Ritchie

This is an appeal from the trial court’s order denying petitioner’s application for a name change.

Petitioner Thomas Boyd Ritchie III (appellant) filed an application to change his name as a matter of public record (Code Civ. Proc., 1 § 1275 et *1072 seq.) to the roman numeral “HI” (pronounced Three). The application stated in essence that appellant was born Thomas Boyd Ritchie III. Approximately six years prior to the filing of the application appellant began to use HI as his name primarily for the sake of convenience. Thereafter, he kept using the new name because it gave him a greater sense of personal identity and his friends, peers and business associates knew him by that name. Appellant finally alleged that an official recordation of his new name was essential in order to obtain crucial documents (driver’s license, credit cards, etc.) from agencies and financial institutions.

After hearing the trial court denied the application on the grounds that a change to a roman numeral did not constitute a name change within the meaning of the law and that the new “name” used by appellant was inherently confusing.

Appellant contends that the denial of his petition was an…

I concur in the judgment. I agree with the lead opinion and the North Dakota and Minnesota Supreme Courts that a number is not a name. (Petition of Dengler (N.D. 1976) 246 N.W.2d 758 ; Application of Dengler (Minn. 1979) 287 N.W.2d 637, 639 .) Here petitioner wants to be called “Three” but he wants to have it spelled “HI.” “HI” is simply not a word, it is a symbol. A person might change his name to “number” but surely he could not spell that name The same rationale would apply to the name “period” spelled “.” or “question mark” spelled

Where I part from the lead opinion is in its suggestion that the validity of the trial court’s decision turns on whether it abused its discretion. The implication is that the trial court in its discretion could have approved petitioner’s change of name request. I think not. In my view the trial court could not have ruled otherwise. The trial court does not have the discretion *1075 to approve a name change wherein the petitioner requests that he be permitted to use a symbol in place of a word in the spelling of his name.

A petition for a rehearing was denied October 10, 1984, and appellant’s petition for a hearing by the Supreme Court was denied…