Brown v. Sojourner (In re Brown)

• Decision Date: 17 June 2020
• Docket Number: Opinion No. 27982,Appellate Case No. 2018-001990
• Citation: 846 S.E.2d 342,430 S.C. 474
• Court: South Carolina Supreme Court
• Parties: IN RE: the ESTATE OF James BROWN a/k/a James Joseph Brown. Tommie Rae Brown, Respondent, v. David C. Sojourner, Jr., in his capacity as Limited Special Administrator and Limited Special Trustee, Deanna Brown-Thomas, Yamma Brown, Venisha Brown, Larry Brown, Terry Brown, Michael Deon Brown, and Daryl Brown, Defendants, Of whom Deanna Brown-Thomas, Yamma Brown, and Venisha Brown are the Petitioners.

430 S.C. 474

846 S.E.2d 342

IN RE: the ESTATE OF James BROWN a/k/a James Joseph Brown.Tommie Rae Brown, Respondent,

v. David C. Sojourner, Jr., in his capacity as Limited Special Administrator and Limited Special Trustee, Deanna Brown-Thomas, Yamma Brown, Venisha Brown, Larry Brown, Terry Brown, Michael Deon Brown, and Daryl Brown, Defendants,Of whom Deanna Brown-Thomas, Yamma Brown, and Venisha Brown are the Petitioners.

Appellate Case No. 2018-001990

Opinion No. 27982

Supreme Court of South Carolina.

Heard October 16, 2019

Filed June 17, 2020

Rehearing Denied August 24, 2020

Robert C. Byrd and Alyson Smith Podris, both of Parker Poe Adams & Bernstein, LLP, of Charleston, and Marc Toberoff, of Toberoff & Associates, PA, of Malibu, California, for Petitioners.

Robert N. Rosen, of Rosen Law Firm, LLC, of Charleston; S. Alan Medlin, of Columbia; Thomas Heyward Carter Jr., Andrew W. Chandler and M. Jean Lee, all of Evans Carter Kunes & Bennett, PA, of Charleston; David Lawrence Michel, of Michel Law Firm, LLC, of Mount Pleasant; Arnold S. Goodstein, of Goodstein Law Firm, LLC, of Summerville; and Gerald Malloy, of Malloy Law Firm, of Hartsville, for Respondent.

CHIEF JUSTICE BEATTY :

Disputes over the estate of entertainer James Brown (Brown) have persisted in the years since his untimely death on December 25, 2006. In this case, the Court considers an action by Tommie Rae Brown (Respondent) to establish that she is the surviving spouse of Brown under the South Carolina Probate Code. The issue arose in the context of Respondent's claims filed in the Aiken County Probate Court for an elective share or an omitted spouse's share of Brown's estate.¹ Uncertainty as to Respondent's marital status existed because Respondent did not obtain an annulment of her first recorded marriage until after her marriage ceremony with Brown. Respondent's claims were transferred to the circuit court, which granted Respondent's motion for partial summary judgment and denied a similar motion by the Limited Special Administrator and Trustee (LSA). The circuit court found as a matter of law that Respondent was the surviving spouse of Brown. The court of appeals affirmed. In re Estate of Brown , 424 S.C. 589, 818 S.E.2d 770 (Ct. App. 2018). This Court granted a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by several of Brown's children (Petitioners)² to review the decision of the court of appeals. We reverse and remand.

I. FACTS

In February 1997, Respondent participated in a marriage ceremony in Texas with Javed Ahmed, a native of Pakistan who was living in the United States. Ahmed's and Respondent's signatures appear on the application for a marriage license and affirmed that Ahmed was not currently married.

The application contained a warning that false statements could result in imprisonment and a fine.

In December 2001, Respondent participated in a marriage ceremony with Brown in South Carolina, after the birth of a son earlier that year.³ Respondent signed the 2001 marriage license, affirming this was her first marriage. However, Respondent and Ahmed had not divorced and no formal document purporting to terminate or void Respondent's marriage to Ahmed existed at that time.

A third party informed Brown sometime in 2003 that Respondent had been married to Ahmed and was never divorced. In December 2003, Respondent brought an action in South Carolina to annul her marriage to Ahmed.

In January 2004, Brown filed an action to annul his marriage to Respondent, indicating the parties had recently separated. Brown alleged he was entitled to an annulment because Respondent never divorced her first husband, so their purported marriage was void ab initio. Brown asked that Respondent "be required to permanently vacate the marital residence" and noted the parties had executed a prenuptial agreement that resolved all matters regarding equitable division, alimony, and attorney's fees.

