Holland v. Holland, 00-291.

• Decision Date: 29 November 2001
• Docket Number: No. 00-291.,00-291.
• Parties: Brad HOLLAND, Appellant (Plaintiff), v. Karen HOLLAND, Appellee (Defendant).
• Court: Wyoming Supreme Court

35 P.3d 409

2001 WY 113

Brad HOLLAND, Appellant (Plaintiff), v. Karen HOLLAND, Appellee (Defendant).

No. 00-291.

Supreme Court of Wyoming.

November 29, 2001.

Representing Appellant: David A. Nicholas and Julie M. Yates of Anthony, Nicholas, Goodrich & Tangeman, LLC, Laramie, WY. Argument by Ms. Yates.

Representing Appellee: Anthony F. Ross and Russell W. Sinnett of Ross, Ross & Santini, LLC, Cheyenne, WY. Agrument by Mr. Ross.

Before LEHMAN, C.J., and GOLDEN, HILL, KITE, and VOIGT, JJ.

HILL, Justice.

[¶ 1] Appellant, Brad Holland (Husband), seeks review of isolated provisions of an order of the district court, which he claims erroneously divided his premarital assets, as well as an inheritance he received during the year preceding the divorce with Appellee, Karen Holland (Wife). Husband also asserts that a lifetime non-competition agreement to which he stipulated during trial is unenforceable as a matter of law.

[¶ 2] We affirm.

ISSUES

[¶ 3] Husband's brief states these issues:

1. Did the district court abuse its discretion by dividing appellant's inheritance received by him during the year preceding the parties' divorce as well as his premarital assets?

2. Is the life long non-compete agreement stipulated to by appellant during the trial unenforceable as [a] matter of law?

Wife rephrases those issues as follows:

I. Whether the distribution ordered by the district court was just and equitable under applicable Wyoming precedent and statutory law and was not an abuse of discretion.

II. Whether the district court was correct to deny plaintiff's Rules 59 and 60 [W.R.C.P.] motion to reconsider, alter or amend judgment; whether the non-compete agreement, under all of the circumstances, should be enforced and upheld because it is not in violation of Wyoming law or against public policy.

FACTS

[¶ 4] The facts included in the portion of Husband's brief devoted to the "statement of the facts" do not conform to the standard of review to be applied in a case such as this, nor do they give meaningful recognition to Husband's burden in this appeal. Husband limits his recitation of the facts to those that are favorable to his contentions, while wholly ignoring the totality of the facts and circumstances that the district court had to digest and then apply to its decision-making process. Husband included in the record almost all of the exhibits introduced on his behalf during the proceedings before the district court, but did not include any of the exhibits introduced by Wife which, of course, the district court was required to consider in formulating the divorce decree and dividing the parties' marital estate. Although it is not a fact of central importance, we do take note that the approximate dollar total of all assets owned by both parties, including those in dispute in the instant appeal, was about $2.5 million. We also note, as a matter generally applicable to an understanding of the facts pertinent to this appeal, that as a strategy in estate planning, many of the assets were in the parties' individual names, rather than jointly owned. When the distribution of the marital estate was complete, each party ended up with about one-half of those total assets.

[¶ 5] The parties were married on January 10, 1985, and the marriage was dissolved by decree of divorce that became final on July 26, 2000. For the most part, the parties were able to resolve their differences amicably. An exception to that amity revolved around separately owned assets, which husband claimed he brought to the marriage in the approximate amount of $100,000.00. However, the record reflects that in his opening statement, Husband qualified his claim in this regard to a statement that "some" of those assets were decipherable, but that "some of that's pretty muddy." Indeed, to the extent it was a factor of measurable significance in the resolution of this case, Husband conceded that he could not prove he had brought $100,000.00 to the marriage. It was agreed that he had purchased the home the couple initially lived in (referred to as the Comanche property) for $64,000.00 in 1984. That property was a duplex, and the parties lived in it for about four years before moving to a second marital home (referred to as the Granito property). They continued to rent the Comanche property for a number of years after moving to the Granito property, and when the Comanche property was finally sold, the proceeds of that sale were deposited into their joint bank accounts and used for mutual purposes associated with the marriage. Wife testified that while the couple lived in the Comanche property, she paid all household bills in recognition that Husband had purchased the property. In the district court's decree, one of the assets Husband received was a 100% interest in the Granito property. For purposes of clarity, we will take note at this juncture that Husband contends that the district court indicated in its decision letter that it did "not intend to retrace and restore to [Husband] funds invested and absorbed into the marriage years ago, even if [Husband] held them prior to the marriage." It is Husband's contention that the district court thereby abdicated a part of its duty under Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 20-2-114 (LexisNexis 2001) (emphasis added), which provides:

