J-A05006-20

NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37

MARGARET RICE 

Appellant

v.

JAMES RICE

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 IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF

 PENNSYLVANIA

 No. 1564 WDA 2018

Appeal from the Order Entered October 31, 2018

In the Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny County Family Court at 

No(s): FD - 12-006400-005

BEFORE: BENDER, P.J.E., BOWES, J., and PELLEGRINI, J.*

MEMORANDUM BY BENDER, P.J.E.: FILED JULY 02, 2020

Margaret Rice (Mother) appeals from the order dated September 24, 

2018, and entered on October 31, 2018, dismissing Mother’s exceptions to 

the support master’s report and recommendation, which dealt with James 

Rice’s (Father) petition to modify an existing child support order for the benefit 

of Mother’s and Father’s son, who is a special-needs twenty-year-old 

individual (Child). We vacate and remand.

Mother and Father were previously married and were divorced in August 

of 2013. In May of 2015, the parties entered into a consent order, which 

provided for Father’s support obligation plus additional expenses required by 

Child that would be equally split between the parties. Father filed his petition 

to modify the support obligation on August 17, 2017, requesting a lowering of

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* Retired Senior Judge assigned to the Superior Court.
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the existing child support order. A complex support hearing was held on March 

28, 2018, before a support master. In the order that assigned the support 

master, dated February 16, 2018, “the parties were reminded ... that ‘[p]retrial 

[s]tatements [were] to be filed on or before 7 days prior to trial....’” Trial 

Court Opinion (TCO), 7/19/19, at 1. In its opinion, the trial court explained

that Mother “failed to file a full and complete [p]retrial [s]tatement, [and] as 

a result of which the [m]aster, in accordance with Local Rules 212.2 and 

212.3(5), declined to allow [Mother] to introduce exhibits and third[-]party 

testimony at the support hearing.” Id. at 2-3.1 Essentially, Mother was 

prohibited from testifying herself. Additionally, because Mother had brought 

Child to the hearing without an aid to tend to Child, she was asked to sit in 

the hallway with Child because his actions were interrupting the proceedings. 

As a result, Mother was unable to participate at all in the hearing. 

The master issued her decision on May 8, 2018, determining the parties’

incomes based on exhibits submitted by Father and setting forth the amount 

that Father was required to pay in support of Child. The master’s hearing 

summary provides the following in its entirety:

RECOMMENDATION: Effective 08/17/17 Deft [Father] to pay Pltf 

[Mother] $518/mo. suppt. for [Child]. There is an overpayment

of [$]12,552.56 as of 05/07/18. Due to the payment schedule 

herein, the overpayment of $12,552.56 is set to zero as of 

05/07/18 and no more money will be sent to Plaintiff this month. 

____________________________________________

1 Mother’s pretrial statement includes a narrative statement, a list of witnesses 

and a list of exhibits that Mother reserves the right to call and/or enter into 

evidence, and a statement of reservations. However, the portion entitled 

“Child Support Recommendation/Proposed Order” is entirely blank. 
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Deft’s actual support obligation remains at $518/mo. However, 

effective 06/01/18 the obligation is charging at $388.50/mo. 

through the refund period to recoup the overpayment of 

$12,552.56. On 07/01/26, the monthly suppt obligation will 

return to $518/mo, unless the [c]ourt determines that the 

overpayment has been recouped prior to 07/01/26, in which case 

the court will return the order to $518/mo. If the overpayment is 

not recouped by 07/01/26, the court will extend the period to fully 

recoup the overpayment. Any future arrears thereafter will be 

payable at $5.00/mo. until paid in full. Pltf shall submit 

documentation to Deft on a monthly basis for reimbursement of 

his 36% share. Deft shall pay Pltf within 10 days. Any disputed 

charges shall be submitted to the [c]ourt annually for 

determination. Parties agreed to reduce the monthly support by 

25% to allow Deft to recoup his overpayment more quickly.

EXPLANATION: Parties appeared with counsel for the 3/28/18 

hearing. H.O. found Deft/Father’s net income to be significantly 

less than it had been in 2016 when the last Order went into effect. 

[Child] is 20 yrs old but is unable to support himself for undisputed 

reasons. [Child] lives with Mother. The parties’ older son resides 

with Father when not at college. Father argued that he assists 

[older son] with college expenses. However, the H.O. advised 

Father that under current PA law, he has no obligation to do so 

and that his first obligation is to provide the necessary child 

support for [Child].

