Deaton v. Deaton
| Docket Number | CL-2023-0570 |
| Decision Date | 08 November 2024 |
| Parties | Drew S. Deaton v. Leanne W. Deaton |
| Court | Alabama Court of Civil Appeals |
Appeal from Jefferson Circuit Court (DR-18-901324.03)
Drew S Deaton ("the father") and Leanne W. Deaton ("the mother") were divorced by a 2019 judgment entered by the Jefferson Circuit Court ("the trial court"). The trial court modified the original divorce judgment in a judgment entered on May 12, 2021; that judgment incorporated an agreement of the parties. Ten days later, on May 22, 2021, the father filed a petition in the trial court that, among other things, sought to have the mother held in contempt for violations of the divorce judgment, as modified and sought clarification and enforcement of the visitation provisions of the divorce judgment, as modified.[1]
In November 2021, the trial court, acting sua sponte, appointed Clotele H. Brantley as guardian ad litem for the parties' children. In the order appointing Brantley, the trial court ordered both the father and the mother to pay into the office of the trial-court clerk the sum of $2,500 as a "retainer for the fees of the guardian ad litem." In various motions filed in response to the sua sponte appointment of Brantley, the father indicated that he had no objection to the appointment of a guardian ad litem for the children, but he requested that the trial court appoint someone other than Brantley. The trial court denied that request.
In May 2022, the mother filed a counterclaim for modification, in which she sought a modification of the custody, visitation and childsupport provisions of the divorce judgment, as modified. On June 30, 2022 the trial court entered an order dismissing, with prejudice, the father's petition, as finally amended, as a sanction for his failure to comply with numerous discovery requests propounded by the mother. The action proceeded on the mother's counterclaim.
In December 2022, Brantley filed a motion requesting that she be "[a]warded additional [a]ttorney [f]ees [because her] time in this case has exceeded the initial deposit of $5000.00."[2] Brantley did not provide an itemization of the time that she had expended on the action. The trial court granted Brantley's motion on December 26, 2022, requiring "each party [to] pay an additional retainer to [Brantley] of $2,500.00 (Two-Thousand Five Hundred Dollars and no/100)." On January 23, 2023, the father filed a motion requesting that Brantley provide a detailed bill to support her request for additional interim guardian ad litem fees and requesting an evidentiary hearing on the reasonableness of those fees.
In April 2023, the father again filed a motion seeking a detailed bill or accounting from Brantley to support her request for additional interim guardian ad litem fees and requesting an evidentiary hearing on the reasonableness of the interim guardian ad litem fees. The trial court denied the request for an evidentiary hearing "at this time" but instructed Brantley to provide detailed billing to support her request for additional interim guardian ad litem fees. Before Brantley filed an interim billing statement, the father filed what he entitled a "Supplemental Motion to Disqualify the Guardian Ad Litem Based on Formal Alabama State Bar Opinion," to which Brantley responded. As instructed by the trial court, Brantley provided an interim billing statement in which she indicated that the current balance of the interim guardian ad litem fees, after deduction of the two $5,000 payments she had apparently already received from the parties, was $18,350. Brantley also filed a motion seeking additional fees with which to pay a contract paralegal to assist her in preparing for trial; the trial court denied that motion.
The father then filed an objection to Brantley's interim guardian ad litem fees. In that objection, the father requested an evidentiary hearing on the reasonableness of Brantley's interim guardian ad litem fees. He also again requested that the trial court remove Brantley as the children's guardian ad litem. On May 6, 2023, the trial court "overruled" the father's objection to Brantley's interim guardian ad litem fees and denied the father's request for an evidentiary hearing "as it would increase the already documented fees of [Brantley] and be an unreasonable use of court time and resources." The trial court also specifically found that Brantley's interim guardian ad litem fees were reasonable, noting that the modification action had been pending for over two years, during which Brantley had attended numerous court hearings, had responded to various motions, and had spoken with the children, the parties, the attorneys, and various professionals involved with the children and the parties. The father sought reconsideration of the denial of his request for a hearing, which the trial court denied.
