Stevens v. Stevens

• Decision Date: 15 December 2000
• Docket Number: No. 25662.,25662.
• Citation: 135 Idaho 224,16 P.3d 900
• Parties: Deborah STEVENS, Plaintiff-Respondent, v. Larry STEVENS, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: Idaho Supreme Court

16 P.3d 900

135 Idaho 224

Deborah STEVENS, Plaintiff-Respondent, v. Larry STEVENS, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 25662.

Supreme Court of Idaho, Rexburg, September 2000 Term.

December 15, 2000.

Anderson, Nelson, Hall, Smith, P.A., Idaho Falls, for appellant. Scott R. Hall argued.

Weinpel, Woolf & Combo, Idaho Falls, for respondent. Marc J. Weinpel argued.

KIDWELL, Justice.

Larry Stevens appeals from the magistrate judge's order in a divorce proceeding against Deborah Stevens. The magistrate judge held that an oral settlement agreement between Larry and Deborah was unenforceable because it was not written, pursuant to I.C. § 32-917. The magistrate judge's order was affirmed by the district court acting in its appellate capacity.

I. FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

Larry and Deborah were married on August 17, 1973 in Bonita, California. Larry was in the military at the time. Their two children were born in 1981 and 1982. Larry retired after serving twenty years in the military and subsequently worked for Pillsbury and Lockheed Martin. Deborah, who had two years of college in the early 1970s, suffered from various ailments including progressive myopia, flat feet, and debilitating headaches; she did not work outside the home. By 1988, Larry and Deborah lived in Idaho.

In February 1998, Deborah filed for divorce, citing irreconcilable differences. She asked for spousal support and proposed a property division in her complaint. In early May 1998, Larry answered and requested judgment on the pleadings. He agreed that the couple had irreconcilable differences, but alleged that he and Deborah had entered into an agreement covering all issues of property division, child support, and spousal support. On May 18, Larry moved for summary judgment based on his oral agreement with Deborah. He supported the motion with affidavits from himself and Joel Tingey, the attorney representing him at the settlement conference.

In their affidavits, Larry and Tingey averred the following. They had met with Deborah and her then-attorney, Royce Lee, on April 17, 1998 for a settlement conference. After approximately two hours of discussion, they reached a final agreement resolving all property and support issues. Lee dictated the terms of the agreement into a tape recorder so the agreement could be committed to paper. The dictated agreement constituted the entire agreement and the only work left to do was the clerical work of committing it to paper.

Larry and his attorney provided identical accounts of the agreement. Deborah was to receive the house and its furnishings and "the Prudential funds." She would receive $900 a month in child support, dropping to $600 a month once the older child reached 18. For spousal support, Deborah would receive 45% of Larry's military retirement and $300 a month in spousal support for two years, with an ability to seek a continuation of spousal support subject to several conditions.

On May 8, Tingey faxed Lee, wanting to know if he objected to Tingey meeting with Deborah without Lee present "to discuss the issues." Lee faxed back an objection to the proposed meeting. On the same day, Lee sent Deborah a draft of the discussed settlement, writing, "We need to do a thorough review on the property settlement issues so that we are certain about the values and balances on the settlement."

On May 19, Prudential processed Larry's request for a $7,000 withdrawal out of the $24,000 cash value of the Prudential life insurance policy assigned to Deborah in the settlement conference.

At a hearing on May 20, Larry asked the magistrate court to enter judgment on the pleadings and issue a final decree. Through her new attorney, Marc Weinpel, Deborah objected to Larry's motion and moved to amend her complaint to include adultery and extreme cruelty as grounds for divorce. The magistrate judge granted Deborah's motion to amend and denied Larry's request for a divorce decree.

In an affidavit in opposition to summary judgment filed on June 16, Deborah disagreed that the parties had resolved all issues. She agreed that Larry's affidavit showed the general outlines of an agreement, but she stated that she never received the verification of the actual values of the various items of property necessary for the agreement to become final. Deborah stated that Larry had misstated the value of several assets and debts during the settlement conference. She noted that both attorneys contacted her after the conference to discuss the proposed settlement. Deborah also stated that the child support figures reached at the settlement meeting did not conform to the Idaho child support guidelines.

