Case Title: Senjab v. Alhulaibi

Citation: 137 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 64

Docket Number: 81515

State: nevada

Court: Nevada Supreme Court

Date: 2021-10-21T00:00:00Z

Document:
437 Nev., Advance Opinion 44
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF NEVADA

AHED SAID SENJAB, No. 81515
Appellant,

vs FILED

MOHAMAD ABULHAKIM ALHULAIBI,
Respondent.

OCT 21 2021

    

Appeal from a district court order dismissing a complaint for
divorce. Eighth Judicial District Court, Family Division, Clark County;
‘T. Arthur Ritchie, Jr., Judge.

Reversed and remanded.

Willick Law Group and Marshal S. Willick, Las Vegas,
for Appellant.

‘Markman Law and David A. Markman, Las Vegas,
for Respondent.

Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada, Inc., and Barbara E. Buckley and

April S. Green, Las Vegas,
for Amicus Curiae National Immigrant Women's Advocacy Project, Inc.

BEFORE THE SUPREME COURT, EN BANC.
OPINION
By the Court, PARRAGUIRRE, J.:
NNRS 125.020(2) provides in part that “no court has jurisdiction
to grant a divorce unless either the plaintiff or defendant has been resident
of the State for a period of not less than 6 weeks preceding the

ae 302284

 

 
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commencement of the action.” Although residence and domicile are distinct
concepts elsewhere in the law, for divorce jurisdiction, we have long
considered residence “synonymous with domicile.” Vaile v. Eighth Judicial
Dist. Court, 118 Nev. 262, 269-70, 44 P.3d 506, 511 (2002) (quoting Aldabe
v, Aldabe, 84 Nev. 392, 396, 441 P.2d 691, 694 (1968)). In this appeal, we
revisit that rule and conclude that divorce jurisdiction requires mere
residence.
FACTS

Appellant Ahed Said Senjab and respondent Mohamad
Abulhakim Alhulaibi are Syrian citizens. They married in Saudi Arabia
and have one minor child. In 2018, Alhulaibi obtained an F-1 (student) visa
and moved to Las Vegas to attend the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
Senjab and the child later obtained F-2 (dependent) visas and, in January
2020, moved to Las Vegas to live with Alhulaibi.

In March 2020, Senjab filed a complaint for divorce. She also
sought spousal support, custody of the child, and child support. Alhulaibi
moved to dismiss Senjab’s complaint for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction.
He argued that Senjab, as a nonimmigrant, cannot establish intent to
remain in Nevada (i.e., domicile), so the district court lacked subject-matter
jurisdiction under NRS 125.020, Nevada's divorce-jurisdiction statute. He
cited caselaw in which we explained that residence is synonymous with
domicile under NRS 125.020, so subject-matter jurisdiction under NRS
125.020 requires not only physical presence in Nevada (i.e., residence), but
also intent to remain here. He also cited a recent United States Court of
Appeals for the Ninth Circuit decision and other caselaw holding that some
visas preclude domicile as a matter of law by requiring that the visa holder
not intend to abandon his or her foreign residence. Senjab replied that the
caselaw does not apply to her F-2 visa, and the district court had subject-

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matter jurisdiction under NRS 125.020 because she had resided in Nevada
for the stated period of not less than six weeks.

‘The district court heard Alhulaibi’s motion and granted it.
Citing our long-standing rule that residence is synonymous with domicile
under NRS 125.020, it found that both parties had been physically present
in Nevada for at least six weeks before Senjab filed her complaint but
neither party had established domicile here. Citing a recent Ninth Cireuit
decision, it concluded that Alhulaibi’s F-1 visa and Senjab’s F-2 visa
precluded them from establishing domicile as a matter of law, so it
dismissed Senjab’s complaint for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction.

Senjab now appeals, inviting us to reconsider our rule that
residence and domicile are synonymous under NRS 125.020. She argues
that “reside{nce]” under NRS 125.020 plainly means mere residence—not
domicile. We agree, so we reverse and remand to the district court.

DISCUSSION

We review subject-matter jurisdiction de novo. Ogawa v.
Ogawa, 125 Nev. 660, 667, 221 P.3d 699, 704 (2009). We likewise review
statutory-interpretation issues de novo and will interpret a statute by its
plain meaning unless some exception applies. Young v. Nev. Gaming
Control Bd., 136 Nev. 584, 586, 473 P.3d 1034, 1036 (2020). Neither party
to this appeal argues that any exception applies. We will not supply an
argument on a party's behalf but review only the issues the parties present.
Pelkola v. Pelkola, 137 Nev., Adv. Op. 24, 487 P.3d 807, 809 (2021). Senjab

'National Immigrant Women’s Advocacy Project, Inc., argues in its
amicus brief that an F-2 visa does not preclude domicile, but we do not reach
that issue or the broader question of domicile because neither is necessary
to resolve this appeal. Senjab also raises custody and support issues that
‘we decline to consider because, as she admits, the district court did not
reach them.

 

 
——

simply argues that we should interpret NRS 125.020 by its plain meaning,
and Alhulaibi cites our long-standing rule that residence and domicile are
synonymous under NRS 125.020.

