Source: https://familylaw.typepad.com/virginiafamilylawappeals/premarital_prenuptial_antemarital_agreements/
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 06:23:36+00:00

Document:
In Kellogg v. Green, Va. S.Ct. 2/22/18, an amended prenup was incorporated, but not merged, into a divorce decree. The ex-wife reopened the divorce case and sought a Rule to Show Cause, claiming the ex-husband owed her money under the agreement. The court declined to issue a rule, saying the agreement did not say "when, where or in what form payment of any amount due shall be performed." Wife then sued for breach of contract on the same grounds. Husband pled res judicata, and the trial court agreed. Wife protested that the rejection of the Rule to Show Cause was not a final order, as the court had kept the case on the active docket for further enforcement of the agreements.
A party whose claim for relief arising from identified conduct, a transaction, or an occurrence, is decided on the merits by a final judgment, shall be forever barred from prosecuting any second or subsequent civil action against the same opposing party or parties on any claim or cause of action that arises from that same conduct, transaction or occurrence, whether or not the legal theory or rights asserted in the second or subsequent action were raised in the prior lawsuit, and regardless of the legal elements or the evidence upon which any claims in the prior proceeding depended, or the particular remedies sought.
A final judgment is essential to the imposition of res judicata to bar a claim. Norris v. Mitchell, 255 Va. 235, 239, 495 S.E.2d 809, 812 (1998). A decree that enters judgment for a party is not final if it “expressly provides that the court retains jurisdiction to reconsider the judgment or to address other matters still pending in the action before it.” Super Fresh Food Mkts. v. Ruffin, 263 Va. 555, 561, 561 S.E.2d 734, 737 (2002); see also Johnson v. Woodard, 6 281 Va. 403, 409-10, 707 S.E.2d 325, 328 (2011) (“[A] circuit court may avoid the application of the 21-day time period in Rule 1:1 by including specific language stating that the court is retaining jurisdiction to address matters still pending before the court.”). A decree is final only when it disposes of the whole subject, gives all the relief that is contemplated and leaves nothing to be done by the court in the cause except its ministerial execution. Where further action of the court in the cause is necessary to give completely the relief contemplated by the court, the decree is not final but interlocutory. Brooks v. Roanoke Cty. Sanitation Auth., 201 Va. 934, 936, 114 S.E.2d 758, 760 (1960) (citations omitted).
The Show Cause Order did not contain any language to indicate that it was a final order regarding the enforceability of the Agreements; there was no language indicating that there was nothing further to be done in the action. There was no language in the Show Cause Order which would bar the filing of a subsequent show cause petition or the attempted enforcement of the Agreements in some other manner. Thus, the Show Cause Order did not render a final judgment concerning the enforceability of the Agreements.
But that could have easily gone the other way, on the finality issue. If the trial court had written that the denial of the Rule to Show Cause petition was final because a contract action would be in a separate suit, and had not kept the case open for anything else, that would been a final order. That would have led to an unfair result, because a contract obligation that does not include enough specifics to be enforceable as contempt of court can still be an obligation which a court could interpret and enforce. Especially with the court's powers under 20-107.3(K). This particular obligation was to pay the wife $5,000 for every year of marriage.
At the end of the opinion, the Supreme Court once again reminds us that its holding in Lee v. Spoden, 290 Va. 235, 776 S.E.2d 798 (2015), in which a contempt proceeding created res judicata, requires a judgment that was not only final, but was on the merits.
An appeal of a court's interpretation and enforcement of a prenup was dismissed for naming as appellee the estate of the ex-husband, instead of the estate's "personal representative", in Loewinger v. Estate of Loewinger (Va. Court of Appeals, 10/21/14).
It's rare, at least in family law, that "misnomer" is a fatal error. This ruling, while harsh, is at least clear and teaches future litigants what they have to do. The appellant had asked the trial court for leave to substitute the estate as a party in the case, but that did not justify any deference or mercy from the Court of Appeals.
