Evans v. Evans

• Decision Date: 20 November 2008
• Docket Number: No. 2007-CP-00920-SCT.,2007-CP-00920-SCT.
• Citation: 994 So.2d 765
• Parties: Robert D. EVANS v. Beverly B. EVANS.
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

994 So.2d 765

Robert D. EVANS v. Beverly B. EVANS.

No. 2007-CP-00920-SCT.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

November 20, 2008.

Robert D. Evans, pro se.

Susan Carole Smith, attorney for appellee.

Before WALLER, P.J., EASLEY and GRAVES, JJ.

EASLEY, Justice, for the Court.

¶ 1. Robert Evans (Evans) appeals a final judgment of the Washington County Chancery Court denying his request for downward modification of his child-support obligation, and then ordering that he pay seventy-five percent of the future college expenses for his youngest child, Robert. Evans filed a counter-complaint to a claim filed by his former wife, Beverly Evans (Beverly), in which she requested an increase in the monthly child-support obligation, payment of all college expenses for their daughter Elizabeth, payment of back child support, and attorneys' fees from Evans. Evans sought modification based on a material change in circumstances due to Elizabeth's upcoming emancipation, her enrollment in college, and the fact that Robert stays at Evans's home six months out of the year. Evans also requested that Beverly be held in contempt for violating telephone privileges, and that she be held responsible for Evans's attorneys' fees.

¶ 2. A trial was held on October 16, 2006, following which the chancellor denied both parties' requests for modification, including Beverly's plea for back child support, as well as Evans's request that Beverly be held in contempt of court, and held that each party was responsible for his and her own attorney costs. The chancellor ordered Evans to resume paying Beverly the lump sum of $2,000 per month for child support in the manner set forth in the decreed settlement. The chancellor ordered that Robert should be provided with an automobile, and that both parties were to pay for Robert's future college expenses. The parties were ordered to share proportionately in all the expenses thereof; seventy-five percent to be paid by Evans, and the remaining twenty-five percent by Beverly.

¶ 3. Following judgment, Evans moved the trial court to reconsider its prior decision denying modification, and included a motion asking the court to clarify whether the parents were to share in college and automobile expenses or only college expenses in general. The chancery court granted the clarification request, and ruled that Evans and Beverly are to pay for both children's car expenses as well as college expenses, seventy-five percent/twenty-five percent, respectively. The chancellor reaffirmed that neither party would be required to pay for such expenses upon each child reaching emancipation. The chancellor denied Evans's motion to reconsider the modification request. Evans appeals to this Court.

FACTUAL BACKGROUND

¶ 4. The parties were granted a divorce on the grounds of irreconcilable differences by the Chancery Court of Washington County in December 1998. The decree approved the parties' incorporated marital settlement agreement as to child custody, support, and property division. Accordingly, Evans agreed to pay to Beverly the sum of $2,000 per month for the support and maintenance of their two minor children, Elizabeth and Robert, ages thirteen and seven, respectively, at the time of the divorce. Out of this amount, Evans was to pay the monthly note toward the mortgage on the marital home, approximately $550 per month, and Beverly was to pay for each child's private-school education, approximately $320 per child, each month during the school year. The parties were to share joint physical and legal custody of the children. The marital home would remain Beverly's residence. Evans would continue to cover the children under his medical insurance plan; he would also pay seventy-five percent of any medical expenses not covered by insurance, with Beverly responsible for the remaining twenty-five percent. Evans was to maintain not less than $300,000 in life insurance, with the children as beneficiaries, with this obligation to terminate when the children are emancipated or reach the age of twenty-one, whichever occurs first. Both Evans and Beverly specifically released each other from any claim for alimony, either periodic or lump-sum.

¶ 5. At trial, Beverly testified that, beginning on September 1, 2005, Evans unilaterally decreased the amount of child support that he was paying each month. Beverly claimed that Evans began paying only the house note (which had increased to $590 per month) and Robert's private-school tuition (approximately $322 per month), thereby shorting her approximately $1,088 per month.

¶ 6. Evans disputed Beverly's claim, but did not deny reducing his monthly support payments. Evans claimed that he did so due to Elizabeth's enrollment in college and need of extra support, and because Beverly was no longer in need of money for Elizabeth's private-school tuition. Evans submitted evidence showing that from September 1, 2005, until November 2006, the time of trial, he had paid $30,100 in child support, averaging $2,150 per month. Evans also testified that he had been paying an additional sum of $200 a month toward Elizabeth's car, and approximately $80 a month in car insurance.

