Case Title: Poulos v. Poulos

Citation: 169 Vt. 607, 737 A.2d 885

Docket Number: 98-420

State: vermont

Court: Vermont Supreme Court

Date: 1999-06-24T00:00:00Z

Document:
Poulos v. Poulos (98-420); 169 Vt. 607; 737 A.2d 885

[Opinion filed 24-Jun-1999]
[Motion for Reargument denied 13-Jul-1999]

                                 ENTRY ORDER

                       SUPREME COURT DOCKET NO. 98-420

                               MAY TERM, 1999

James Poulos	                       }	APPEALED FROM:
                                       }
                                       }
     v.	                               }	Rutland Superior Court
                                       }	
Vicki Poulos	                       }
                                       }	DOCKET NO. S0010-98RcC

             In the above-entitled cause, the Clerk will enter:

       Appellant James Poulos appeals a declaratory judgment action ruling
  that his marriage to appellee  Vicki Poulos is not void despite the fact
  that they married before the nisi period in appellee's prior  divorce had
  expired.  We affirm.  

       Appellee was divorced from her first husband in Massachusetts on
  October 31, 1977.  The  Massachusetts court issued a decree nisi, which did
  not become absolute until six months later, on  April 30, 1978.  The
  parties married on January 7, 1978, in the State of New York, more than
  three  months prior to the expiration of the nisi period.  When the parties
  applied for a New York marriage  license, neither party disclosed any
  previous marriage.  The court found, and the parties do not  dispute, that
  appellant and appellee held themselves out as husband and wife for almost
  twenty years,  and that four children were born of the marriage.   

       On January 8, 1998, appellant filed a request for declaratory judgment
  in the Rutland Superior Court  that his marriage to appellee was void
  because appellee was still married to her former husband at  the time of
  her marriage to appellant.  The superior court applied both New York and
  Massachusetts  law and determined that, pursuant to either state's law, the
  parties' marriage was legal and not void.  It also concluded that appellant
  was estopped from raising any claim of voidness because the parties  were
  married for almost twenty years, they held themselves out as husband and
  wife, and because  appellee acted in good faith when she married appellant
  during the nisi period.	

       On appeal, appellant argues that because the parties were divorced in
  Massachusetts, the State of  Vermont is required to give the Massachusetts
  judgment of divorce nisi full faith and credit and  interpret it as would
  Massachusetts; likewise, because the parties married in New York, Vermont 
  must interpret the New York marriage under the laws of the State of New
  York.  Appellant argues  that, although the trial court indicated that it
  would apply New York law as to the validity of the New  York marriage and
  Massachusetts law as to the validity of the Massachusetts divorce decree,
  in fact  it did not do so.  Had the court properly applied New York law to
  the validity of the parties'  marriage, appellant contends it would have
  determined that the marriage was void.  Appellant also  argues that: (1)
  the court erred in ruling that at most, the parties' marriage prior to the
  expiration of  the nisi period would render the divorce "voidable but not
  void"; (2) a 1979 Rutland Superior Court  decision holding that a marriage
  during the nisi period is void is binding on this Court; (3) the court 
  erred in characterizing the nisi period as "ministerial"; (4) the court
  erred in finding that appellant  was aware of appellee's divorce and
  counseled her not to disclose it and (5) the court erred in finding  that
  prior to the commencement of the declaratory judgment action, two relief
  from abuse  proceedings were commenced in Rutland Family Court.  We address
  these arguments in turn.   

       A marriage contract will be interpreted here according to the law of
  the state of its

 

  making, so long as to do so will not violate the public policy of the State
  of Vermont.  See Rogers  v. Rogers, 135 Vt. 111, 112,