Mississippi State Dept. of Human Services v. St. Peter, 96-CA-01232-SCT
| Decision Date | 12 March 1998 |
| Docket Number | No. 96-CA-01232-SCT,96-CA-01232-SCT |
| Citation | 708 So.2d 83 |
| Parties | MISSISSIPPI STATE DEPARTMENT OF HUMAN SERVICES v. Landon Carroll ST. PETER. |
| Court | Mississippi Supreme Court |
Byron W. Hughes, Jackson, for Appellant.
No brief filed for Appellee.
En Banc.
I. STATEMENT OF THE FACTS AND CASE
¶1 Landon and Margaret St. Peter were divorced in Bolivar County, Mississippi on September 14, 1979. The final decree of divorce required Landon to pay $400 per month in child support to his two minor daughters, Lacy and Sonya. On May 9, 1988, the Court entered an order finding Landon to be $11,850.00 in arrears in his child support payments and awarding this same amount to Margaret. The Court also entered an order providing for the withholding of Landon's income to satisfy this indebtedness. This order provided for the withholding of $500 per month total to gradually satisfy the delinquency while at the same time continuing the current payments called for under the original child support order 1.
¶2 Landon timely made the payments called for under the May 1988 order, but on July 18, 1996, the Mississippi Department of Human Services (DHS) served a Notice of Delinquency upon Landon informing him that he was still $2827.00 in arrears on his child support payments and warning of additional withholdings if this amount was not paid. On August 28, 1996, Landon filed an "Objection to Notice of Delinquency," requesting that the Bolivar County Chancery Court enter an order to the effect that Landon had no current delinquency and that the arrearage was being timely paid. The motion further requested that the Court order the DHS to withdraw any notices of a delinquency sent to credit bureaus and abstain from sending any such notices in the future.
¶3 On September 17, 1996, the Court entered an "Order Adjudicating No Delinquency," holding that "due to timely payment by Landon C. St. Peter on the aforesaid arrearage of $2,827.00 there is no delinquency, and that any notice sent to any credit bureau by the Mississippi Department of Human Services, or otherwise, be corrected and redacted to reflect that Landon C. St. Peter has had good credit on said arrearage and in fact there is no delinquency whatsoever." The DHS filed a motion for rehearing of this order, but this motion was denied on September 17, 1996. The DHS timely filed an appeal before this Court.
II. LAW
That pursuant to Miss.Code Ann. § 93-11-69, as amended, ... Do timely payments on child support arrearage effectively constitute a non-delinquency of such, which would thereby void and cause to be rescinded any notices sent by the Mississippi Department of Human Services, by authority of aforesaid statute, to any credit bureau or credit reporting agency, as to said arrearage?
¶4 The instant appeal presents this Court with a question of law as to whether a sum of past due child support which is being paid off under a scheduled "payment plan" nevertheless constitutes a "delinquency." This Court has previously answered this question in the affirmative in similar contexts. This Court noted in Tanner v. Roland, 598 So.2d 783, 786 (Miss.1992) (citations omitted) that:
We have consistently held that child support payments vest in the child as they accrue. Once they have become vested, just as they cannot be contracted away by the parents, they cannot be modified or forgiven by the courts. Each payment that becomes due and remains unpaid "becomes 'a judgment' against the supporting parents."
¶5 In Brown v. Gillespie, 465 So.2d 1046 (Miss.1985), a Chancellor entered judgment against a father for past due child support, but he stayed execution on this judgment so long as the father paid $ 150.00 per month in current child support plus $50 per month to address the delinquency. This Court held that this order, which is very similar to that entered by the Chancellor in the present case, was invalid. This Court in Brown cited Walters v. Walters, 383 So.2d 827 (Miss.1980), in which this Court held that:
The chancellor was in error in granting a stay of execution on the judgment for $3,350 past-due child support for "so long as he pays ... the sum of $25.00 per month toward payment of such judgment." At this rate of payment it would take about 111/2 years to pay out the judgment ...
[i]n the meantime, the appellant is being denied the right to attempt to collect the judgment through the normal collection processes, that is, writ of garnishment or writ of execution, or even the right to negotiate a mutually satisfactory plan of payment with the appellee.
Brown, 465 So.2d at 1048-49 (citing Walters, 383 So.2d at 829).
¶6 This Court held in Brand v. Brand, 482 So.2d 236 (Miss.1986) that the Chancellor
(c)ommitted error when he suspended execution on the judgment for past due child support. We have recently held unequivocably that a judgment for child support is subject to enforcement via the auxiliary processes of writ of execution, writ of garnishment, and the like, the same as any other judgment.... So much of the judgment below as provides for a stay of enforcement is reversed and rendered.
Brand, 482 So.2d at 238-239. (citations omitted).
¶7 This Court has thus previously concluded that a Chancellor may not "forgive" a child support judgment or otherwise limit the collection remedies available in the enforcement of a child support judgment. There can accordingly be little doubt that the Chancellor was incorrect in ruling that the $2,827.00 which remained unpaid from the 1988 child support judgment against Landon did not constitute a delinquency. The law is clear that unpaid amounts of child support become a judgment against the supporting parent when they are due, and it can not be validly contended that an unpaid judgment, including one in the process of being paid, does not constitute a delinquency. There is similarly no doubt that the DHS was within its authority in reporting this delinquency to credit bureaus. See Miss.Code Ann. § 93-11-69 (1994).
¶8 Landon did not elect to file a responsive brief in the present appeal, and this Court accordingly has no arguments on his part to address. This Court infers, however, that Landon and the Chancellor based their conclusion that Landon was not delinquent in his child support obligations on the fact that Landon complied with the 1988 order in which the Chancellor ordered payments of $ 400 per month...
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