Mullonkal v. Kodiyamplakkil (In re Mullonkal)
| Citation | 265 Cal.Rptr.3d 285,51 Cal.App.5th 604 |
| Decision Date | 29 June 2020 |
| Docket Number | C085825 |
| Court | California Court of Appeals |
| Parties | IN RE the MARRIAGE OF Carolyn MULLONKAL AND Sithaj KODIYAMPLAKKIL. Carolyn Mullonkal, Respondent, v. Sithaj Kodiyamplakkil, Appellant. |
Certified for Partial Publication.*
Stephanie J. Finelli, Sacramento, for Appellant.
Downey Brand, LLP, Jay-Allen Eisen, Alexandra K. LaFountain, Sacramento, and Dougherty & Associates, Frank E. Dougherty for Respondent.
When a spouse pays off student loans for education attained before the marriage with funds from salary earned during the marriage, does a trial court have discretion under Family Code section 26411 to deny reimbursement to the community because the nonstudent spouse did not contribute to the repayment of the loans or otherwise contribute to expenses during the marriage? In the published portion of this opinion, we conclude that section 2641 does not permit such discretion.
Wife Carolyn Mullonkal and husband Sithaj Kodiyamplakkil were married for three years and five months. Husband appeals from judgment of dissolution, as well as post judgment orders. He contends: (1) the community is entitled to reimbursement, under section 2641, for community funds spent repaying wife's educational loans; (2) reimbursement is also required for community funds used to pay wife's non-educational loans; (3) wife breached her fiduciary duty by transferring community property to family members; (4) the trial court abused its discretion in awarding only $10,000 of the over $108,000 in attorney's fees he incurred; (5) the court also abused its discretion in denying a new trial; and (6) the trial court erred in finding a bank account of husband's was community property. We agree with husband as to every contention except the fifth.
We reverse.
Husband and wife were married on August 27, 2011. Three years and five months later, wife petitioned for divorce. They have one child, born shortly before the dissolution petition was filed.
The couple met in India. When they married, wife was living with her parents in Michigan, completing her medical residency program, and earning around $45,000 to $50,000. Husband was then living and working in India.
After finishing her residency, wife worked for a Michigan hospital from July 2012 to May 2013, earning around $225,000 a year. She continued to live with her parents, and paid them for expenses, increasing the amount she paid as her salary increased.
In May 2013, wife moved to California and began working for a different health care provider. That month, husband moved from India to California, and they began living together. Husband obtained his residency card in July 2013. Wife recalled paying "a couple of immigration fees," for husband which she testified was not "very much."
Until wife filed for dissolution on January 27, 2015, the couple lived together2 in a two bedroom, two bath apartment, which they rented for roughly $1,200 a month. They shared one car, which they leased from wife's brother for around $350 or $400 a month. Wife was then earning around $200,000 a year. She paid the rent and all expenses. Wife testified that beyond rent, utilities, and food, there were no other significant expenses other than education loan payments.
Wife had started paying off her medical school loans when she began her residency in 2009, approximately two years before the marriage. She had taken out roughly $120,000 in institutional education loans, and her parents, who had loaned her money for college, also paid for her first year of medical school. By early 2014, wife had paid off her institutional education loans. With interest, she paid around $153,000 to satisfy those loans — $130,000 of that was paid during marriage.
In early 2014, wife began paying off her loans from her parents. She paid them $2,000 a month and finished the payments with two lump-sum payments: $48,080.37 in December 2014 and $60,000 in January 2015. The last lump sum payment was made two days before wife met with a certified family law specialist, and 18 days before she filed for dissolution in January 2015. Wife did not tell husband about the $60,000 payment, though she testified she told him she was paying off her student loans and loans from her parents, and husband did not object.
Between September of 2011 and July of 2013, wife also wrote checks to her family amounting to more than $75,000. She testified that these included $9,500 to her brother: $500 as a gift and $9,000 to repay a loan he had given her during medical school. The checks also included $12,000 to her parents, as a gift and to pay for a new roof. Other checks were to her parents as gifts and to repay them for living expenses they had covered.
