Stern v. Stern

• Decision Date: 25 November 1932
• Citation: 163 A. 149
• Parties: STERN v. STERN.
• Court: New Jersey Court of Chancery

163 A. 149

STERN

v. STERN.

Court of Chancery of New Jersey.

Nov. 25, 1932.

Syllabus by the Court.

Breach of covenants not to molest, etc., the husband is not a ground for canceling articles of separation. The covenants are independent of the allowance promised during separation in lieu of the husband's legal obligation to support his wife and children.

Suit by Allison L. S. Stern against Helen Vogel Stern. On defendant's motion to strike out the bill for want of equity.

Motion granted.

Kanter & Kanter, of Newark, for complainant.

Lum, Tamblyn & Colyer, of Newark, for defendant.

BACKES, Vice Chancellor.

The motion is to strike the bill for want of equity. The bill is to cancel a separation agreement, and discloses that: The parties were married in 1923. They have two children. They reside in the shore section of Monmouth county. In December, 1927, they entered into an agreement to live apart; the husband agreeing to pay his wife $18,000 a year, in monthly installments, for her and the children's support. He defaulted in the February, 1932, installment, and she brought suit in the Supreme Court of New York. He defaulted in three succeeding installments, and she again sued in New York. Thereupon he filed this bill alleging that his wife, in violation of her covenants not to sue, molest, or disturb any third person for receiving, entertaining, or harboring him, and not to malign or slander him or in any way injure his reputation, sued him for divorce in the Supreme Court of New York, charging adultery with a married woman (name withheld), and sued a married woman (name withheld) for alienation of his affection and sued a married woman (name withheld) for criminal conversation with him. The divorce suit was discontinued just before the trial day; the others are pending against the married woman (presumably the co-respondent) in the New York Supreme Court. The charges are that the suits were brought without basis and maliciously for the purpose of molesting him and a third person and also for the purpose of slandering and injuring his reputation; that, in violation of her further covenants, the wife (a) contracted debts on his credit, (b) denied him access to his children, (c) alienated their affections, (d) denied him partial custody of them, and (e) removed them beyond where it was agreed they were to be kept, without his consent—from all of which the conclusion is alleged that, by reason of her conduct in respect of these matters, the wife has repudiated the separation agreement and that it is no longer binding on him.

It is also charged that the two suits for installments of support money are fraudulent, vexatious, and inequitable, and fear is expressed that other suits will be brought for later unpaid installments unless the agreement is canceled.

For spice, the husband adds that he has brought suit in this court for absolute divorce for extreme cruelty, antecedent the separation, and genuflects an offer to do full equity (whatever that means)...