A hearing was held in the family court in Charleston County in April 2004, on Respondent's application for an annulment of her marriage to Ahmed. Ahmed did not appear to litigate the claim. Respondent's attorney conceded Ahmed technically was in default, but stated he was not moving to place Ahmed in default. Respondent briefly testified as the sole witness and stated immediately after the marriage, she went to Ahmed's house with her belongings and Ahmed told her that she could not live with him, he already had three wives in Pakistan, and he just wanted to stay in the United States. It is undisputed that Respondent's testimony as to Ahmed's alleged statements was the only evidence before the family court that Ahmed was married at the time of his marriage ceremony with Respondent.

The same day as the hearing, the family court issued an order granting Respondent's request for an annulment. The family court found Ahmed had been adequately served by publication in Texas (his last known residence) after attempts to locate him were unsuccessful, and that he was given notice of the hearing. Citing Respondent's testimony, the family court found Respondent's marriage to Ahmed was void ab initio because (1) their union was bigamous, as Ahmed had three wives and lacked the capacity to marry; (2) the parties never consummated the marriage; and (3) Ahmed fraudulently induced the marriage to stay in the United States.

In May 2004, Brown amended his complaint against Respondent. In the amended complaint, Brown alleged Respondent did not inform him that she had been married and was still married to Ahmed at the time of their marriage ceremony in 2001. Brown asserted S.C. Code Ann. § 20-1-80 prohibited Respondent from entering into another marriage while she was still married to Ahmed. Respondent answered and counterclaimed, seeking a divorce from Brown and support. The actions of Respondent and Brown were ultimately withdrawn and dismissed without prejudice in a consent order filed in August 2004, in which Respondent and Brown agreed to seal the court records, and Respondent agreed to "forever waive any claim of a common[-]law marriage to [Brown], both now and in the future." Respondent and Brown had an on-and-off relationship until Brown passed away on December 25, 2006. They did not have another marriage ceremony following the issuance of the 2004 order declaring Respondent's marriage to Ahmed null and void.

After Brown's death, Respondent and Petitioners filed actions in the Aiken County Probate Court to set aside Brown's 2000 will and charitable trust based on fraud and undue influence. Respondent sought an elective share or an omitted spouse's share of Brown's estate, as well as a share for her son with Brown. The probate court transferred the matters to the circuit court in Aiken County. Respondent and Petitioners reached a settlement with Brown's Estate, and the circuit court issued an order approving the settlement. On appeal, this Court affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded the matter to the circuit court, finding the settlement was improper. Wilson v. Dallas , 403 S.C. 411, 743 S.E.2d 746 (2013).

In 2014, following the remand, the circuit court took up Respondent's claims for an elective share or an omitted spouse's share of Brown's estate, as well as Respondent's motion for partial summary judgment on the issue of the legal validity of her ceremonial marriage to Brown. The LSA also filed a summary judgment motion, asserting Respondent could not establish that she is Brown's surviving spouse because her marriage to Brown was legally impossible under South Carolina law. The LSA contended Respondent's marriage to Brown in 2001 was invalid because she still had a marriage of record with Ahmed at that time, citing S.C. Code Ann. § 20-1-80 (providing a marriage contracted while a party has a living spouse is void ab initio unless one of several exceptions applies). The LSA also contended that, while the status of Respondent's first marriage is binding on the world (i.e., it is annulled), the underlying factual findings in the family court's 2004 annulment order (such as the finding that Ahmed had three wives in Pakistan in 1997) were not conclusive as to nonparties who had no opportunity to litigate those points. Petitioners submitted memoranda and documents in support of the LSA's motion and opposed Respondent's motion.⁴

The parties also submitted a Joint Stipulation of Facts summarizing the facts on which they were able to agree.

The circuit court granted Respondent's motion for partial summary judgment on the issue of Respondent's status and denied the LSA's in a 2015 order, finding as a matter of law that Respondent is the surviving spouse of Brown. The circuit court, relying on the family court's 2004 annulment order (which it found was conclusive of the facts recited therein and binding on Petitioners), ruled Respondent's first marriage to Ahmed was void ab initio due to Ahmed's bigamy, so Respondent had no legal impediment to her marriage with Brown in 2001 and their marriage was valid. The circuit court further found Respondent and Brown had not annulled their 2001 marriage or divorced prior to Brown's death in 2006.

The court of appeals affirmed the circuit court's determination that Respondent was Brown's surviving spouse.⁵ In re Estate of Brown , 424 S.C. 589, 818 S.E.2d 770 (Ct. App. 2018). The court of appeals reasoned Petitioners lacked standing to challenge the annulment order, just as Brown did not have standing to intervene in the annulment action, and any rights Petitioners have are derivative from Brown. The court noted Brown availed himself of the method he could use to invalidate his marriage to Respondent by bringing his own annulment action, but the parties agreed to dismiss that action, and Brown did not bring another action during his lifetime.⁶

The court of appeals rejected Petitioners' contention that they were not disputing the annulment order's effect on Respondent's status , but only the unchallenged factual findings, such as the fact that Ahmed had three...