¶ 7. The chancellor found that Evans, without permission from the court, had unilaterally modified the original settlement agreement. Evans was ordered to resume paying Beverly $2,000 per month in child support in the manner set forth in the decreed settlement, and to continue the payments until the emancipation of the youngest child, Robert. The chancellor also determined that, because Evans had provided funds in excess of the support required of him for both children throughout, he did not owe back child support.

¶ 8. The chancellor ruled that Elizabeth's enrollment in college constituted a material change in circumstances, finding for both parties on this ground; but he declined to modify the $2,000 support obligation for either party. The chancellor also found that Beverly's income had increased since the time of the divorce decree, but that Evans's had not. The chancellor therefore ordered Beverly to begin assisting Evans with both Elizabeth's college expenses and her car expenses, in the proportional share of twenty-five percent.¹ Finally, the trial court ruled that both parties were to share Robert's future college and automobile expenses, in the same seventy-five/twenty-five proportional amount.²

DISCUSSION

¶ 9. Domestic-relations matters are reviewed under the limited substantial-evidence/manifest-error rule. Giannaris v. Giannaris, 960 So.2d 462, 467 (Miss.2007) (citing R.K. v. J.K., 946 So.2d 764, 772 (Miss.2007); Mizell v. Mizell, 708 So.2d 55, 59 (Miss. 1998)). A chancellor's findings will not be disturbed "unless the chancellor was manifestly wrong, clearly erroneous or an erroneous legal standard was applied." Id.

I. WHETHER THE CHANCELLOR ERRED BY NOT REDUCING THE TWO-THOUSAND-DOLLAR CHILD-SUPPORT PAYMENT.

¶ 10. At the outset, Elizabeth has since turned twenty-one, and is now legally emancipated. Evans does not raise or dispute the chancellor's decision ordering the payment of Elizabeth's college expenses. Though now moot, this matter was intertwined at trial with the issue at hand and warrants discussion. To avoid confusing the chancellor's treatment between the two, the portion of the chancellor's ruling pertaining to the payment of Elizabeth's college expenses will be discussed in the last part of this opinion, for clarity.

¶ 11. Evans's argument centers on the trial court's refusal to modify the $2,000 child-support obligation despite what Evans claims was a material change in circumstances in his favor. This change was that Elizabeth would soon reach the age of twenty-one, that she was no longer incurring private-school tuition, and that Robert lives with Evans much of the year.³ Evans submits that the chancellor found for him on these grounds but he felt, under Varner v. Varner, 588 So.2d 428 (Miss. 1991), that he could not reduce his child support. Evans asserts that the trial court misinterpreted Varner, and avers that the trial court's decision not to modify the $2,000 support obligation to reflect this change results in an unfair windfall for Beverly. We do not agree.

¶ 12. The reason for the chancellor's application of Varner in this matter was chiefly twofold. First, the trial court found both that Evans unilaterally had modified his support payments without the court's permission, but also that he had continued to provide sufficient support for both children. To resolve this conflict, the chancellor relied on this Court's finding in Varner.

¶ 13. Varner reiterated that "[n]o party obligated by a judicial decree to provide support for minor children may resort to self help and modify his or her obligation with impunity." Varner, 588 So.2d at 433 (citing Cumberland v. Cumberland, 564 So.2d 839, 847 (Miss.1990)). Varner also reaffirmed the Court's longstanding view that child-support obligations are for the benefit and protection of children, and that the children's interest weighs in the judicial mind far heavier than that of either parent. Id. at 432 (citing Lawrence v. Lawrence, 574 So.2d 1376, 1381 (Miss.1991); Cumberland, 564 So.2d at 847; Nichols v. Tedder, 547 So.2d 766, 781 (Miss.1989); Alexander v. Alexander, 494 So.2d 365, 368 (Miss. 1986)). Therefore, in a situation where a supporting parent claiming to have made payments directly to the child can prove such payment, the parent may receive credit for having paid child support, "where to hold otherwise would unjustly enrich the [non-supporting parent]." Id. at 435 (citing Alexander, 494 So.2d at 368).⁴

¶ 14. The chancellor found that Evans had continued to provide sufficient support for both children, although not in the manner and means set forth in the decreed support agreement. Thus, the chancellor denied Beverly's claim for back child support based on the same equitable principle explained by this Court in Varner.

¶ 15. Secondly, in...