The magistrate judge denied summary judgment on June 18, 1998. On October 13, 1998, the magistrate judge held a court trial on the issue of whether there was an agreement between the parties reached on April 17.

At trial, Larry testified that since the settlement meeting he had complied with the agreement reached on that day. On cross-examination, he testified that he had not provided documents to verify the value of various items at the settlement conference. He testified that he had withdrawn $7,000 from the Prudential life insurance policy to pay for attorney fees, medical insurance for the children, and a vacation.

Tingey testified that at the settlement meeting, he listed the assets and debts going to each spouse in columns on a chalkboard and that Deborah's attorney, Lee, made a final offer, which he and Larry accepted. Eventually Tingey sent a letter asking Lee to save the tape of the dictated agreement, but Lee indicated that the tape was erased in the normal course of doing dictation. Tingey opined that Larry's withdrawal of $7,000 from the Prudential policy did not breach the settlement agreement because Larry was "running out of money" and invaded the account in response to Deborah's refusal to honor the April agreement. Tingey "assumed" that Deborah had access to the financial records. He did not remember Lee making the agreement contingent on verifying the values set on the chalkboard. Tingey also stated that he sought the May 8 meeting with Deborah "to find out where she stood on the agreement" because he had heard that Deborah had fired Lee.

At trial, Deborah testified that she disputed some of Larry's valuations at the settlement meeting but that Lee had seemed "to accept most of the things that they were saying." She reiterated that she never saw any paperwork at or before the meeting which confirmed the value of any asset or debt. She claimed that she was "heavily doped up" on muscle relaxants and tranquilizers at the meeting. She vacillated between testifying that Lee agreed to things and that there was no agreement between the parties. After the meeting, she said, she told Lee to stop working on the paperwork because she was unhappy with the proposed agreement called Marc Weinpel (her current attorney) to begin the process of changing counsel, and started actively investigating the values of the assets and debts discussed at the meeting. When specifically asked if she accepted the agreement on April 17, she replied, "I really didn't say any way or another. Larry said something about, `Is there anything else blocking us from getting this decree, and, you know, holding up the decree?' And I think I said that I couldn't think of anything."

The magistrate judge issued Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law from the bench. It found that there was an agreement on April 17, because both counsel accepted the agreement and Deborah, who was present, did not protest when Lee was accepting the agreement. The magistrate judge concluded that there was no fraud, duress, or undue influence, and that the Statute of Frauds did not apply. It also indicated that it believed that the spouses should be free to reach their own settlements, even if this resulted in an unequal division of community property, and that it did not believe that the agreement was unfair. The judge ordered Larry's attorney to prepare a proposed order for a divorce decree incorporating the terms of the April 17, agreement as set forth in Larry's affidavit.

On October 16, the magistrate judge, sua sponte, reopened the matter for additional evidence and argument on the enforceability of the oral settlement agreement. On December 3, 1998, the magistrate judge issued a memorandum decision and order concluding that Idaho Code § 32-917 prohibited enforcement of the spouses' oral agreement.

After the magistrate judge issued a Rule 54(b) certificate, the district court granted Larry permission to appeal. Subsequently, over Larry's objection, the district court allowed Deborah to augment the record with the affidavit of Royce Lee. After a hearing, the district court issued an appellate decision and order affirming the magistrate judge's decision. Because it ruled that the agreement was unenforceable, the district court did not address Larry's issue of whether the appellate record could be augmented by the Lee affidavit.

II. STANDARD OF REVIEW

This Court reviews the decisions of a magistrate division independently, with due regard for the decision of a district court acting in its appellate capacity. Keller v. Keller, 130 Idaho 661, 663, 946 P.2d 623, 625 (1997). The Court upholds a magistrate judge's findings of fact if they are supported by substantial and competent evidence, but exercises free review over questions of law. Id. The Court is free to draw its own conclusions from the facts presented. Id.

III. ANALYSIS

A. Idaho Code § 32-917 Requires That Divorce Settlement Agreements Be In Writing.

The magistrate judge made a factual finding that Larry and Deborah had reached an agreement on April 17, 1998. However, the magistrate held that the agreement was unenforceable because it was not in writing and not acknowledged, and so did not conform to the requirements of I.C. § 32-917. Larry asserts that settlement agreements made in contemplation of divorce are not ...