” in an unsafe building proceeding initiated by the Town of Vevay that resulted in the demolition of a house that she and her ex-husband owned in Vevay. Appellant's Br. at 18 (.pdf pagination). We find Lyon's arguments waived for lack of cogency and therefore affirm.

[2] Pro se litigants are held to the same legal standards as licensed attorneys, so Lyons’ “pro se status garners no special consideration.” T.J. v. J.J., 270 N.E.3d 979, 986 (Ind. Ct. App. 2025), trans. denied. “This means that pro se litigants are bound to follow the established rules of procedure and must be prepared to accept the consequences of their failure to do so.” Picket Fence Prop. Co. v. Davis, 109 N.E.3d 1021, 1029 (Ind. Ct. App. 2018), trans. denied. “These consequences include waiver for failure to present cogent argument on appeal.” Id.

[3] “The purpose of our appellate rules, Ind. Appellate Rule 46 in particular, is to aid and expedite review and to relieve the appellate court of the burden of searching the record and briefing the case.” Ramsey v. Rev. Bd. of Ind. Dep't of Workforce Dev., 789 N.E.2d 486, 487 (Ind. Ct. App. 2003). “While we prefer to decide issues on the merits, where the appellant's noncompliance with appellate rules is so substantial as to impede our consideration of the issues, we may deem the alleged errors waived.” Davis, 109 N.E.3d at 1029. We will not become an advocate for a party or address arguments that are too poorly developed or expressed to be understood. In re N.E., 228 N.E.3d 457, 475 (Ind. Ct. App. 2024).

[4] “A brief should not only present the issues to be decided on appeal, but it should be of material assistance to the court in deciding those issues.” Cnty. Line Towing, Inc. v. Cincinnati Ins. Co., 714 N.E.2d 285, 290 (Ind. Ct. App. 1999), trans. denied. Here, Lyon's disjointed statement of the case and statement of facts in her initial brief are inappropriately argumentative. See Dridi v. Cole Kline LLC, 172 N.E.3d 361, 365 (Ind. Ct. App. 2021) (stating that an appellant's statement of the case and statement of facts should not be argumentative). Furthermore, they do not contain a single citation to the record on appeal or her appendix as required by Indiana Appellate Rule 46(A)(5) and (6) and Appellate Rule 22(C).¹ It is not our role to parse the record in order to obtain a coherent chronology of this case and be able to verify Lyon's version of events.

[5] “A party's analysis of an issue on appeal must [also] be supported in relevant part by citations to the Appendix or parts of the Record on Appeal upon which the party relies.” Wilcox v. Gingrinch, 274 N.E.3d 1269, 1272 (Ind. Ct. App. 2026) (citing Ind. Appellate Rule 46(A)(8)(a)). Like her statement of the case and statement of facts, the argument section of Lyon's initial brief is completely devoid of citations to the appendix or the record.² We will not search the record to find the basis for a party's argument. Cingel v. Ferreri, 269 N.E.3d 857, 859 (Ind. Ct. App. 2025). Moreover, the argument section of Lyons’ initial brief lacks “a concise statement of the applicable standard of review[,]” as required by Appellate Rule 46(A)(8)(b).

[6] Appellate Rule 46(A)(8)(a) further provides that an appellant's argument “must contain the contentions of the appellant on the issues presented, supported by cogent reasoning. Each contention must be supported by citations to the authorities [and] statutes relied on[.]” Many of Lyon's contentions are not supported by citations to legal authority. And many of Lyon's citations are simply used to state legal conclusions, which is insufficient to merit reversal. See Pope v. Wabash Valley Hum. Servs., Inc., 500 N.E.2d 209, 213 (Ind. Ct. App. 1986) (“Mere conclusory arguments do not discharge the appellant's burden of establishing reversible error.”).³

[7] Based on the foregoing, we conclude that Lyon's noncompliance with the appellate rules is so substantial as to impede our consideration of the issues, and therefore we deem her alleged errors waived.⁴ Accordingly, we affirm.

[8] Affirmed.

FOOTNOTES

1.   Appellate Rule 46(A)(5) provides that the statement of the case “shall briefly describe the nature of the case, the course of the proceedings relevant to the issues presented for review, and the disposition of these issues by the trial court” and that “[p]age references to the Record on Appeal or Appendix are required in accordance with Rule 22(C).” Lyon's description of the multistage unsafe building proceeding consists of a single sentence and does not list, let alone describe, the orders that she purports to challenge on appeal. Appellate Rule 46(A)(6) provides in pertinent part that the statement of facts “shall describe the facts relevant to the issues presented for review[,]” “shall be stated in accordance with the standard of review appropriate to the judgment or order being appealed[,]” and “shall be supported by page references to the Record on Appeal or Appendix in accordance with Rule 22(C).” Lyon's statement of facts is essentially a litany of unsubstantiated complaints. Finally, Appellate Rule 22(C) states in relevant part, “Any factual statement shall be supported by a citation to the volume and page where it appears in an Appendix, and if not contained in an Appendix, to the volume and page it appears in the Transcript or exhibits[.]” As stated above, Lyon's brief contains no such citations.

2.   Lyon devotes a significant portion of her five-page argument to the discussion of a lien that is not mentioned in either the statement of the case or the statement of facts.

3.   The only argument with even a hint of cogency is Lyons’ assertion that “the trial court lacked personal jurisdiction” because she was never served “under Trial Rule 4.” Appellant's Br. at 13 (.pdf pagination). But, like her other arguments, this argument is not supported by any citation to the record or the appendix, and it fails to acknowledge that lack of personal jurisdiction may be waived in certain circumstances. E.g., In re Groleau, 585 N.E.2d 726, 729 (Ind. Ct. App. 1992).

4.   We observe that Lyon's reply brief is noticeably more coherent than her initial brief and appears to have been drafted by someone with either some legal training or the assistance of AI legal research tools. An appellant may not correct the deficiencies of her initial brief in her reply brief, because the appellee would have no opportunity to respond. Michaels v. Johnson, 223 N.E.2d 585, 587 (Ind. Ct. App. 1967).

Bailey, Judge.

Brown, J., and Weissmann, J., concur.