Master’s Hearing Summary, 5/8/18. 

Mother filed exceptions to the master’s report and recommendation and 

on August 17, 2018, a hearing was held before the trial court. The resulting 

court order, dismissing Mother’s exceptions and adopting the master’s report 

and recommendation, was dated September 24, 2018. However, the order 

was not entered on the trial court docket until October 31, 2018. Thereafter, 

Mother filed her timely appeal to this Court. 

Unfortunately, the delays in this matter did not end at that point. The 

record and the trial court’s opinion were due in this Court by December 31,
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2018. This Court sent two letters to the trial court, one dated January 31, 

2019, and one dated May 3, 2019, indicating that pursuant to Pa.R.A.P. 

1935(a), the record was overdue. In the second letter, the trial court was 

informed that, “upon receipt of the record, a briefing schedule [would] be 

established, and [that] the appeal process, which [was] currently languishing, 

[could] go forward.” Letter, 5/3/19. The record was finally docketed in this 

Court on August 1, 2019. Argument was held on February 18, 2020. The 

case is now finally ready for disposition. 

In her appeal to this Court, Mother lists the following issues for our 

review: 

1. Did the [t]rial [c]ourt abuse its discretion/err as a matter of law 

in affirming the [m]aster’s decision to preclude Mother’s testimony 

and evidence because of a minor error in her [p]retrial 

[s]tatement?

2. Did the [t]rial [c]ourt abuse its discretion/err as a matter of law 

by not correcting the [m]aster’s discrimination of not allowing the 

parties’ handicap [C]hild in the room during the [h]earing due to 

his special needs, thereby forcing Mother [to] sit in the hallway 

with the [C]hild and depriving Mother of the opportunity to 

participate in the hearing?

3. Did the [t]rial [c]ourt abuse its discretion/err as a matter of law 

by not correcting the [m]aster’s improper calculations of each 

party’s income?

4. Did the [t]rial [c]ourt abuse its discretion/err as a matter of law 

by not correcting the [m]aster’s error in calculating child support 

amount and improper calculation of overpayment amount? 

5. Did the [t]rial [c]ourt abuse its discretion/err as a matter of law 

in affirming the [m]aster’s decision regarding additional expenses 

despite the fact that Father’s share was not properly defined and 

only annual reviews were provided, which thus require[s] Mother 
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to advance the costs associated with raising a child with special 

needs? 

6. Did the [t]rial [c]ourt abuse its discretion/err as a matter of law 

in affirming the [m]aster’s decision that the parties agreed to 

reduce the support by twenty-five percent (25%) despite the fact 

that no such agreement was reached? 

Mother’s brief at 5-6. 

Our review is guided by the following:

In reviewing an order entered in a support proceeding, an 

appellate court has a limited scope of review. The trial court 

possesses wide discretion as to the proper amount of child support 

and a reviewing court will not interfere with the determination of 

the court below unless there has been a clear abuse of discretion. 

The function of the appellate court is to determine whether there

is sufficient evidence to sustain the order of the hearing judge. An

abuse of discretion is not merely an error of judgment; rather, it

occurs when the law is overridden or misapplied, or the judgment

exercised is manifestly unreasonable or the result of partiality,

bias or ill-will.

Johnson v. Johnson, 153 A.3d 318, 321 (Pa. Super. 2016).

We begin by noting that the trial court’s opinion addresses the exclusion 

of evidence and testimony by Mother, concluding that it was proper for the 

master to so order. To support this conclusion, the trial court’s opinion states:

This [c]ourt was not persuaded by any of the evidence or 

testimony in the record or at the [e]xceptions [a]rgument that the 

[m]aster committed any material error or omission or any abuse 

of discretion. On [e]xceptions, [Mother] challenged the [m]aster’s 

calculations of [Father’s] income, [Mother’s] income, [Father’s]

child support obligation and overpayments, [Father’s] share of

medical expenses; [Mother] also challenges the [m]aster’s 

enforcement of a purported agreement to reduce [Father’s]

support obligation, the [m]aster’s establishment of reviews on an 

annual basis, the [m]aster’s failure to award [Mother] an upward 

deviation, the [m]aster’s requirement that Mother supervise the 

disabled son she brought with her to the complex support hearing, 

and the [m]aster's refusal to let [Mother] present evidence and/or 
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testimony because of her failure to submit a complete pretrial 

statement. This [c]ourt, however, discerned nothing in the record

before it that substantiated [] any of these assignments of error, 

omission or abuse of discretion. Since [Mother] was properly 

excluded from providing evidence and third-party testimony

pursuant to Local Rules 212.2 and 212.3(5), the record provides 

[Mother] scant evidence upon which to argue that the [m]aster’s 

handling of the admissible evidence and testimony was materially 

flawed. Presumably, the [m]aster’s [r]eport and 

[r]ecommendations would have been more fully informed had 

[Mother] submitted a complete pretrial statement and therefore 

been able to introduce elucidating exhibits and testimony; it was 

not reversible error, however, either for the [m]aster to have 

proceeded with the evidence before her, or for this [c]ourt to have 

affirmed and adopted the [m]aster’s [r]eport and 

[r]ecommendations.

TCO at 2-3.2 

Additionally, the trial court distinguishes the opinion in In re Estate of 

Ghaner, 779 A.2d 585 (Pa. Super. 2001), a case relied on by Mother, that 

discusses the judicial discretion allowed when formulating an appropriate 

sanction for failure to comply with a court order. In Ghaner, this Court held 

that precluding a party “from introducing any exhibits or testimony was an 

[in]appropriate sanction given the facts of record before [the court].” Id. at 

590. Here, the trial court explained that unlike the Ghaner case, Mother

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2 The pretrial order issued by the court prior to the master’s hearing indicated 

the information that was required to be included in the pretrial statement. 

See Pretrial Order, 1/18/18, at (2)(a)–(e). The order also stated that “[a] 

party who fails to comply with any requirements of paragraph 2(a) through 

2(e) of this order of court may not offer any testimony in support of claims for 

the matters covered in the paragraphs with which he has not complied, and 

any testimony offered in support of a claim for the matters covered in 

paragraphs 2(a) through 2(e) may not be inconsistent with or go beyond the 

fair scope of the information set forth in the pretrial statement.” Id. at (4). 
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had been put on notice by numerous motions court arguments 

and orders of court that full and complete responses were required 

to resolve the parties[’] complex support dispute. [Mother] had 

been repeatedly ordered to provide full and complete answers to 

interrogatories and pretrial discovery requests, and this [c]ourt 

believes that [Mother’s] subsequent failure to submit a complete 

pretrial statement provided sufficient evidence of obduracy on the 

part of [Mother] to justify the [m]aster’s decision to exclude 

[Mother’s] evidence and testimony. 

TCO at 3-4. 

Although the record supports this statement by the trial court, relating 

to Mother’s failures to respond to some court orders and to submit a complete 

pretrial statement, we are troubled by the court’s decision due to a lack of a 

discussion that includes its factual findings and credibility determinations. 

Rather than including a discussion about anything other than the sanction 

imposed upon Mother based on her failure to include information in one part 

of her pretrial statement (argued by Mother in her first issue), the court 

identified Mother’s list of exceptions and stated its conclusion that nothing in 

the record would support any of Mother’s alleged errors. Notably, the trial 

court’s statement regarding Mother’s challenge, relating to the “enforcement

of a purported agreement to reduce [Father’s] support obligation,” id. at 3, is 

not supported by any evidence in the record that the parties agreed to reduce 

support. Mother’s allegation relating to this omission is contained in her 

argument pertaining to her sixth issue. Moreover, it is evident that the trial 

court’s decision does not include a discussion about any of the other issues 

raised by Mother. 
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Therefore, we conclude that under the circumstances here, we must 

vacate the trial court’s order and remand the matter for further proceedings,

with the first determination to be directed at whether Mother should have been 

allowed to testify about the items that she did include in her pretrial 

statement. Moreover, if one of the parties appeals from the court’s new order 

deciding the matter, the court should provide a discussion of the facts and its 

credibility determinations in an opinion accompanying its order. For the 

reasons stated supra, we vacate the order on appeal and remand for further 

proceedings. 

Order vacated. Case remanded. Jurisdiction relinquished. 

Judgment Entered.

Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq.

Prothonotary

Date: 7/2/2020