Staats v. McKinnon

• Decision Date: 02 May 2006
• Citation: 206 S.W.3d 532
• Parties: Richard Bradley STAATS v. Noel Elizabeth (Staats) McKINNON.
• Court: Tennessee Court of Appeals

Page 532

206 S.W.3d 532

Richard Bradley STAATS v. Noel Elizabeth (Staats) McKINNON.

Court of Appeals of Tennessee, at Nashville.

December 14, 2005 Session.

May 2, 2006.

Permission to Appeal Denied by Supreme Court October 16, 2006.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Stanley A. Kweller, Nashville, Tennessee, for the appellant, Noel Elizabeth (Staats) McKinnon.

Helen Sfikas Rogers, Nashville, Tennessee, for the appellee, Richard Bradley Staats.

OPINION

WILLIAM C. KOCH, JR., P.J., M.S., delivered the opinion of the court, in which WILLIAM B. CAIN and FRANK G. CLEMENT, JR., JJ., joined.

This interlocutory appeal involves an interstate custody dispute over a nine-year-old child. The child's mother was designated the primary residential parent when her parents were divorced in 2000 in Florida. In 2002, the father filed a petition requesting the Florida court to change custody. While this petition was pending, the mother remarried, the mother moved to Massachusetts with her new husband and the parties' child, and the father moved to Tennessee. In June 2004, the Florida court granted the father's petition and designated him as the child's primary residential parent. As a result of this order, the child began living with the father in Tennessee and has lived in Tennessee ever since. In 2005, the Florida District Court of Appeal reversed the order changing custody and remanded the case to the Florida trial court for further proceedings. Thereafter, the father filed a petition in the Circuit Court for Davidson County seeking to modify the original Florida order designating the mother as the child's residential parent. The mother responded by filing an emergency petition in the Florida trial court to enforce the original custody order and by entering an appearance in the Tennessee proceeding to contest the Tennessee trial court's subject matter jurisdiction. Following a hearing and two conversations with the Florida trial court, the Tennessee trial court entered orders asserting jurisdiction over the father's modification petition and designating the father as the child's primary residential parent pending a final disposition of the father's petition. Both the trial court and this court granted the mother's application for a Tenn. R.App. P. 9 interlocutory appeal. We have concluded: (1) that the Florida trial court no longer has exclusive, continuing jurisdiction over the custody of this child because the child and her parents have not lived in Florida since 2003; (2) that Tennessee became the child's home state while she was living with her father during the pendency of the Florida appeal; (3) that the Tennessee trial court was not required to decline to exercise its jurisdiction to modify the original Florida custody decree; and (4) that the father was not required to return the child to her mother in Massachusetts following the reversal of the Florida trial court's change of custody order. Accordingly, we affirm the trial court's assertion of subject matter jurisdiction and remand the case for the consideration of the father's petition to modify custody.

I.

Noel E. Staats and Richard B. Staats were married in June 1991. Their only child, Sophia Monet Staats, was born in August 1996. Their marriage was dissolved on January 31, 2000 in Panama City, Florida. The Florida decree incorporated a marital settlement agreement in which the parties agreed that they would have joint custody of their daughter, that Ms. Staats would be the primary residential parent, and that Mr. Staats would pay Ms. Staats $380 per month in child support.

In February 2002, Mr. Staats filed a petition in the Florida trial court that had dissolved the parties' marriage seeking a modification of the initial custody determination. He asserted that Ms. Staats had engaged in misconduct that warranted designating him as their daughter's primary residential parent. Ms. Staats moved to dismiss Mr. Staats's petition and filed a counter-petition seeking to increase Mr. Staats's child support. For the next two years, Mr. Staats's modification petition and Ms. Staats's counter-petition languished in the Florida trial court.

In the meantime, Ms. Staats married Robert McKinnon in June 2002, and she and Mr. McKinnon began making plans to move to Massachusetts. Mr. Staats and his parents objected to the move. However, in August 2002, the Florida court permitted Ms. McKinnon,¹ her new husband, and the parties' daughter to move to Massachusetts. Thereafter, Mr. Staats moved to Tennessee.

