Stoker v. Stoker, 04-96

• Decision Date: 07 April 2005
• Docket Number: No. 04-96,04-96
• Citation: 2005 WY 39,109 P.3d 59
• Parties: JIM W. STOKER, Appellant (Defendant), v. TINA STOKER, Appellee (Plaintiff).
• Court: Wyoming Supreme Court

2005 WY 39

109 P.3d 59

JIM W. STOKER, Appellant (Defendant), v. TINA STOKER, Appellee (Plaintiff).

No. 04-96

Supreme Court of Wyoming. APRIL TERM, A.D. 2005.

April 7, 2005

Representing Appellant: John D. Bowers of Bowers & Associates Law Offices, PC, Afton, Wyoming.

Representing Appellee: Kenneth S. Cohen, Jackson, Wyoming.

Before HILL, C.J., and GOLDEN, KITE, and VOIGT, JJ., and SKAVDAHL, D.J.

VOIGT, Justice.

[¶1] The appellant, Jim W. Stoker (the husband), and the appellee, Tina Stoker (the wife), were married in 1995 and divorced in 2002. In the divorce proceeding, the district court awarded the wife a judgment equivalent to one-half of the appraised value of real property known as the "dry farm." On appeal, the husband essentially argues that the district court failed adequately to consider all of the factors listed in Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 20-2-114 (LexisNexis 2003) in disposing of the dry farm property. We find that the district court did adequately consider these factors, and affirm.

ISSUE

[¶2] Whether the district court adequately considered the factors listed in Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 20-2-114, and ultimately whether the district court's consideration of such factors led to a just and equitable property division under the circumstances of the instant case?

FACTS

The Parties' Marriage and Divorce

[¶3] When the wife met the husband, she was unemployed, renting a trailer, "on welfare," was not receiving child support, and her possessions consisted of household items and utensils, her children's property, and a car. The husband and wife then lived together in the husband's home for about two years prior to their marriage on July 27, 1995. The husband had "a couple" children from a previous marriage¹ and the wife had three minor children from a previous relationship.² However, no children were born to the husband and wife.

[¶4] During her marriage to the husband, the wife testified that she: (1) was employed at least forty hours per week and earned an average wage of $7.00 per hour; (2) performed the housework, cooked, did the laundry, and cared for her children; (3) paid ninety-five percent of the utilities (telephone bill, electric bill, propane bill (although the husband sometimes traded his services for propane)); (4) purchased the groceries and the wood to heat the residence; and (5) made between one and three payments of $158.00 for the husband's tractor loan, when the lender was unable to contact the husband. The wife's parents also "often paid the bills for [the husband and wife's] house, utilities, water, lights, propane and clothing" because "they would be turned off and have to have a deposit before they'd turn them back on" and "[the husband and wife] had to have a telephone and they had to have heat."

[¶5] It further appears from the record that, during the marriage, the husband: (1) was a farrier, raised and cared for horses, and trained race horses in Casper for six weeks over a "couple" of summers; (2) provided a residence for the wife and her children; and (3) paid the water bill and the insurance for the residence. The wife testified that the husband never declared income for tax purposes (the wife filed an individual return during the marriage), used his income primarily to feed and maintain his horses (as opposed to "buying new furniture," for example), did not send money home when he worked in Casper,³ and did not support her children.

[¶6] In 1998, the husband "got in [a] bind with the bank" regarding the real property on which the aforementioned residence was situated. According to the wife's mother, the property "was going to be foreclosed on and . . . [the husband, wife, and the wife's children] would be out in the street within two weeks." The husband "trusted" the wife's father to help him, and the wife's father made financial arrangements to "have this paid off so that they wouldn't be out in the street." The property was apparently quitclaimed to the wife's parents so that they could obtain a loan in order to retire the indebtedness. The wife's mother testified that at the time, she further informed the husband and wife that the property would be returned to them if they

would stop their drinking and show that they could make a go of the farm, pay their taxes and their bills and have a family oriented home or it would be a cold day in hell before I gave it back to them. And I gave them six months to do it.

