dissolution act states that the value of the pension benefit under the illinois pension code shall be determined according to the valuation procedures established by the retirement system itself daniel's pension endos pension is the new municipal employees annuity and benefit fund of chicago and it's governed by article eight of the on my pension code the value of daniel's benefits is found in section eight dasht one thirty eight b section one thirty eight b states or determines that there are there is a pre determined mandated benefit from ala based on the employee's age years of service and annual salary and i'm sure counsel doesn't disagree with anything that you've stated so transcript or you're out of the reason there was no transfer just because there was no way for i is the counsel to prepare one i spoke to both of the actuaries i spoke to the trial counsel and i spoke to  my client irene and no one could remember how or why whatever the testimony was during the the trial that indicated that it would be contributions so there was nothing to agree to i mean what i would have to do is take the trial counsel's word for it which i felt as if i couldn't do and on top of everything else when i looked at the record that i had it was very clear to me because that this is a defined benefit plan and that it is clearly cannot be contributions alone it's just you know that's just natural portion can now we can then determine what the true value of the country really is and we i think you can your honor if you apply the reserve jurisdiction approach what value would that be take in the best case scenario from your point of view what value is that that value would there's a region free in well it's a four page i don't know those details but there's a four page report in the record that explains how he came to that determination i don't we know that the figures that she has  contributions are just contributions and it's one of the factors it says in the letter that the benefit is determined your bet your benefit has been determined to be your estimate about if it has been determined to be three thousand whatever it was you know a month if you were to retire at a big distinction between this case and richardson because here we're talking about value of the pension at a particular day as opposed to sharing the pension benefits themselves well you had a few read richardson parties in terms of what is to be divided between the the party says it is it a share of the pension benefit or is it the value half of the value of the pension benefit down on a you understand the difference in the language you're talking value here not after the pension exactly but the pension in richardson is defined as from the date of the marriage to the date of the dissolution which is the marital portion in where we're not i'm not focusing on what the mirror or snooze and of course the marital portion is always going to be the same it's going to be during that period of time that they were actually married what we're looking at is what is the agreement between the parties what did your client agree with her the soon to be x regarding how to divide the pension benefit looks like it looks like based on language that she only wanted half of the value of the pension  the form of payment is an annuity so since daniel's receiving his annuity at this point now since it's this is how it's the case about it has to be a portion of his benefit so you're saying that the value but the judge obviously did oh well your honor i i i don't understand to me there's no rhyme or reason how contributions can be just the benefit i mean it's clearly just one of the  thousand what was the difference there the difference that i thought it was the difference that i saw is that daniel's expert calculate the benefit as if dan had retired on the date of the years of the while they were married over in a ratio over the years of participation according to what the benefit formula was and they know my pension  methodology did judge murphy use in making that determination and that in your client's estimation why in your client's  well your honor she or she erred because the contribution simply can't be the benefit the it states that that this is that the half of the value or the value of the of the benefit is what's to be determined and it's in a case the benefit restricted in themselves to be so the amount of the most was contribution well you want i don't think that's reflected in the in the record at all i mean i don't i don't see where she i mean she could have thought she was doing that but i don't see how she came up with just the contributions as as the benefit i mean it's is there anything in the settlement agreement that that would would steer her otherwise i didn't see anything in it i think you had another question that i didn't i have no idea why she picked the contributions doesn't it go back to her just as holmes point that she was trying to sexually the agreement between the parties and you'll have you can see that on the date of the divorce his contribution and in that sense the value of the pension based on his contribution was one hundred five thousand nine hundred five thousand and some i i'm going to city on my pension co why should the parties agree totally on a division of the one well i guess they could do that but i don't think it's reflected in the record that the contributions alone would be there we go back to the record what is and what's in the record well nothing from the trial because it was there when the trial counsel was there she had no what reporters and i came in at the very end of this so and then when i looked at the record and talked to everybody and no one remembered anything there was nothing i could do other than what i did that each share has to be valued the same according to richardson and i remain share was valued simply as the contributions whereas daniel share was valued according to section one thirty eight of the my pension code because that's what the fines i do apply because that's what that's what article eight sets and the last thing i will say your honor