The Florida trial court entered an order on June 8, 2004 granting Mr. Staats's petition to change custody. The court determined that its initial custody determination should be modified because there had been "many" substantial changes of circumstances since the entry of the divorce decree and that if Ms. McKinnon remained the primary residential parent, she would eventually completely alienate the child from Mr. Staats. Accordingly, the Florida trial court designated Mr. Staats as primary residential parent and granted Ms. McKinnon monthly weekend visitation in Massachusetts.² As a result of this order Monet Staats moved to Tennessee on June 21, 2004 to live with her father.

Ms. McKinnon appealed the Florida trial court's June 8, 2004 order to the Florida District Court of Appeal. On March 21, 2005, the appellate court filed an opinion concluding that the Florida trial court had erred by changing physical custody from Ms. McKinnon to Mr. Staats. McKinnon v. Staats, 899 So.2d 357 (Fla.Dist.Ct.App. 2005) (Staats I). The appellate court found insufficient evidence to support the trial court's finding of a substantial and material change of circumstances and held that the trial court erred by basing its best interests determination on the mere possibility of future parental alienation by Ms. McKinnon. Staats I, 899 So.2d at 359-61.

On April 27, 2005, the appellate court denied Mr. Staats's motion for a rehearing, and on May 13, 2005, it issued the mandate remanding the case to the trial court with instructions to conduct "further proceedings, if required." While the appellate court's reversal of the modification judgment breathed new life into Ms. McKinnon's counter-petition for an increase in Mr. Staats's child support obligation, nothing in the appellate court's opinion or mandate suggested that there was anything left for the Florida trial court to do with respect to Mr. Staats's underlying petition to modify the initial custody determination.

Mr. Staats could have requested the Florida Supreme Court to review the decision of the Florida District Court of Appeal.³ However, on May 23, 2005, he filed a new petition in the Circuit Court for Davidson County seeking to modify the Florida trial court's initial custody order. Mr. Staats did not attempt conceal the Florida proceedings,⁴ nor did he seek to re-litigate the issues already considered by the Florida courts. Rather, he asserted that the events occurring after June 8, 2004 constituted substantial and material changes of circumstances justifying a modification of the initial Florida custody order that had been filed in January 2000.

Mr. Staats alleged that the Tennessee trial court had modification jurisdiction pursuant to the provisions of the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act (UCCJEA),⁵ which had been enacted in both Tennessee and Florida.⁶ He asserted that the Florida trial court no longer had exclusive, continuing jurisdiction over the child custody determination because: (1) the first modification proceeding had been terminated; (2) neither the child nor either parent presently resided in Florida; and (3) Tennessee had become the child's "home state" during the pendency of Ms. McKinnon's successful appeal of the Florida modification judgment.

In addition, Mr. Staats requested the trial court to enter a temporary restraining order to prevent Ms. McKinnon from removing their child from Tennessee except to exercise standard visitation. The Tennessee trial court, apparently without consulting the Florida trial court,⁷ issued a temporary restraining order and set a show cause hearing for June 22, 2005 on Mr. Staats's request for temporary custody while the Tennessee modification proceeding was pending.

Within days, Ms. McKinnon filed an emergency petition in the Florida trial court seeking to enforce the District Court of Appeal's mandate and the January 2000 initial custody order. She also filed papers in the Tennessee trial court challenging the court's jurisdiction to modify the initial Florida custody order and requesting the court to dissolve its temporary restraining order. Meanwhile, on May 27, 2005, Mr. Staats appeared specially in the Florida trial court to challenge the court's jurisdiction over Ms. McKinnon's emergency enforcement petition.⁸ The Florida trial court, apparently without consulting the Tennessee trial court, rejected Mr. Staats's challenge to its jurisdiction and directed Mr. Staats and Ms. McKinnon to begin complying immediately with the January 2000 initial custody order designating Ms. McKinnon as the primary residential parent.

On June 22, 2005, the Tennessee trial court conducted a show cause hearing. During this proceeding, the court informed the parties that it had discussed the case with the Florida trial court and that both courts agreed that the Tennessee trial court should exercise temporary jurisdiction over the child. However, the court also stated that it understood that the Florida trial court intended to take further action on Ms. McKinnon's counter-petition to increase Mr. Staats's child support. The court informed the parties that it had tentatively decided to exercise jurisdiction over Mr. Staats's petition to modify the initial January 2000 custody order but that it desired to consult with the Florida trial court one more time before entering the order.

On June 29, 2005, the Tennessee trial court...