[¶7] At some point, a sale of about eight acres of the property was contemplated. That portion of the property was listed with a realtor for seven months and ultimately sold for $70,000.00. All but approximately $43,000.00 of the sale proceeds was used to satisfy the financial obligations incurred by the husband and wife. A lawsuit ensued between the husband and his in-laws regarding the remaining property and the proceeds from the sale of the eight-acre parcel. The lawsuit was apparently settled—the remaining real property (including the residence) was transferred to the husband,⁴ and the wife's parents kept the remaining sale proceeds.⁵ The husband admitted that the wife and her family got him out of a "tight spot," but added that he felt he had "paid dearly for it."

[¶8] The wife's mother also submitted approximately $22,000.00 in checks issued by the wife's parents between 1996 and 2003 as "examples" of payments they made directly on behalf of the husband, the wife, and the wife's children. The testimony, and the checks, reflect payments for upkeep of the residence and real property, utilities, propane, the children's doctor bills, property taxes for the husband's property, school expenses, clothing, wife's vehicle license, satellite television, groceries, cash, legal fees on behalf of the wife and her parents, and other items. A good portion of these payments were made from the aforementioned $43,000.00, but some expenditures obviously occurred prior to the existence of those proceeds.

[¶9] In October 2001, the wife filed for a divorce due to "[i]rreconcilable differences." The wife testified that she was tired of the husband "coming home drunk and being abusive" and that after the husband had been drinking he would be in a "bad mood" and want to "start yelling, fighting." According to the wife, the husband physically "grabbed" her more than once during the marriage and after one incident in which the husband "pushed [the wife] against the wall and grabbed ahold of [the wife's] neck to choke" her in the presence of her youngest child, the wife sought, and received, a restraining order.⁶ The wife acknowledged that at one time she had a drinking problem, but she completed rehabilitation and had not had a drink since May 26, 1999.

[¶10] The husband alleged that the wife had a relationship with another man, which caused the irreconcilable differences between the husband and wife. The wife testified that she met another man through her employment and visited him at hotels (where he was staying for work purposes) to watch videos. The wife denied that she had an affair with the other man, denied that she ever had "intimate relations" with the other man, and testified that she and the other man were seeing each other as "friends."

[¶11] The district court entered a divorce decree in December 2002.

The Dry Farm Property

[¶12] The dispute in the instant case focuses on the district court's disposition of real property known as the "dry farm." Historically, the husband's family owned and operated a 203-acre farm and/or ranch near Thayne, Wyoming, and the husband purchased the property in 1968. In 1990, the husband sold a 150-acre portion of the property known as the "dry farm" to Ray Johnston, apparently to satisfy a judgment resulting from the husband's divorce from a previous wife.⁷

[¶13] The husband testified that as early as 1993, he discussed the possibility of selling a twenty-acre parcel of his property to the local school district, and re-acquiring a portion of the dry farm property from Ray Johnston.⁸ Six or seven months after the husband and wife were married, a Section 1031 exchange was finalized, wherein the school district acquired the twenty-acre parcel from husband and husband used the proceeds to re-acquire two parcels (totaling forty-eight acres) of the dry farm property from Ray Johnston for $143,414.00. The wife testified that the husband discussed the negotiations with her, but she did not contribute money to the transaction and was not formally involved in the negotiations.

[¶14] Apparently, the two parcels acquired in this exchange were deeded to "Jim W. Stoker and Tina Stoker, husband and wife, as tenants by the entireties." The wife testified that her name was included in the deeds because the seller executed the deeds as such—it "happened" because "[w]e were married"—and the wife was never asked to enter a prenuptial or postnuptial agreement regarding the property. The husband also testified that the seller included the wife's name on the deeds essentially "because I was married to her for, like, six months," and the husband had not requested that the seller exclude the wife's name from the deeds. According to the husband, he and the wife "never talked about" the wife's interest in the property prior to the marriage, and there was no agreement prior to, or after, the marriage that the wife would not have an interest in the property.

[¶15] The husband testified that he trained horses for a "couple years" on the forty-eight-acre dry farm property and also leased it to another individual "on shares" of hay for a "couple years" in order to feed husband's horses. The wife testified that during the marriage, she would ask if the husband needed any help on the dry farm property and run errands "or bring him things or help him fix things on the land,"⁹ and that she contributed "toward keeping the dry farm property as marital property." At some point, the wife discovered a tax notice regarding the dry farm property. The property had apparently...