Turner v. Turner

Decision Date18 July 1991
Docket NumberNo. 14231,14231
Citation595 A.2d 297,219 Conn. 703
CourtConnecticut Supreme Court
PartiesCarolyn TURNER v. Richard TURNER.

Rochelle Homelson, Asst. Atty. Gen., and Lucy Potter, Hartford, with whom, on the brief, were Richard Blumenthal, Atty. Gen., and Joseph X. Dumond, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellants (state and plaintiff).

Andrew M. Dewey, Hartford, for appellee (defendant).

Before PETERS, C.J., and SHEA, CALLAHAN, GLASS and BORDEN, JJ.

PETERS, Chief Justice.

The principal issue in this appeal is whether legislation authorizing the modification of child support orders in light of established child support guidelines applies retrospectively to orders of child support entered before the effective date of the statute. The state of Connecticut, as a party in interest pursuant to General Statutes § 46b-55(a), 1 moved on February 28, 1990, to modify an order entered in 1988 for the support of the minor children of the plaintiff, Carolyn Turner, and the defendant, Richard Turner, on the ground that the defendant's financial circumstances had substantially changed after the entry of the order. After the legislature enacted Public Acts 1990, No. 90-188 (P.A. 90-188), 2 which authorized the modification of child support orders based on a substantial deviation from the Connecticut child support guidelines (the guidelines), the state enlarged its motion to seek modification on the ground that the 1988 order substantially deviated from the guidelines. 3 The family support magistrate granted certain nonmonetary modifications to the 1988 order but denied the substantial financial modification requested, and the trial court approved the magistrate's order. The state and the plaintiff filed a joint appeal to the Appellate Court. We transferred the appeal to this court pursuant to Practice Book § 4023, and we reverse.

The relevant facts are undisputed. The trial court, Hon. Simon Cohen, state trial referee, dissolved the marriage of the parties on January 25, 1982, and granted custody of the couple's four minor children to the plaintiff. At that time, the court ordered the defendant to pay $5 per week for support of each child, to pay $10 per week to reduce an arrearage of $3369.66 owed to the state for child support payments, and to maintain medical insurance for the children as available through his employer. At the time of the dissolution and at all times since then, the plaintiff and her minor children have been recipients of aid under Connecticut's Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program.

On the motion of the state and by stipulated agreement with the defendant, the court, Covello, J., modified the child support order in 1986 to require the defendant to pay a total of $85 per week for the support of the three children who were then still minors and to pay $5 per week to reduce the arrearage owed to the state, which was then calculated to be $1015.73. After the defendant's continued failure to keep up his support payments had led to an order by the court, Mulcahy, J., finding him in contempt, he successfully moved for a modification of the support order on the ground of substantially adverse financial circumstances arising out of his own back injury and out of medical bills he had undertaken to pay for his second wife and his stepdaughter. The modification granted by the court, Mulcahy, J., in 1988 ordered the defendant to pay $60 per week for current support of his three minor children and $5 per week for the arrearage of $8069.63 owed to the state on that date.

Alleging a substantial improvement in the defendant's financial circumstances, the state initiated the present proceeding on February 28, 1990, for an upward modification of the defendant's support obligation. After several continuances granted at the defendant's request, a hearing on the state's motion was held on October 19, 1990. At that hearing the state enlarged its request to include, as an alternative ground for modification, the substantial deviation of the existing order from the Connecticut child support guidelines, pursuant to P.A. 90-188, which had taken effect on October 1, 1990.

After reviewing financial affidavits and hearing testimony regarding the defendant's financial circumstances, the family support magistrate ruled that the defendant's financial circumstances had not changed so substantially as to warrant a modification of the child support order entered in 1988. The magistrate also ruled that P.A. 90-188 was inapplicable in the absence of a clear expression of legislative intent concerning its retroactivity. The magistrate accordingly issued a memorandum of decision that granted only nonmonetary relief, including the incorporation of General Statutes § 46b-84(c) into the medical insurance provision of the original order and the allocation of the child support payments only to the two youngest children in order to avoid affecting social security disability benefits that the remaining minor child, then 17, was receiving. The trial court, Steinberg, J., approved the magistrate's decision and rendered judgment accordingly.