“'[A]ll suits and actions must be prosecuted by and against living parties, in either an individual or representative capacity.' ... because '[t]here must be such parties to the record as can be affected by the judgment and from whom obedience can be compelled'”, the Court says, quoting Rennolds v. Williams, 147 Va. 196, 198, 136 S.E. 597, 597 (1927).
"Code § 8.01-229(B)(1) and (B)(2) 'direct [a] decedent’s personal representative to file any personal action which the decedent may have been entitled to bring and to defend any personal action which could be brought against the decedent.' Swann v. Marks, 252 Va. 181, 184, 476 S.E.2d 170, 171 (1996) (emphasis added). This limitation is further highlighted by the language of Code § 8.01-229(B) 'which allows claims to be filed against the property of the estate, but provides that actions may only be filed against the decedent’s personal representative.' Appellant was required under Code § 8.01-229(B)(2) to name Loewinger’s personal representative, not his estate, as the party in interest in the present case."
The fact that this was a suit on a contract, i.e. the prenup, and the timing of the death relative to the timing of the suit, the lower court ruling, and the appeal, also seem to the Court to be relevant to the outcome.
In Harris v. Harris (9/30/14), the Court of Appeals upholds a Circuit Court ruling rejects a fraud challenge filed several months after a final divorce decree, which was agreed-on and incorporated a postmarital agreement. The husband claimed the wife had failed to disclose several debts in the postnup, he only started finding out about them a few months after the divorce, and he would not have signed the postnup if he had known. But he trial court said husband could have raised his fraud claims during the divorce process, so he cannot now. The Court of Appeals says that "nothing in the recorrd suggests otherwise."
The postnup was really a separation agreement; it was made three years after the couple had separated permanently, and shortly before the divorce. The agreement had a clause about after-discovered assets and liabilities, but apparently it did not help. The opinion does not disclose whether the debts were ones that actually affected the husband, nor any of the facts or claims in the controversy over whether the husband should have known of the debts at the time of the agreement, except that it quotes the wife's cliam that if he had undertaken a minimal investigation into his own financial situation, he would have discovered them. The wife's counsel used a "plea in bar" successfully to narrow down the issues and dispose of the case. So in that process no evidence was taken, and the husband's case was rejected even with all his factual claims taken as true.
Although a "res judicata" does not apply when extrinsic fraud is proven, it does apply here because such fraud is "conduct that prevents a fair submission of the controversy to the court." The Court relied on Ellett v. Ellett (2001) which is said was very similar.
The appeals court declined to award wife fees on appeal.
Laches was mentioned but not addressed because it was not "the best and narrowest ground available".
SEPARATION AGREEMENTS – SET-ASIDE – UNCONSCIONABILITY -- UNDUE INFLUENCE – $10,000/MONTH FROM $12,000 INCOME -- SEPARATION AGREEMENT AS “GOOD-FAITH” TOKEN ALLOWING RECONCILIATION -- ENFORCEMENT NOTWITHSTANDING REPRESENTATIONS. - Va.Ct.
A trial court’s refusal to enforce a rather dubious separation agreement was reversed because the Court of Appeals found no undue influence (and nothing unconscionable) where the trial judge had found plenty. Though apparently it was proved that the doctor’s monthly income was $12,066, and the contractual alimony was $10,000. Soon after the husband left home the couple had seen a priest, who told H that W was demanding a signed separation agreement as a precondition of reconciliation “as a sign of his good faith,” and that she would not enforce it, but six months after getting it ratified by a court, W brought a support enforcement Rule to Show Cause against H. The Record, the Court says, does not show that W engaged in deception. Nor was there “pecuniary necessity,” as this is a middle-aged male physician, who can always go out and make “a significant salary.” Guirguis v. Salib, unpublished, (1/15/13).
Cruelty to Husband; proven through Wife's previous charges - Va.Ct.App.