On May 24, 2023, Brantley filed a motion seeking to be paid the unpaid $18,350 in interim guardian ad litem fees. In response, the father filed a renewed motion to remove Brantley as the children's guardian ad litem; in the alternative, he requested that the trial court clarify or limit Brantley's role. He also filed a motion requesting that Brantley be required to produce the 231 e-mails that Brantley had itemized in her interim billing statement, to which Brantley responded by requesting that, if the trial court were inclined to grant the father's request, it exclude the e-mails that were "work product" or were not billed.
On June 5, 2023, the trial court granted Brantley's motion for payment. In its order, the trial court ordered the father and the mother to pay the $18,350 balance due on the interim billing statement upon receipt of a statement from Brantley and before the trial of the modification action, which was scheduled for June 7, 2023. In a separate order also entered on June 5, 2023, the trial court denied the father's motion to remove Brantley, his request for clarification and limitation of Brantley's role as guardian ad litem, and his motion for the production of the e-mails.
The father then filed a "brief" on the imposition of the interim guardian ad litem fees. In that "brief" the father again requested a hearing on the reasonableness of Brantley's interim guardian ad litem fees. The trial court set an "evidentiary hearing" on the father's "brief" for July 21, 2023. On July 20, 2023, Brantley filed a motion to show cause, arguing that the father should be held in contempt for failing to pay his half of the $18,350 in interim guardian ad litem fees. At the July 21, 2023, hearing, the trial court explained that the hearing was not intended to be a hearing on the reasonableness of the interim guardian ad litem fees and was instead a hearing to determine whether a hearing on the reasonableness of the interim guardian ad litem fees was necessary. Thus, the trial court did not allow the father to call Brantley as a witness and took no evidence relating to the reasonableness of Brantley's interim guardian ad litem fees at the "evidentiary hearing."
On July 29, 2023, the trial court, relying solely on Brantley's interim billing statement, entered an order stating that the interim guardian ad litem fees were "acceptable" and ordering the father to pay his one-half of the outstanding interim guardian ad litem fees by Monday, August 31, 2023. Pursuant to Rule 60(a), Ala. R. Civ. P., the trial court amended the July 29, 2023, order on August 1, 2023, to correct a clerical error. The August 1, 2023, order clarified that the father was required to pay the outstanding interim guardian ad litem fees by Monday, July 31, 2023, but extended the time for payment until Wednesday, August 2, 2023, because of the typographical error in the July 29, 2023, order. The trial court again amended its order on August 6, 2023, stating that, if the interim guardian ad litem fees were not paid by August 14, 2023, the trial court would issue a separate order regarding a hearing on Brantley's contempt motion. On August 14, 2023, the father filed a notice of appeal from the trial court's order requiring him to pay Brantley one-half of $18,350, or $9,175, in interim guardian ad litem fees.
As a preliminary matter, we must address the motions to dismiss the father's appeal filed by the mother and by Brantley. They both contend that, because the trial on the modification action has not concluded and because the trial court has not yet entered a judgment resolving the modification action, no final judgment exists from which the father's appeal can lie. See, e.g., Warren v. Warren, 94 So.3d 392, 396 (Ala. Civ. App. 2012) (). Although we agree that no final judgment relating to the modification action exists in the present case, we are not inclined to dismiss the father's appeal.
The father argues that the order awarding guardian ad litem fees is itself a final judgment capable of supporting an appeal. See Roberts v. Roberts, 189 So.3d 79, 81 (Ala. Civ App. 2015) (). As this court stated in Roberts, an award of guardian ad litem fees is itself a final judgment because "'attorney-fee matters are separate and distinct from matters going to the merits of a dispute and ... an appeal may be taken from a final judgment as to either aspect of a case.'" 189 So.3d at 81 (quoting Niezer v. SouthTrust Bank, 887 So.2d 919, 923 (Ala. Civ. App. 2004)); see also Kimbrough v. Dickinson, 251 Ala. 677, 681, 39 So.2d 241, 244 (1949) (...
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