Lindsley v. Lindsley
| Decision Date | 06 June 1977 |
| Parties | Patricia C. LINDSLEY et al. v. Frederick O. LINDSLEY. |
| Court | Maine Supreme Court |
Murray, Plumb & Murray by Peter S. Plumb, John C. Lightbody, Portland, for plaintiffs.
Theodore H. Kurtz, South Paris, for defendant.
Before DUFRESNE, C. J., and POMEROY, WERNICK, ARCHIBALD, DELAHANTY and GODFREY, JJ.
Plaintiffs Patricia C. Lindsley and Lloyd I. Isler, Marvin Lewis and William Shorenstein Patricia Lindsley's attorneys in the Florida proceedings hereinafter described instituted a civil action against defendant Frederick O. Lindsley in the Superior Court (Cumberland County) to recover certain sums designated alimony and legal fees as embodied in a judgment of the Circuit Court of Florida. 1
The answer of defendant husband included a counterclaim. The first count of the counterclaim asks an adjudication that Patricia Lindsley is liable to indemnify defendant should he be ordered to pay any amount of money to her in excess of $75 for any week since August 9, 1971 or any amount of money to plaintiffs Isler, Lewis and Shorenstein. The counterclaim asserts that such liability to indemnify arose by virtue of Patricia Lindsley's alleged violation of the provisions concerning payments of support and counsel fees contained in a separation agreement which Mr. & Mrs. Lindsley had executed in the State of New York on February 23, 1965. Plaintiffs moved for summary judgment in their favor as to this first count of defendant's counterclaim. The presiding Justice granted the motion and ordered summary judgment for plaintiffs. Defendant has appealed from the judgment entered in plaintiffs' favor. 2
We deny the appeal.
The following facts are undisputed.
The Lindsleys married in New Jersey on February 11, 1960. By late 1962 they had determined to separate. During almost an entire decade, from 1962 to 1971, they lived apart most of the time. There are no children of the marriage. On February 23, 1965 the Lindsleys executed in New York the separation agreement central to Mr. Lindsley's assertions in count one of his counterclaim.
The provisions of that agreement here pertinent are threefold.
First, Mr. Lindsley undertook to pay $75 per week to his wife during her lifetime (or until her remarriage) "for her support and maintenance, use and comfort." In return for this agreement, Mrs. Lindsley discharged her husband from any other claims "for alimony or for any other provision for maintenance and support."
Second, the Lindsleys generally released one another of all present and future obligations and divested themselves of present and future marital interests. Mrs. Lindsley agreed to reimburse her husband for any future amounts he might expend for her debts, including, specifically, legal fees.
Third, the agreement included a covenant that:
In 1970 Mr. Lindsley sued for divorce in the Circuit Court of Florida. Mrs. Lindsley appeared and counterclaimed for separate maintenance. Mr. Lindsley brought to the attention of the Florida court the 1965 separation agreement, asserting, first, that the Florida court should adopt its provisions as part of its decree and, second, because the agreement by its own terms purported to have binding effect as an agreement between the parties independently of any divorce decree, the court should refrain from merging the contract into the decree. Mrs. Lindsley urged the Florida court to nullify the 1965 agreement either by merging it into the divorce decree or adjudicating that a reconciliation of the parties subsequent to 1965 had vitiated the contract obligations. She sought alimony in an amount greater than the $75 per week set forth in the 1965 agreement as well as payment by Mr. Lindsley of the fees of her attorneys in the divorce action.
On August 9, 1971, the Circuit Court of Florida awarded Mr. Lindsley a divorce and denied Mrs. Lindsley's counterclaim for separate maintenance. Additionally, the court ordered Mr. Lindsley to pay alimony at the rate of $125 per week and attorney fees in the amount of $7,500.00. In so acting, the Florida court made no express mention of the 1965 separation agreement and offered no explanation concerning the interrelationship between the 1965 agreement and its decision.
Neither party appealed from the divorce judgment. Since Mr. Lindsley had not performed the obligations imposed by it, Mrs. Lindsley and her attorneys instituted the present civil proceeding against him in Maine to achieve enforcement of the Florida court's judgment for alimony arrearage and counsel fees. (See n. 1, supra). As asserted in count one of his counterclaim, Mr. Lindsley's claim is that the 1965 agreement remained in force, entitled him to the difference between $125 and $75 per week and obligated Mrs. Lindsley to indemnify him for any legal fees for which she was indebted.
