Title: READ v. READ

State: oklahoma

Issuer: Oklahoma Supreme Court

Document:

READ v. READ  READ v. READ 2001 OK 87 57 P.3d 561 72 OBJ 3055 Case Number: 92930 Decided: 10/16/2001 Modified: 02/11/2002 Mandate Issued: 11/01/2002 Rehearing Denied: February 11, 2002 THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA [57 P.3d 561] SHAWNA K. READ, Plaintiff-Appellee/Counter-Appellant v. MICHAEL RAY READ, Defendant-Appellant/Counter-Appellee ON CERTIORARI TO THE COURT OF CIVIL APPEALS, DIV. IV ¶0 Former wife twice brought contempt proceedings against former husband for failure to pay child support. In the first proceeding, the trial court found former husband guilty and sentenced him to six (6) months in the county jail, subject to the payment of a purge fee of $3,000.00. Former wife appealed from that portion of the order which set the amount of the purge fee. In the second proceeding, the trial court again found former husband guilty and sentenced him to six (6) months in the county jail, subject to a purge fee of $9,200.00. Former husband sought review of the second contempt order, the related commutation to judgment of the unpaid child support, and the order made in each of the two proceedings that awarded former wife an attorney's fee and costs. The parties' appeals were consolidated for disposition. The Court of Civil Appeals, Division IV, held that the child support order was void and unenforceable because its legal predicate -- the parties' divorce decree -- had been entered without personal jurisdiction over former husband. COCA vacated inter alia the divorce decree's determination of paternity and order to pay child support as well as both contempt orders. It then remanded the cause with directions to reopen the divorce action to permit former husband to be heard on the merits of any issue bearing on his liability for child support. COCA declined to reach former wife's counter-appeal regarding the purge fee pending post-remand proceedings over former husband's liability for child support. Upon former wife's petition for certiorari, THE COURT OF CIVIL APPEALS' OPINION IS VACATED; THE NISI PRIUS ORDERS TENDERED BY FORMER HUSBAND FOR REVIEW ARE AFFIRMED, AND THE CAUSE IS REMANDED TO THE COURT OF CIVIL APPEALS WITH INSTRUCTIONS TO ADDRESS THE ISSUE RAISED IN FORMER WIFE'S COUNTER-APPEAL Shannon Davis, Law Office of Shannon Davis, Tulsa, Oklahoma, for Plaintiff-Appellee/Counter-Appellant. David H. Sanders, Sanders & Sanders, Tulsa, Oklahoma, for Defendant, Appellant/Counter-Appellee OPALA, J. ¶1 The dispositive issues I ANATOMY OF LITIGATION ¶2 Shawna K. Read, now Shawna K. Dunn (Dunn), and Michael Ray Read (Read) were married on 16 May 1987 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. On or about 1 December 1987, a child was born of their marriage. Approximately seven months later, Read departed from the state of Oklahoma, leaving behind his wife and child who were not informed of his whereabouts. ¶3 On 26 February 1990, Dunn filed a petition for divorce in which she sought approval of service upon Read by publication. Although Dunn stated in the petition that she had a last known Oklahoma address for Read, she also alleged that she had had no contact with him since June 1988 and was unable to determine his whereabouts despite the exercise of due diligence. A hearing on the divorce petition was held on 30 April 1990. Read did not appear and Dunn was granted a default judgment. The decree recites that Dunn had timely but unsuccessfully attempted service of summons on Read and that service by publication was authorized and proper. Read was ordered to pay child support in the amount of $403.20 per month. ¶4 Over the next six and one-half years Read neither challenged the divorce decree nor complied with its order to pay child support. On 6 December 1996 Dunn filed her first application for contempt (first contempt). Read responded by filing a petition to vacate the divorce decree -- the legal predicate for the child support order -- alleging lack of personal jurisdiction over him in the divorce proceeding. Read's motion was denied and he appealed. The Court of Civil Appeals, Division III, affirmed and this court denied certiorari. ¶5 While Read's appeal from the vacation quest's denial was pending, a non-jury trial was held on Dunn's contempt application. The trial court withheld a decision on the issue of contempt, but did commute the accrued unpaid child support to judgment (for the period from the date of the divorce decree through 28 April 1997 in the amount of $32,659.20 plus interest). ¶6 On 8 December 1998, the trial court finally reconvened to decide whether Read should be held in contempt. ¶7 As of mid-December 1998, Read had paid none of the commuted child-support arrearage other than the $3,000 purge fee, nor had he paid any further monthly child support. On 18 December 1998, Dunn filed a second contempt application (second contempt) covering all unpaid child support, including that which had been at issue in the first contempt proceeding. In response to Read's argument that this constituted double jeopardy, the trial court ordered Dunn to amend her application to cover only unpaid child support not covered by the first contempt order. [57 P.3d 564] ¶8 On the day set for jury trial, Read filed another motion to dismiss the proceeding, which in addition to again raising the double jeopardy issue, also challenged the facial validity of the divorce decree on a new jurisdictional ground: lack of judicial power to impose the particular child support obligation incorporated in the divorce decree. ¶9 A jury trial was then held on the second contempt application and Read was found guilty of nonsupport (for the period from 25 April 1997 through 31 January 1999). He was sentenced to six (6) months in the Tulsa County Jail, with the contempt subject to purge by the payment of $9,200.00. Unable to pay the purge fee, Read was incarcerated. A petition to this court for a writ of habeas corpus was denied. ¶10 Read appealed from this second order of contempt, urging among other errors the trial court's