NRS_125,020(1) provides several bases for subject-matter

 

jurisdiction of a divorce complaint, including either party's “residen{ce)
the county in which the plaintiff files the complaint. NRS 125.020(2)
further provides that,

[ulnless the cause of action accrued within the

county while the plaintiff and defendant were

actually domiciled therein, no court has jurisdiction

to grant a divorce unless either the plaintiff or

defendant has been resident of the State for a

period of not less than 6 weeks preceding the

commencement of the action.
Although residence and domicile are generally distinct concepts elsewhere
Black's Law Dictionary (11th ed. 2019) (defining
residence as “{tJhe place where one actually lives, as distinguished from a

in the law, see, e,

 

domicile,” and domicile as “[t]he place at which a person has been physically
present and that the person regards as home; a person’s true, fixed,
principal, and permanent home, to which that person intends to return and
remain even though currently residing elsewhere”), we have long
considered residence “synonymous with domicile” for divorce jurisdiction,
Vaile, 118 Nev. at 269-70, 44 P.3d at 511 (quoting Aldabe, 84 Nev. at 396,
441 P.2d at 694).

“[Wle recognize the important role that stare decisis plays in
our jurisprudence and reiterate that ‘[I]egal precedents of this Court should
be respected until they are shown to be unsound in principle.” ASAP
‘Storage, Inc. v. City of Sparks, 123 Nev. 639, 653, 173 P.3d 734, 743 (2007)
(second alteration in original) (quoting Grotts v. Zahner, 115 Nev. 339, 342,
989 P.2d 415, 417 (1999) (Rose, C.J., dissenting). Our review of NRS

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125.020 reveals that the rule we reiterated most recently in Vaile is
unsound, and we take this opportunity to retreat from it for several reasons.

First, residence and domicile are distinct concepts not only
elsewhere in the law but also in NRS 125.020 itself. NRS 125.020(2) plainly
and separately addresses “domicile| |" in its first clause and “residen(ce]” in
its second clause. Given such a construction, we cannot interpret residence
‘and domicile to be synonymous in NRS 125.020. See Berberich v. Bank of
Am,, N.A., 136 Nev. 93, 95, 460 P.3d 440, 442 (2020) (explaining that, under
the surplusage canon, no word or provision of a statute “should be ignored
{or] given an interpretation that causes it to duplicate another provision or
to have no consequence” (internal quotation marks omitted)).

‘Second, the very Ninth Circuit decision that Alhulaibi and the
district court cited expressly and persuasively distinguished residence and
domicile as we do here. In Park v. Barr, the Ninth Circuit explained that
the California Court of Appeals decision on which the lower court relied
“conflated ‘residence’ with ‘domicile” by describing them as “synonymous.”
946 F.3d 1096, 1100 (9th Cir, 2020) (quoting In re Marriage of Dick, 18 Cal.
Rptr. 2d 743, 746 (Ct. App. 1993)).?

And, finally, the Legislature has supplied an applicable
definition of residence. NRS 10.155 provides that,

[ulnless otherwise provided by specific statute, the
legal residence of a person with reference to the
person's right of naturalization, right to maintain
or defend any suit at law or in equity, or any other
right dependent on residence, is that place where

 

*Like this court, California courts long ago read an additional, extra-
textual domicile requirement into a divorce-jurisdiction statute that
required only residence. E.g., Ungemach v. Ungemach, 142 P.2d 99, 102
(Cal. Ct. App. 1943) (“The residence referred to in the [divorce-jurisdiction]
statute is equivalent to domicile.”).

 

 
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the person has been physically present within the

State or county, as the case may be, during all of

the period for which residence is claimed by the

person.

No relevant statute provides an alternative definition, so NRS 10.155
applies. Under that definition, residence under NRS 125.020 plainly
requires only “physical[] presen(ce]"—not an extra-textual intent to
remain. NRS 10.155; see also ASAP Storage, 123 Nev. at 653, 173 P.3d at
744 (Statutes should be given their plain meaning whenever possible;
otherwise, as we have explained, the constitutional separation-of- powers
doctrine is implicated.” (footnote omitted)).

Here, the district court found that Senjab and Alhulaibi had
been physically present in Nevada for at least six weeks before Senjab filed
her complaint. Under a plain-meaning interpretation of “reside[ncel,” that,
finding satisfies NRS 125.020(1\e), which provides that a plaintiff may
obtain divorce in “the district court of any county .... [if plaintiff resided 6
weeks in the State before suit was brought.” It also satisfies NRS
125.0202), which likewise requires residence “for a period of not less than
6 weeks preceding the commencement of the action.” With that finding and
the plain-meaning interpretation of “residen{ce]” that we now acknowledge,
the district court did not lack subject-matter jurisdiction under NRS
125.020,

CONCLUSION

Under NRS 125.020, “residen{ce]” means mere residence—not
domicile—and NRS 10.155 defines residence as “physical{] presen{cel.”
Because the district court found that Senjab had been physically present in
Nevada for at least six weeks before she filed her divorce complaint, we
conclude that it had subject-matter jurisdiction under NRS 125.020.

 

 
Accordingly, we reverse and remand to the district court for further

proceedings consistent with this opinion.

J
Parraguirre

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