On appeal, the state and the plaintiff assert that the trial court: (1) abused its discretion in finding that the defendant's financial circumstances had not substantially changed; and (2) mistakenly concluded that the modification provision enacted in P.A. 90-188 should not be applied to orders entered before the effective date of the act. 4 Because we hold that the trial court should have considered modifying the child support order on the basis of its substantial deviation from the amount set forth in the child support guidelines, we reverse the judgment and remand the case to the trial court for consideration of the factors mandated by the guidelines.

I

We first address the contention that the trial court abused its discretion in finding that the defendant's financial circumstances had not improved so substantially as to warrant a modification of the child support order. The state and the plaintiff assert that because the defendant's net weekly income had increased by approximately 61 percent, while his expenses had increased only by approximately 26.7 percent, over the period between the 1988 order and the 1990 motion for modification, the magistrate abused her discretion in denying the motion based upon a substantial change in circumstances. In light of all the circumstances set forth in the magistrate's memorandum of opinion, we are unpersuaded by this claim.

The scope of our review of this issue is limited. "The well settled standard of review in domestic relations cases is that this court will not disturb trial court orders unless the trial court has abused its legal discretion or its findings have no reasonable basis in the facts." McGuinness v. McGuinness, 185 Conn. 7, 13, 440 A.2d 804 (1981); Gallo v. Gallo, 184 Conn. 36, 50, 440 A.2d 782 (1981). Our function in reviewing such discretionary decisions is to determine whether the decision of the trial court was "clearly erroneous in view of the evidence and pleadings in the whole record." Practice Book § 4061. In determining whether there has been an abuse of discretion, the ultimate issue is whether the court could reasonably have concluded as it did. deCossy v. deCossy, 172 Conn. 202, 204-205, 374 A.2d 182 (1977).

In the present case, the state and the plaintiff asked the court to increase the defendant's child support obligation from $60 per week to $175 per week for support of the two minor children who were then fifteen and sixteen years old. The plaintiff was at that time receiving $134 per week in AFDC benefits for support of the two children, and the support increase that was requested would enable her eventually to be removed from welfare. The parties noted that the amount requested was $10 less than that set forth in the child support guidelines based on the defendant's net weekly income, but that the deviation was justified to preserve the plaintiff's eligibility for Title XIX medical insurance (Medicaid), which she needed because her health was poor. The state also sought an order of $25 per week in payment of the defendant's arrearage of $7155.15. The total sought by the state and the plaintiff was therefore $200 per week.

The defendant's financial affidavits and testimony revealed that during the period from 1988 to 1990 his net weekly income, including his wages and a $60 weekly payment of child support from his stepdaughter's father, had risen from approximately $316 5 to approximately $508, for a net increase of approximately 61 percent. In the same time period, however, his weekly expenses, excluding his child support and arrearage obligations of $65 and arguably unnecessary expenses such as cigarettes, had increased from $418 to approximately $530. The most significant increases were a $60 per week rent increase and a $49 6 weekly expense for psychotherapy for his current wife; other expenses included payments on outstanding medical bills incurred for treatment of his wife and stepdaughter. The state and the plaintiff argued, however, that the amount allowed as necessary expenses should have been further reduced to approximately $429, because $111 of the expenses claimed by the defendant were medical expenses for his stepdaughter, for which her father was legally required to maintain insurance.

In her memorandum of decision rejecting the proposed order for increased support, the magistrate took account of the fact that the defendant, who had regularly been meeting his reduced child support obligations of $65 per week, had described the proposed order as financially disastrous for him. In evaluating that possibility, the magistrate expressed her concern that the plaintiff, who stood to lose her $134 weekly AFDC payments if the requested support increase were ordered, might find herself in a precarious financial situation if the defendant failed to meet his...

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