In granting a divorce, the court shall make such disposition of the property of the parties as appears just and equitable, having regard for the respective merits of the parties and the condition in which they will be left by the divorce, the party through whom the property was acquired and the burdens imposed upon the property for the benefit of either party and children. The court may decree to either party reasonable alimony out of the estate of the other having regard for the other's ability to pay and may order so much of the other's real estate or the rents and profits thereof as is necessary be assigned and set out to either party for life, or may decree a specific sum be paid by either party.

[¶ 6] The second exception to the parties' otherwise amicable dissolution of their marriage was an inheritance that Husband received from his grandmother in 1998. The approximate sum of that inheritance was $180,000.00, and that sum was on deposit in an investment account at a Laramie bank. Husband held that property in his own name. However, prior to Husband's receipt of the inheritance, the $180,000.00 was invested conservatively, so the securities in that account were sold and the parties pursued more aggressive investments. That transaction generated significant capital gains taxes, and the parties paid those taxes from their joint bank accounts (not out of the inheritance itself). That account grew dramatically from the time of the inheritance until the time of the divorce, and its value at the time the divorce decree was entered was approximately $324,000.00. During the course of the proceedings, the parties agreed in principle that their marital assets should be split 50/50, but it was Husband's position that his $100,000.00 in premarital assets and the money he inherited from his grandmother, including its appreciation, should be given over to him before the 50/50 split was made. The district court opined in the decision letter which accompanied the divorce decree that it would not set over to Husband the above-described assets before distributing the marital estate, but would instead apply the standard set out in Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 20-2-114 to the overall distribution of all assets of the parties, without regard to whose name those assets were in. In the divorce decree, Husband received 100% of the account, which contained the inheritance Husband received from his grandmother. As an additional matter, we must note that Husband contends that a separate provision of the divorce decree, which required Husband to pay Wife $135,000.00 in cash, was clearly the district court's way of giving Wife half of Husband's inheritance.

[¶ 7] As a part of the agreed upon settlement of the disposition of the parties' marital estate, it was established that Wife would get the family dry-cleaning business, which the parties agreed was worth $685,000.00.¹ In exchange, Husband received the Granito property and two rental properties that the parties agreed had an aggregate value of $685,000.00.² Included in this stipulation was an agreement by Husband that he would not compete in Albany County with the business given over to Wife for the remainder of his life. Wife negotiated for that agreement based, in significant part, on threats by Husband that if Wife obtained the business, he would open his own dry-cleaning business as close as possible to the existing business, and run her out of business. Husband entered into that agreement, on the record, freely, voluntarily, and with full opportunity for consultation with his lawyers. Two weeks after the decree was entered, Husband changed his mind and asked the district court to declare the lifetime non-compete agreement to be void as a matter of law on public policy grounds, and to reduce the non-compete agreement to no more than a two-year period of time.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

[¶ 8] There are few rules more firmly established in our jurisprudence than the proposition that the disposition of marital property is committed to the sound discretion of the district court. Judicial discretion is made up of many things, including conclusions reached from objective criteria, as well as exercising sound judgment with regard to what is right under the circumstances and without doing so arbitrarily or capriciously. We are required to ask ourselves whether the trial court could reasonably conclude as it did and whether any facet of its ruling was arbitrary or capricious. In accomplishing our review, we consider only the evidence in favor of the successful party, ignore the evidence of the unsuccessful party, and grant to the successful party every reasonable inference that can be...