Breedlove v. Breedlove
| Decision Date | 06 December 1984 |
| Docket Number | No. 15075,15075 |
| Citation | 691 P.2d 426,100 Nev. 606 |
| Parties | Nancy J. BREEDLOVE, Appellant, v. Charles BREEDLOVE aka David Berger, Respondent. |
| Court | Nevada Supreme Court |
The parties in this case had five children together during the course of their marriage, which ended by divorce in 1968. The Indiana trial court which conducted the divorce proceedings awarded custody of all five children to appellant, and further ordered respondent to pay child support to appellant in the sum of $175 per week.
It is undisputed that respondent subsequently defaulted on his child support payments and, in 1980, appellant obtained a judgment from the Indiana trial court, awarding her approximately $90,000 in child support payment arrearages and $2,260 in attorney fees. Appellant duly recorded the judgment in the Clark County district court, and respondent, who is a resident of Clark County, was given notice of the judgment. Respondent, however, failed to pay any amount of the judgment, and appellant began a lengthy series of attempts to secure payment, with respondent in turn going to even greater lengths to avoid making payment. In one instance respondent, after being notified of the judgment against him, placed his major attachable asset, his home in Las Vegas, into a family trust. The trust, however, was later ordered set aside primarily because the district court found that it had been created for the sole purpose of defrauding appellant in her attempt to execute on the judgment.
Shortly after the trust was set aside, respondent filed a homestead exemption on his home pursuant to NRS 115.010, 1 again frustrating appellant in her attempt to execute on the judgment. 2 Appellant then moved in the district court to have the homestead exemption ruled inapplicable to her judgment against respondent, primarily contending that public policy requires an exception to the homestead laws in cases where a party is seeking to enforce a child support award against the homesteader. The district court, however, denied the motion, concluding that respondent could use the homestead exemption to prevent appellant from executing on his home. Appellant contends that the district court erred in this determination. We agree.
On its face, the homestead law in this state seems to indicate that a homestead exemption is always enforceable against a party seeking to execute on the homestead, unless the party can demonstrate that he or she comes within one of the statutory exceptions. See NRS 115.010, supra, note 1; see also Nev.Const. art. 4, § 30. Applying the statute in a strictly technical fashion, it would appear that appellant does not come within one of the listed exceptions. 3 Nevertheless, we agree with appellant that to interpret the statute in such a highly technical fashion would in this case lead to absurd results, and would in fact contravene the legislature's clear intent in enacting this statute.
Homestead laws in this country were designed for the purpose of protecting families and making families secure in their homes from creditors they are unable to pay. See, e.g., Bickel v. Bickel, 17 Ariz.App. 29, 495 P.2d 154 (1972); Winter v. Winter, 95 Neb. 335, 145 N.W. 709 (1914); see generally Annot., 54 A.L.R.2d 1422 (1957). As such, when an ex-wife or child attempts to enforce court-ordered support payments, the rationale behind upholding the homestead exemption can no longer be said to apply since the policy of protecting the family would no longer be served by such an application. See Bickel v. Bickel, supra; Winter v. Winter, supra. A former family member attempting to enforce a support judgment can hardly be said to be a creditor of the sort against which the legislature sought to protect the homesteader, and it would be extremely unfair to permit the homestead to be used as a shield under these circumstances to insulate a father from being forced to pay the support that is owed to his own children. See Bickel v. Bickel, supra; Winter v. Winter, supra.
Respondent nevertheless cites cases from other jurisdictions which have refused to find a public policy exception to their own homestead laws in cases involving enforcement of support benefits. See Yager v. Yager, 7 Cal.2d 213, 60 P.2d 422 (1936); Putz v. Putz, 572 P.2d 970 (Okla.1977). The courts in these cases reasoned that if a person owing child support payments remarried and created a new family and home, the second family had a right to be secure in the home, and that this right essentially overrode the right the first family had to seek enforcement of a support award. Respondent contends that since he is now living in the home with his second wife and her children from a former marriage, the public policies of Nevada would be served by applying the homestead laws to protect his second family.
We cannot agree with this reasoning. Respondent owed his first family a duty of support long before the second marriage arose, and he entered into the second marriage well aware of that duty. As the Nebraska Supreme Court stated:
Winter v. Winter, supra, 145 N.W. at 712.
To permit the application of the homestead laws to protect respondent's second family, at the expense of depriving his first family of the support to which they are entitled, was clearly not a result intended by the Nevada L...
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In re Tarkanian, Case No.: 13–20495–MKN
...additional exception for payment of child support obligations. 75 P.3d at 378–79 & nn.5 & 6, citing, e.g., Breedlove v. Breedlove, 100 Nev. 606, 608, 691 P.2d 426, 427 (Nev. 1984). With respect to parents who owed child support arrearages, the court concluded that they are "not the type of ......
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...Constitution and NRS 115.010(3) establish specific exceptions that are inapplicable here, the Sheriff, relying on Breedlove v. Breedlove, 100 Nev. 606, 691 P.2d 426 (1984), and Maki v. Chong, 119 Nev. 390, 75 P.3d 376 (2003), asserts that public policy warrants creating a forfeiture excepti......
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