Title: Demgard v. Demgard

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

Demgard v. Demgard (2001-282); 173 Vt. 526; 790 A.2d 383

[Filed 19-Dec-2001]

                                 ENTRY ORDER

                      SUPREME COURT DOCKET NO. 2001-282

                             DECEMBER TERM, 2001

John P. Demgard	                       }	APPEALED FROM:
                                       }
                                       }
     v.	                               }	Rutland Superior Court
                                       }	
Sylvia Demgard	                       }
                                       }	DOCKET NO. S0198-01RcC

                                                Trial Judge: Richard W. Norton

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

       Plaintiff appeals the Rutland Superior Court's dismissal of his claim
  for contribution from  defendant, plaintiff's ex-wife, for payments
  plaintiff made on a promissory note the parties executed  prior to their
  divorce.  Plaintiff asserts that his superior court action is not a
  collateral attack on the  parties' final divorce order and the superior
  court's determination to the contrary was erroneous.  We  agree and reverse
  and remand.  

       On April 12, 1996, the parties, who were married at the time, executed
  an unsecured  promissory note in which they promised to repay a sum of
  $20,000, with interest, to Henry J. and  Frances C. Bargmann over a period
  of forty-eight months.  In April 1998, defendant filed for divorce  in
  Rutland Family Court.  The family court issued its final judgment and
  decree on February 9, 2000  after a contested hearing.  The divorce
  judgment included a division of the parties' property, granting  defendant
  title to the marital residence and the roughly eight acres of land upon
  which the residence  sits.  Although that property was formerly owned by
  plaintiff's mother, the court awarded defendant  title to the property
  "free and clear of any debt or other interest" of plaintiff.  The order did
  not  contain a specific provision relating to the parties' individual or
  marital debts, including the  promissory note to the Bargmanns.

       In March 2001, plaintiff filed the present action seeking contribution
  from defendant for  payments plaintiff allegedly made on the promissory
  note.  Defendant moved to dismiss the suit on  the grounds that plaintiff
  was attempting to relitigate the property distribution encompassed in the 
  divorce judgment.  The Superior Court agreed and dismissed the action. 
  Plaintiff appealed.

       Plaintiff contends that the superior court misunderstood the nature of
  his claim by concluding  that he was attempting to collaterally attack the
  property division in the final divorce judgment.   Defendant counters that
  plaintiff's suit is indeed a collateral attack because she alerted the
  family 

 

  court to the existence and history surrounding the note through a
  memorandum she filed prior to the  contested merits hearing in the divorce
  action.  That memorandum alleged that the note's purpose  was to allow the
  parties to satisfy the debts of plaintiff's mother's estate in exchange for
  obtaining  title to the real property where the parties made their
  residence.  Defendant's memorandum also  stated that the Bargmanns rewrote
  the promissory note to exclude her as a debtor. (FN1) Relying on our
  opinion in Tudhope v. Riehle, 167 Vt. 174,