The viability of count one of Mr. Lindsley's counterclaim 3 turns, in essence, on the proper interpretation of the legal effect of the Florida divorce judgment. In Mr. Lindsley's view, it did not affect his right to enforce against his wife the entirety, or any part, of the obligation which the 1965 separation agreement imposed upon her as a party to it.
Plaintiffs disagree. They read the divorce judgment as nullifying the 1965 agreement, if not in its entirety at least in those parts of it pertaining to alimony and legal fees. The Justice presiding in the Superior Court decided expressly that the Florida judgment invalidated all of the 1965 agreement.
We uphold the summary judgment for plaintiffs but on grounds different from those advanced by the presiding Justice. We conclude that we need not presently decide (and we intimate no opinion concerning) whether all, or some, of the provisions of their 1965 separation agreement may remain binding on the Lindsleys for any purposes other than are involved in the instant proceeding. Instead, we decide only that: (1) the Florida judgment upon which plaintiffs have sued in Maine is predicated upon, and embodies, an adjudication by the Florida court appropriately made within its powers under Florida law as a court vested with divorce jurisdiction that the 1965 separation agreement ceased to have binding effect upon Mr. and Mrs. Lindsley in the specific respects concerning which the Florida court had seen fit to make determinations contrary to particular provisions of the separation agreement; and (2) Maine courts will give faith and credit to the Florida judgment at least to the extent that in the present situation in which a Maine court has been called upon to act upon the Florida judgment defendant will be denied the right to assert as binding upon his wife those particular provisions of their 1965 separation agreement which, precisely for the purposes here involved, the Florida judgment has adjudicated to be ineffectual between them.
Legal Fees.
We dispose summarily of the contentions concerning attorney fees. Unlike the question of alimony, the issue of legal fees does not, in the end, involve the 1965 separation agreement.
The September 1971 judgment of the Florida court for alimony arrears and legal fees makes clear that the Florida court imposed upon Mr. Lindsley a direct obligation to the attorneys of plaintiff rather than a debt to Mrs. Lindsley. The indebtedness for legal fees was thus Mr. Lindsley's own debt, not the debt of his wife. The 1965 separation agreement imposed no obligation upon Mrs. Lindsley to indemnify her husband for the services of attorneys rendered in her behalf but for which her husband, not she, was indebted.
Alimony.
As above noted, the Florida judgment of divorce awarded Mrs. Lindsley $125 per week alimony whereas the 1965 separation agreement, urged upon the Florida court by Mr. Lindsley, provided that the husband pay only $75 per week.
In the matter of alimony on judgment of divorce, Florida courts are governed generally by Fla.Stat.Ann. § 61.08 which empowers them to consider "any factor necessary to do equity and justice between the parties." 4 Where a spouse seeks modification of a previous judicial award of alimony or, as here, an initial adjudication of alimony in excess of amounts agreed upon as support, or alimony, in a separation agreement, the Florida courts are governed specifically by Fla.Stat.Ann. § 61.14. Section 61.14 provides as here material:
"(1) When the parties have entered into . . . an agreement for payments for, or instead of, support, maintenance, or alimony . . . and the circumstances or the financial ability of either party has changed . . ., either party may apply to the circuit court . . . for a judgment decreasing or increasing the amount of support, maintenance, or alimony, and the court has jurisdiction to make orders as equity requires, with due regard to the changed circumstances or the financial ability of the parties . . ., decreasing, increasing, or confirming the amount of separate support, maintenance, or alimony provided for in the agreement . . .."
Thus, to effectuate the public policy of the State of Florida 5 the Florida legislature has unequivocally authorized the Florida judiciary to deem ineffectual as against the powers reposed in the court the provisions of pre-existing support, maintenance or alimony agreements. Defendant does not contest this conclusion. Instead, he asks us to read into § 61.14 a limitation that the modification power thereby conferred be applied only to "Florida agreements." 6
We read § 61.14 otherwise.
First, § 61.14 on its face contains no hint of the limitation defendant would...
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