MJ v. CR
| Decision Date | 30 June 2021 |
| Docket Number | NO. CAAP-17-0000696,CAAP-17-0000696 |
| Citation | 496 P.3d 501,150 Hawai‘i 23 |
| Parties | MJ, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. CR, Defendant-Appellant and Child Support Enforcement Agency, State of Hawai‘i, Defendant. |
| Court | Hawaii Court of Appeals |
On the briefs:
Peter Van Name Esser, and Curtis Kam (Lynnae Lee & Associates), Honolulu, for Defendant-Appellant.
Robert H. Thomas, Honolulu, Ross Uehara-Tilton (Damon Key Leong Kupchak Hastert), for Plaintiff-Appellee.
Defendant-Appellant CR (Father ) appeals from (1) the "Order" (Temporary Order ), filed on January 26, 2017, in favor of Plaintiff-Appellee MJ (Mother ); and (2) the "Decision and Order" (Decision ) filed September 1, 2017, by the Family Court of the First Circuit (Family Court ).1
On appeal, Father contends the Family Court erred in its Temporary Order and its Decision because: (1) it lacked subject matter jurisdiction with respect to the "Petition for Paternity" (Petition ) filed by Mother in this matter;2 and (2) it lacked personal jurisdiction over Father for purposes of determining parentage or ordering child support and monetary obligations with respect to Father and Mother's minor child (Child ). Father asserts the Family Court violated his rights to due process by not allowing him to argue the issue of personal jurisdiction at trial. Father also challenges many of the Family Court's conclusions of law (COLs ) and findings of fact (FOFs ).3
We conclude the Family Court had jurisdiction to decide custody in this case, but lacked personal jurisdiction over Father to decide Father's paternity and Father's obligations for child support and other monetary expenses related to Child. Therefore, we affirm in part and vacate in part the Temporary Order and Decision entered by the Family Court.
Mother and Father met in Texas in September 2014 and began dating. At the time, Mother was obtaining a divorce from her then-husband, HF (HF ).4 Mother became pregnant in January 2016. In April 2016, Mother moved into Father's home with her two minor children from her marriage with HF. After an argument, Mother and Father separated approximately June 2, 2016, when Father told Mother she needed to leave his residence. Mother moved out of Father's home.
On June 27, 2016, Mother visited her parents in Mililani, Hawai‘i, and asked if she could move in with them. Sometime in or around July 2016, Mother left Texas and began living in Hawai‘i with her parents. After Mother moved to Hawai‘i, she traveled between Texas and Hawai‘i for various reasons, including court hearings and visitation with the children she had with HF.
Child was born in Honolulu in October 2016. In September 2016, Father filed a paternity action in Texas. Pursuant to an order in that Texas case, Father submitted to a paternity test in November 2016,5 which confirmed his biological paternity of Child.
On November 15, 2016, Mother filed the Petition initiating this action in Hawai‘i and seeking to establish Father's paternity of Child, sole custody of Child, child support, and other payments from Father under Hawaii Revised Statutes (HRS ) Chapters 346, 571, 576D, and 584. Father was personally served with the Petition at his place of employment in Texas.
On January 23, 2017, Father filed his "Special Appearance and Answer to Petition for Paternity" (Answer to the Petition )and argued, inter alia , that the Petition should be dismissed because the Family Court lacked both personal and subject matter jurisdiction. Father declared that he had only been in Hawai‘i once, on vacation as a teenager, had never lived in the state, did not own property in Hawai‘i, and did not conduct any business in Hawai‘i. He also challenged Mother's residency, arguing that she was a resident of Texas, and asserted that Child was conceived in Texas.
At the hearing for temporary custody on January 26, 2017, Mother's attorney made an offer of proof that: Mother resided in Hawai‘i since June 27, 2016; she initially lived in Mililani with her father, stepmother, brother, and grandmother before renting her own apartment on December 12, 2016; Mother was going through a divorce in Texas and had traveled to Texas since moving to Hawai‘i; Mother went back to Texas for a week, because the Texas court ordered Mother to appear personally for Father's paternity petition.
Father's attorney asked Mother whether her Texas attorney filed papers that listed her address as being in Texas. Mother's attorney objected and the Family Court stopped the questioning, stating:
Look, I've taken everything into consideration. The Court in Hawaii has jurisdiction, all right? And I had a conversation with the judge in Texas, discussed this matter, and decided based upon our conversation that if the facts that had initially been proceeded [sic] were testified to, that Texas would agree, and it did, to Hawaii taking jurisdiction.
Father's counsel asked that the Family Court state the basis for personal jurisdiction over Father for the record. The court replied:
The Temporary Order entered on January 26, 2017, states that "Hawaii has jurisdiction in this case because Hawaii is [C]hild's home state and may enter temporary orders and adjudicate the issues in this matter including child custody, visitation, child support and related matters." The Temporary Order then granted Mother temporary sole legal and physical custody of Child, and ordered Father to pay temporary child support of $1,455 per month including past due child support for half of November 2016 as well as December 2016 and January 2017 totaling $3,637.50.
Father again raised the issue of personal jurisdiction in his trial memo. Trial was held June 14, 2017, at which Mother and Father testified.6 A certified public accountant also testified regarding Father's income as the president and an owner of a family-owned chain of convenience stores in Texas.
On September 1, 2017, the Family Court entered its Decision, finding that Child's natural parents are Mother and Father. The court noted the Temporary Order had held that the court had jurisdiction "over Father and the subject matter sufficient to enter orders pertaining to custody, paternity, child support and any other orders in support of those orders."
In the Decision, the Family Court further determined that the parties shall share legal custody and that when the parties live within 150 miles of each other, they shall share physical custody; if the parties live more than 150 miles apart, the Family Court determined it was in Child's best interest that Mother have primary physical custody, subject to visitation by Father. The Family Court awarded monthly child support of $2,784 to Mother, based on Father's gross monthly income of $45,416 and Mother's monthly income, comprised of alimony and imputed income, of $2,643. The Decision also addressed other expenses related to, inter alia , insurance and educational expenses, and Father was ordered to reimburse Mother a portion of birth expenses and other reasonable child-related expenses incurred by Mother.
"The jurisdiction of the family court is reviewed de novo under the right/wrong standard." Hsieh v. Sun, 137 Hawai‘i 90, 98, 365 P.3d 1019, 1027 (App. 2016) (citing Puckett v. Puckett, 94 Hawai‘i 471, 477, 16 P.3d 876, 882 (App. 2000) ).
DL v. CL, 146 Hawai‘i 328, 336, 463 P.3d 985, 993 (2020) (citations, brackets, and internal quotation marks omitted).
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...and Enforcement Act," 33 N.Y.U. J. International L. & Pol. 251, 262 n.40 (2000); see also MJ v. CR , Docket No. CAAP-17-0000696, 150 Hawai'i 23, 31–32, 496 P.3d 501 (Hawai'i App. 2021) (noting "bifurcated jurisdiction" over child custody and child support matters); Stevens v. Stevens , 682 ......