Wife also paid for travel for her parents and various family members. She paid for a trip to India for them. She paid for a cruise for her parents and her uncle in 2012. She flew her brother to Las Vegas in 2012 for his birthday. She paid for a cruise for her brother in 2013. She paid her parents’ and brother's airfare to visit at Christmas 2013. And she paid for her parents to accompany her and husband on a cruise in 2014. Wife testified that she told husband about these payments and he did not object.
Wife and husband went on several trips during the marriage. In 2013, they went to Hawaii for a work conference. Her employer paid for part of the trip; she paid the rest. The next year, they went to Hawaii twice. She paid for those trips, as well as husband's trip to India.
After the parties submitted proposed statements of decision, the trial court issued its final statement of decision. As pertinent to this appeal, the court denied husband's request to reimburse the community for community funds used to pay wife's education expenses. It also declined to find wife breached her fiduciary duty in payments made to family members for "rent, costs of living, reimbursement or for nominal gifts of money" and denied reimbursement to the community for those expenditures. The court awarded husband $5,000 in attorney's fees, which was on top of $5,000 in fees awarded pre-trial. It declined to rule on husband's request for support under federal immigration law. And the court determined one of the bank accounts in husband's name contained $4,500 in community property.
Husband subsequently moved for a new trial, raising inter alia , the court's refusal to rule on his request for support based on federal immigration law. Husband relied on In re Marriage of Kumar (2017) 13 Cal.App.5th 1072, 220 Cal.Rptr.3d 863 ( Kumar ), which was published after the trial. The Kumar court held an immigrant spouse has standing to enforce in state court the support obligation created by a federal I–864 affidavit. ( Kumar, at p. 1075, 220 Cal.Rptr.3d 863.) The trial court denied the motion.
Husband also moved for a change in attorney's fees awarded, requesting an additional $41,874.50. The trial court denied the request.
Husband contends the community is entitled to reimbursement, under section 2641, for community funds used to pay wife's education loans, both from lending institutions and from her parents. Wife maintains the trial court acted within its discretion in denying reimbursement. We must agree with husband.
Section 2641 addresses community contributions to education or training.3 It directs that on dissolution, "[t]he community shall be reimbursed for community contributions to education," including education loan repayments. ( § 2641, subd. (b)(1), italics added.) But reduction or modification of reimbursement is allowed, "to the extent circumstances render such a disposition unjust ...." ( § 2641, subd. (c).) Exceptions rendering such disposition unjust include, but are not limited to : (1) where the community has "substantially benefited" from the education; (2) where the education of one party is offset by the education of the other party, for which the community also contributed; and (3) where the party's education substantially reduces that party's need for support payments. ( § 2641, subd. (c).)
For the first exception — where the community has substantially benefited from the education — a rebuttable presumption applies. ( § 2641, subd. (c)(1).) If community contributions to the education costs are made less than 10 years before commencement of the dissolution proceeding, it is presumed that the community has not substantially benefited. ( § 2641, subd. (c)(1).) For contributions made more than 10 years before proceedings, the opposite presumption applies. (Ibid .)
The statute is also "subject to an express written agreement of the parties to the contrary." ( § 2641, subd. (e).)
At trial, husband argued that during their marriage, they maintained a relatively low standard of living, which wife took advantage of to "accelerate" her student loan payments. And "other than a few family vacations," he did not enjoy a standard of living commensurate with the salary wife brought to the community, while wife enjoyed the benefit of paying off her student loans.
The trial court denied the request for reimbursement as "contrary to law and unjust." It noted that section 2641, "remedies the injustice that may occur when a married couple separates shortly after graduation but before the community is benefitted by the education when payments are made related to the education." The court went on to find that wife began repaying her institutional education loans before marriage and continued to pay them during marriage. She had also repaid the "significant amount" of money and other support her parents had provided her to complete her education and training. And there was an expectation that wife would repay her family despite the absence of documentation between the family members.
The court also found...
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