refusal to dismiss the contempt application based upon the alleged jurisdictional defects in the divorce decree. ¶11 The Court of Civil Appeals, Division Four, agreed with Read, holding that "the divorce decree was unenforceable as to child support in either contempt proceeding because the decree-based child support was entered without personal jurisdiction [57 P.3d 565] over [Read]." Accordingly, COCA vacated the divorce decree's determination of paternity and its order to pay child support as well as the various other judgments and orders tendered by Read for review. It then remanded the cause to the trial court to permit Read to be heard on the merits of any issue bearing on his liability for child support. COCA declined to decide Dunn's counter-appeal pending post-remand adjudication of Read's liability for child support. ¶12 We granted certiorari on Dunn's petition and now vacate COCA's opinion, affirm the orders tendered by Read for review, and remand the cause to COCA for a determination of Dunn's counter-appeal. II ALLEGED ERRORS IN THE DIVORCE PROCEEDING ARE NO LONGER AMENABLE TO CORRECTIVE RELIEF ¶13 Read contends that the child support obligation -- for nonpayment of which he has been twice held in contempt -- is unenforceable because the divorce decree upon which it is predicated is void on the face of the judgment roll. Even if Read were correct, the procedural posture of this appeal bars him from obtaining the corrective relief he seeks. ¶14 We need not inquire into whether the divorce decree is or is not facially void. If it is facially valid because evidence dehors the judgment roll is necessary to establish the jurisdictional defect in its rendition, a direct attack upon it is now barred by the three-year limitation period applicable to statutory vacation proceedings. ¶15 The law affords no more than a single opportunity to litigate a disputed [57 P.3d 566]question of a tribunal's jurisdiction. ¶16 The procedural straightjacket in which Read finds himself with respect to corrective relief from the divorce decree for lack of personal jurisdiction likewise bars him from challenging the decree for lack of the third element of jurisdiction -- judicial power to render the particular decision. The doctrine of res judicata bars relitigation not only of those issues raised and decided but also of those issues which could have been raised and were not. ¶17 Were we nevertheless to entertain Read's argument that the trial court in the divorce proceeding did not have the judicial power to impose the particular child support obligation set forth in the decree, Read still would not prevail. He argues that jurisdiction to enter the particular order was absent because (1) the decree's requirement that Read pay $403.20 per month when Dunn had asked for only $180.00 per month went beyond the issue presented to the trial court for determination, and (2) the divorce petition failed to comply with the provisions of ¶18 Read is wrong on both counts. By force of statute, child support - its award and amount - is always within the issues framed by a divorce petition where the parties have minor children. ¶19 Read's contention that the notice in the divorce proceeding failed to comply with statutory requirements is also without merit. A divorce proceeding in which child support is an issue is not a common-law action for the recovery of money. Hence, the notice requirement of ¶20 Read cites Bailey v. Campbell, ¶21 Southwestern Surety III READ WAS NOT PLACED IN DOUBLE JEOPARDY BY THE SECOND CONTEMPT PROCEEDING ¶22 Read argues that his constitutional protection against double jeopardy, guaranteed by the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitu-[57 P.3d 569]tion, has been violated because he was tried and sentenced in the second contempt proceeding for the same "offense" for which he had already been tried and sentenced in the first contempt proceeding. IV THE CAUSE SHOULD BE REMANDED TO THE COURT OF CIVIL APPEALS FOR CONSIDERATION OF THE ISSUE RAISED IN DUNN'S COUNTER-APPEAL ¶23 Dunn also filed a counter- appeal in this case for review of the order setting the purge fee in the first contempt proceeding. Although the order finding Read guilty in the first contempt proceeding was not among the orders for which Read sought corrective relief, COCA nevertheless vacated that order. Because of that decision, COCA declined to review whether the purge fee was proper. It held that corrective relief is unavailable until the issue of Read's paternity and liability for child support shall have been determined. Today's pronouncement vacating COCA's opinion restores the issue raised by Dunn's counter-appeal. When this court vacates the opinion of the Court of Civil Appeals, it may address any issue properly raised in the appeal or remand the cause to the Court of Civil Appeals for that court to address that issue.38 Whether the trial court [57 P.3d 570]erred in setting the purge fee should be reviewed in the first instance by the Court of Civil Appeals. We hence remand the cause to that court to address this issue. V SUMMARY ¶24 Read seeks our pronouncement that decree-imposed child support cannot be enforced against him by means of contempt because the child-support obligation's legal predicate - the parties' divorce decree - is void on the face of the judgment roll. This precise issue has previously been determined against Read and he is forever barred from seeking corrective relief on this basis. His contention that the proceedings below placed him in double jeopardy is likewise legally unsupportable. The cause is remanded for COCA's disposition of Dunn's counter-appeal for review of the purge fee set in the first contempt proceeding. ¶25 THE COURT OF CIVIL APPEALS' OPINION IS VACATED; THE NISI PRIUS ORDERS TENDERED BY FORMER HUSBAND FOR REVIEW ARE AFFIRMED, AND THE CAUSE IS REMANDED TO THE COURT OF CIVIL APPEALS WITH INSTRUCTIONS ¶26 HARGRAVE, C.J., and HODGES, LAVENDER, OPALA, SUMMERS, BOUDREAU and WINCHESTER, JJ., concur; ¶27 WATT, V.C.J., dissents; ¶28 KAUGER, J., concurs in part and dissents in part. [57 P.3d 571] FOOT