CRUELTY – SUFFICIENT FACTS. It’s not that rare for divorce a party’s claims of cruelty as a divorce ground to be accepted, but when it’s a husband’s claim, it is still newsworthy. And of course this wasn’t one of those disgraceful “ mental cruelty” claims that the appellate courts grudgingly accept once in a blue moon, but which shameless lawyers file all the time. No, this husband who proved his divorce ground that way was a battered one. And what kind of factual evidence did it take to bring off this highly unusual feat? Well it seems that husband married, with a prenup, a woman who had entered the US in 2003, and whom he met in 2007, while representing her in an immigration case. The romance continued in court, where she did not contest her first charge of assaulting and battering the husband (2007). She got probation on the second (2009). Wife got off when she was charged again in 2010, and the parties separated. When she was arrested for the same thing in 2011, the husband filed for divorce and the divorce court took notice of the battering, and considered it more seriously. It found husband’s grounds proved, awarding husband custody of the child they had had by that time, and enforced the antenuptial contract. A male actually got a cruelty divorce with just those facts? (Which seems to have been the argument of the still-unrelenting wife as she challenged the sufficiency of the facts on appeal.) No, of course not: there’s more, of course, and it was significant in convincing the Court of Appeals on appeal. As the Court reads and explains the statute and its case-law interpretations in its opinion, it requires something tending to bodily harm which renders cohabitation unsafe to life, limb or health. Well? …. Husband and his mother had testified that wife’s years of physical and verbal abuse had made the husband afraid to even speak in her presence, creating an unbearable living situation in his home,and making cohabitation unsafe. The Court says the law requires “only slight” corroboration here, because no collusion was shown, and it’s furnished by the three assault and battery charges, wife’s propensity for violence, and photos husband showed of his injuries. A cop and Husband’s mother testified. Well of course wife claimed husband had threatened her (with deportation), and that that made her attacks all right. But the trial court was not required to believe that, nor to grant the divorce on no-fault grounds, as she demanded. Ibrayeva v. Kublan, R. No. 1120-12-4, unpublished (12/11/12).
Prenup boilerplate precludes most challenges; 6-figure disclosure error not fatal in context - Va. Ct. App.
PREMARITAL AGREEMENTS – DISCLOSURE – STANDARD FOR PROVING FRAUD OR NON-DISCLOSURE – ESTOPPEL — CLAIMED REVOCATION/REPUDIATION OF AGREEMENT – SUPPORT — MODIFICATION RETROACTIVITY — DISCOVERY — UNUSUAL DISCOVERY ORDER UPHELD. The Court of Appeals in Makoui v. Makoui, unpublished, 26 VLW 726, 11/22/11, upholds a premarital agreement whose disclosure attachment valued stock at $68,000, even though the owner spouse testified that at the time of the agreement it was worth $250,000 to $300,000.
Husband had told the wife that he had torn up the agreement when she demanded to see a copy of it. But that does not estop him from later asserting his rights under the agreement, the Court says. Although it seems he had lied about this, the trial court didn’t find that the wife proved that she had relied upon that misrepresentation in any way, and that if she had, that reliance would have been unreasonable. Both Code §20-153 and the prenup’s terms say that a prenup can be revoked or amended only by a written instrument. And “wife was charged with knowledge of both the applicable statute ... and the terms of the agreement.” A useful reminder to make sure that clients have read and understood “boilerplate” provisions, and the statutes that lay out the framework, ground rules and limitations of the agreements they are entering.
The husband cross appealed because he had filed for a modification of pendente lite spousal support, and when the court granted that modification from $5,000 to $1,000 per month it did not make it retroactive to the date he filed the motion. The Court of Appeals upholds, as “husband could have avoided the accrual of the arrearage if he had acted in a timely fashion.” So filing for modification so as to enable a change to be retroactive to the filing date, but then not setting it for hearing, can be dangerous.
