Title: Adams v. Adams

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

Adams v. Adams (2003-524); 177 Vt. 448; 869 A.2d 124

2005 VT 4

[Filed 14-Jan-2005]

       NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to motions for reargument under
  V.R.A.P. 40 as well as formal revision before publication in the Vermont
  Reports.  Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions,
  Vermont Supreme Court, 109 State Street, Montpelier, Vermont 05609-0801 of
  any errors in order that corrections may be made before this opinion goes
  to press.

                                  2005 VT 4

                                No. 2003-524

  Susan Adams	                                 Supreme Court

                                                 On Appeal from
       v.	                                 Washington Family Court

  Reuben Adams	                                 September Term, 2004

  Jane E. Dimotsis, J.

  John R. Durrance, Jr. of Gaston, Durrance & Fairbanks, Montpelier, for
    Plaintiff-Appellee.

  Kurt M. Hughes of Murdoch & Hughes, Burlington, for Defendant-Appellant.

  PRESENT:  Dooley, Johnson and Skoglund, JJ., and Allen, C.J. (Ret.),
            Specially Assigned

       ¶  1.  SKOGLUND, J.   In this divorce action, husband appeals the
  Washington Family Court's rulings (1) denying his motion to dismiss and
  granting wife a divorce, and (2) directing him to pay one-half of wife's
  attorney's fees.  Husband argues on appeal that the court should have
  dismissed the action because the parties had already divorced in Honduras,
  and that the court erred in granting attorney's fees in the absence of
  expert testimony concerning the reasonableness of the fees.  The family
  court rejected both arguments after a three-day trial, and we now affirm.
   
       ¶  2.  The core issue in this case is whether the family court
  should have recognized an alleged divorce of the parties that husband
  claimed took place in Honduras in 1979.  The parties first met in 1967,
  when husband's family bought property from wife's grandfather on an island
  off the coast of Honduras where wife had lived since birth.  Prior to
  marrying appellant, wife had married, and obtained a divorce from, another
  man.  When she divorced her first husband, appellant's father helped her
  obtain a lawyer.  During those divorce proceedings, wife appeared in court
  and had to have the questions regarding the divorce read to her, as she had
  only a third-grade education and could not read or write.  After wife's
  divorce, the parties married in Honduras on May 17, 1977.  The oldest of
  their three adult children was born while they were living in Honduras.  

       ¶  3.  In 1979, the parties visited the United States, and had
  conflicts as a result of staying with husband's mother as well as wife's
  concerns about husband's flirtatious behavior.  Wife testified that because
  of husband's behavior, she had a one-night affair after they returned to
  Honduras.  When she told husband about the affair, he told her he could
  divorce her because of her actions.  However, neither party took any action
  based on this incident, and the parties continued to live as a married
  couple. (FN1)
     
       ¶  4.  Months later, husband told wife that a woman would be coming to
  their home with divorce papers for her to sign, and that if she did not
  sign them, he would take their son to the United States and she would never
  see him again.  When the woman showed up with the papers, wife signed them
  even though she could not read them and nobody read or explained them to
  her.  She testified that based on her first divorce, she was aware that she
  had to go to court in order to have a divorce.  The family court credited
  her testimony that she never went to court regarding the divorce husband
  sought to enforce in this action.  
   
       ¶  5.  In any event, the parties lived together continuously as a
  married couple for approximately the next twenty years.  They had two more
  children after moving to the United States in 1980, and always referred to
  each other as spouses.  They filed income taxes jointly as spouses, and
  husband signed the returns each year.  The deed to their property in
  Woodbury, Vermont states that it belongs to "Reuben and Susan Adams,
  husband and wife, joint tenants by the entireties."  Husband prepared and
  signed naturalization papers for wife in 1983, in which he acted as her
  sponsor and described her as his wife.  Their wills also refer to them as
  husband and wife.  In sum, all of the parties' legal documents reviewed by
  the family court referred to them as husband and wife, and most, if not
  all, were prepared and executed by husband.  

       ¶  6.  Moreover, the family court found that the parties consistently
  held themselves out as husband and wife in their social interactions with
  others.  They always celebrated their wedding anniversary, sometimes with
  friends who were married on the same date.  In 1997, on their twentieth
  anniversary, husband bought wife an anniversary band with three diamonds
  and bought himself a new gold band.  Additionally, husband did not raise
  the alleged Honduran divorce until after the parties had met to discuss the
  instant divorce in 2000, and wife had obtained counsel.  Indeed, the court
  found that husband "did not mention the alleged divorce documents that
  [wife] had signed for almost twenty years." 

       ¶  7.    Husband adduced testimony from a social friend that during a
  visit to the parties' home, after consuming alcohol, husband had once
  stated that the parties were not actually married.  The family court did
  not find the witness credible. 
   
       ¶  8.  Husband also introduced into evidence certified divorce
  documents and statutes from Honduras, along with testimony from a Honduran
  attorney that the documents were true and valid.  As reflected by those
  documents, the basis for the divorce request included the assertion that
  "it has become impossible for us to continue together for reasons that
  [are] our own concern, at the present time we are distanced from one
  another to such an extent that there is no bond between us after two years
  of marriage."  While the court found the documents to be authentic and
  therefore received them into evidence, it also found that "[t]he evidence
  was not clear" that the parties had actually appeared before the Honduran
  court prior to the divorce decree's issuance.  Specifically, the court
  noted that the documents do not indicate that the parties themselves
  appeared, and they suggest that an attorney appeared for both of them. 
  Further, the Honduran attorney who testified at trial had not spoken with
  the person who allegedly represented both parties before the Honduran
  court.

       ¶  9.  The essence of defendant's argument in this case is that the
  family court erred by denying his motion to dismiss because it should have
  recognized the Honduran divorce as a matter of comity.  The Full Faith and
  Credit Clause, U.S. Const. art. IV, § 1, does not apply to judgments
  obtained in a foreign country, Aetna Life Ins. Co. v. Tremblay,