is that the that richardson is almost identical case i mean there are some differences but the difference is the gate what you know there anything that's important in fact if anything it helps irene because she was last married longer to her husband th then in richardson and then a participate in the find longer than the husband ind let's start with your position before judge murphy your position was that the value of the pension or the value of the value of the pension was what is an abuse of discretion by the circuit court in deciding that the value is even less than the opponent to suggest a value well i believe it's not an abus can we go below those two points what evidence is there what we have is the document from the pension plan the letter that said that the employees contributions plus interest as of that day were about one hundred five thousand rise and that's just a naked figure and your record concluded based on that naked figure that the real value the value that should be divided between the parties is over two hundred thousand and the expert on behalf of the wife said it's over seven hundred dollars so how do we get to the point where the judge says no you're both wrong maybe she was an expert on her own and if she had to reveal to us the basis for her decision you know we might having done a lot of trouble practice i often find that judges don't pick don't take a position that either party advances but i think what is a fair the point that justice garcia is making is that for our purposes that usually important as it that part if that's your position that the sheep get this she could to decide what the agreement is between the parties against the position taken by the very parties who entered into that agreement disregard the intent of the parties that entered into the green it self i don't think she's disregarding the intent of the parties i think she was attempting to interpret the intent of the parties and that's why she arrived at the numbers that she arrived at and divide it in half and i think  often the case they do that with regard to child support they do that we with regard to maine if they do that with regard to a lot of different aspects that they may not look at what a guideline child support order is for example and they may arrive at their own number so i i do think that does happen we know what what the husband says the agreement was what they dream of as we know what the wife says the agreement was and so we have two conflicting positions but the judge to take a third position seems that's obviously how she valued it let's let's go let's go to the final point that council made and you'll have a chance to respond specifically to the other points she made but one was that richardson i think i can see can be interpreted to stand for the proposition that the value given by one party cannot be at odds with the value given by the other part and i don't believe your client would say that  date of the marriage the value of his pension was only one hundred five thousand dollars that would have been used up in less than three years at the rate of three thousand dollars per month if he got back on but maybe not i guess my main issue is that if if any other value was was placed on it if it was seven seventy would not i mean come back in and make an issue with that unless you write the hot formula i guess the best way you know that the value is the value she got half and so even if they we took her expert's value of seven saturday and it was divided in half she still could raise the same issue let's let's take the worst case scenario and just hypothetically that we had to remain because we found the judge's decision at odds with the evidence presented certainly at odds with the positions taken by by the opposing party  would that would that present what what sort of limitations would you ask us to look i'm such a really well here's the issue counsel is strongly in favor of the court adopting the richardson case and i don't think that the trial court has to adopt the richardson value and furthermore i think that there is language in the contract specifically that  and i think if you're a pilot or a richardson scenario that doesn't necessarily that doesn't lend itself to the opportunity for him to buy out her purchase and that's why i think the they went and both parties valued the pension at that time too so i would really does in order to be fair to both parts you really have to make sure that you're correct value of the pension otherwise one artist can be assured if there's a fifty percent afforded a lot of different mechanisms or means to value the pension even the richardson case brought up a hunt formula and a substitution i think so i was just going to point out that there are varying methods that a trial  right i don't understand the question pensioner guides and because there's five or benefits the expos gets her share does that go on for the entire duration of her life or is the pension cut off after she receives a marital portion of the pension that was or i i'm not an expert on this on this particular plan but i do know that in a lot of other pension scenarios they actually segregate the other spouse's benefit and so it would continue throughout the new would he would be based on what you see in her lifetime i cannot speak to that in this specific  revoke your honor to answer your question in general survivor benefits are not the pension that's a separate benefit from a pension and my understanding of article eight is that if it daniel passed away then says benefit ceases it her entire pension benefit is based on daniel's life also on we believe that the standard of review is the no go because richardson is controlling and several other factors that are mentioned in the brief but even if the use of discretion stand it was applied it's clear that the judge abused her discretion because she didn't follow either expert's opinion not that she has to follow that each each  expert's opinion but as is the justice points out it's even less than what their own expert had the term  began the first place and also that