AGREEMENTS — ANTENUPTIAL CONTRACTS — VALIDITY — ATTACK BY FOREIGN-BORN SPOUSE. Beginning to let these matters get mighty complicated, the Virginia Court of Appeals made some very precise distinctions and rulings for the first time when it reviewed Chaplain v. Chaplain, the case of a complaining wife originally from Morocco trying to overturn her pre-nuptial agreement. After that remand, with all sorts of directions for the trial judge to examine certain issues, or examine them in a different way, it now had to hear a second appeal by this wife because she was even more unlucky when the judge below did a very patient and very thorough job with all the requisite determinations and ultimately held the agreement valid. The Court of Appeals now does the same kind of scrupulously objective job with great thoroughness in Chaplain v. Chaplain II, unpublished, 25 VLW 931 (1/18/11), reviewing every possible issue, one by one. You may remember that the wife said her English wasn’t very good, so that merely finding that the husband was honest and open about everything at the time of marriage, the trial court could justifiably find that she married him in order to get his money and U.S. citizenship and had actually let it be known that she planned to lie about her understanding of what was going on at the time of the agreement if there should ever be a divorce. The Court of Appeals had ruled last time that husband did not make sufficient disclosure of his property holdings and wife had not waived her statutory right to disclosure before signing. And the Court of Appeals now says that the decision below sustaining the agreement would in fact be wrong if the evidence had proved either that the agreement was unconscionable at the time or that it was not fully voluntary. In this framework the Court of Appeals reviews the evidence in great detail. It finds that this wife spoke and understood English quite well back then, and it gives fully detailed findings as to why, so that lawyers taking on such a dispute in future cases might use these indices as a checklist. Before the marriage she read newspapers and menus in English, wrote business letters in English for husband, and was able to converse without a translator, dictionary or phrase book on some complicated subjects. The evidence also established that she had said that if there should ever be a divorce she would lie about all this, and the evidence also supported the finding that she had not proved any kind of physical or mental limitations or any financial oppression brought to bear so that the contract would be unconscionable. All the circumstances of her meeting up with her future husband during a vacation trip from Morocco here are reviewed, as is wife’s 15 or more years’ office experience in Morocco before that, her college education, and her preparation of business letters and other business documents in English once here. It was proved that she had the intellectual capacity to understand what the agreement would mean and she never proved at trial that she didn’t have at the time of the agreement the ability to support herself either over here or over there. The Court found no evidence of bad faith, concealment, misrepresentation, undue advantage or bullying on the husband’s part. And even though he did not completely disclose his financial condition, that alone is not enough to prove any of those necessary elements. The evidence proves she knew exactly what was in the agreement before signing, and had plenty of chance to consult with independent legal counsel if she had wanted. Nor was there any evidence of gross disparity in assets. In fact, the agreement said that the parties would keep their separate assets in the event of a future divorce as separate property. At this point the Court of Appeals says that even if the evidence below had proved a gross disparity of assets, that would not have made it unconscionable nor have established oppression or overreaching. The trial court’s finding that wife signed the agreement voluntarily was also well supported by the evidence, and hence the Court of Appeals affirmed.
MARRIAGE – CONTRACT ENFORCEMENT – IRANIAN PREMARITAL CONTRACT.
Do the Virginia courts want to get into the tricky business of construing and enforcing Iranian marriage contracts? Apparently so. When the Fairfax Circuit Court enforced such a contract, it construed it as being a premarital contract, and as requiring husband to pay wife 514 gold coins known as Bahar-E-Azadis, and held it valid and enforced it. Husband’s various claims on appeal included that it was wrong for the court to admit this document into evidence, along with a BBC Multilingual English translation. But Aha!: husband didn’t sufficiently note his objections at trial so as to satisfy Rule 5A:18. The appellate court can’t really tell what his objections were, and the same goes for his objection that the contract is fatally vague on its face unless bolstered by expert testimony.
Now as to letting the wife be her own expert and testify as to Iranian and Islamic law, it appears that her testimony was simply that she was owed these 514 gold coins as her marriage price and could demand them at any time, i.e., testimony about the terms of a contract she was a party to, so no problem there. (It’s not a case, like some that lawyers see, calling for payment in goats or camels, but one calling for money in the form of gold). Nor can this enforcement be faulted under Code §20-107.3, because this was not an equitable distribution, but merely a judgment that wife had a valid right to that gold under the contract. Afghahi v. Ghafoorian, unpublished, 24 Va. Lawyers Weekly 1189 (3/30/10).

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