Case Name: Annie E. BLOODWORTH, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. John BLOODWORTH, Defendant and Appellee
Court: Louisiana Court of Appeal
Jurisdiction: Louisiana
Decision Date: 1975-01-23
Citations: 306 So. 2d 812
Docket Number: No. 4837
Parties: Annie E. BLOODWORTH, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. John BLOODWORTH, Defendant and Appellee.
Judges: Before HOOD, CULPEPPER and MILLER, JJ.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 306
Pages: 812–816

Head Matter:
Annie E. BLOODWORTH, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. John BLOODWORTH, Defendant and Appellee.
No. 4837.
Court of Appeal of Louisiana, Third Circuit.
Jan. 23, 1975.
Watson, Murchison, Crews & Arthur, William P. Crews, Jr., Natchitoches, for plaintiff-appellant.
Brittain & Williams by Jack O. Brittain, Natchitoches, for defendant-appellee.
Before HOOD, CULPEPPER and MILLER, JJ.

Opinion:
CULPEPPER, Judge.
Plaintiff, Annie Bloodworth, appeals the judgment rejecting her demand for a judicial separation on the grounds of cruel treatment, and granting defendant John Bloodworth's reconventional demand for a separation on the grounds of cruelty. She also appeals the trial court's refusal to award alimony pendente lite.
The issues are factual and must be resolved on the basis of the credibility of the witnesses. In oral reasons dictated at the conclusion of the trial, the district judge stated he did not believe plaintiff and her witnesses. Instead, the trial judge believed the defendant and his impartial' witnesses who testified the cause of the marital difficulties was plaintiff's continued relationship with another man, Ellis Green.
Plaintiff denied that she even knew a man named Ellis Green. She testified that defendant had physically struck her several times. In particular, that on Wednesday, December 12, 1973, she was at home and defendant came in and accused her of having been out somewhere. She says she had been to her mother's house, but she had returned home. Nevertheless, she testified defendant started beating her with a belt. She fought back and threw a metal object at him, which cut his face.
Plaintiff testified that after the fight on Wednesday night she went to her mother's house, but later returned and slipped in a window and slept in the rear bedroom, while her husband slept in the front bedroom. She says that on the next night she again slept in the rear bedroom and he in the front. On Friday, December 14, 1973, she moved out of the house and has not returned since.
Plaintiff's father and her sister testified that on the night after the fight they saw plaintiff, and she was bruised and cut. They both denied they even knew Ellis Green.
The defendant husband testified they had been having marital difficulties for about two years because of plaintiff's continued affair with Ellis Green. He denies ever having struck her and says that he only held her in self-defense. Defendant testified he had seen his wife with Ellis Green on many occasions both before and after the separation on December 14, 1973. He demanded she stop seeing Green. She admitted seeing Green and did not stop.
As to the incident on Wednesday night, December 12, 1973, defendant testified he had been out of town working on a construction job and returned home about 11:00 p. m. and found the lights on and the telephone off the hook and evidence that someone had just left the house hurriedly. Soon after that, he saw Ellis Green's white pickup truck pass in fi'ont of his house and go to the back of plaintiff's father's house where it stopped and plaintiff got out. Shortly thereafter, plaintiff came in the front door. He asked where she had been and she stated it was none of his business, and she was grown and she could go and do what she pleased. The fight ensued. Then Ellis Green phoned and plaintiff left the house and got in Green's pickup truck. They left and she didn't come back that night.
The defendant testified that the next day, Thursday, December 13, 1973, plaintiff returned and they slept together in the same bed that night. On Friday, plaintiff left and has not since returned.
Two disinterested witnesses corroborated the defendant husband as to plaintiff frequently being with Green. Lillian Young testified that she flagged traffic on highway construction jobs and she had seen plaintiff in a white pickup truck with a man identified to her by Gussie Williams, her friend, as being Eddie Green. Some of these occasions were in May of 1974. She said she had also seen plaintiff with Green at a laundramat and on another occasion on a Sunday night in Green's truck near a drugstore.
Gussie Williams testified that she also worked flagging traffic for the Highway Department. She said she knew Green and knew his white pickup truck and she had seen plaintiff with Green in the truck several times during April and May of 1974. Gussie was with Lillian Young on the occasion when they saw them together near the drugstore at night.
The trial judge evaluated this ¡onflicting testimony as follows:
"This presents the Court with nothing more than a factual situation. I don't believe that the plaintiff is truthful in saying that she didn't have anything to do with Ellis Green. The plaintiff and her father and her sister all deny knowing anything having to do with Ellis Green. However, we have two witnesses here who are not related to either of these parties, both testifying that they saw plaintiff with Ellis Green. Therefore, it is my opinion that there should be judgment in favor of John Blood-worth and against Annie Bloodworth, granting to him a legal separation."
An appellate court must give great weight to factual conclusions of the trier of fact. Where there is conflict in the testimony, reasonable evaluations of credibility and reasonable inferences of fact should not be disturbed upon review, Canter v. Koehring Company, La., 283 So.2d 716 (1973).
In the present case there is clearly a reasonable evidentiary basis to support the trial judge's decision to discredit the testimony of the plaintiff and to accept that of the defendant husband. Under defendant's testimony, as corroborated by the two impartial witnesses, the acts of the wife constituted mental cruelty justifying a judgment of separation in favor of the husband. In Carriere v. Carriere, 147 So. 2d 668 (La.App. 3rd Cir. 1962), we held that the conduct of the husband in persistently absenting himself from home without explanation and under circumstances giving rise to a suspicion that he was involved with another woman, was sufficient grounds for a separation on the grounds of mental cruelty. In Gallagher v. Gallagher, 190 So.2d 916 (La.App. 2d Cir. 1966), the court held that the husband's conduct in consistently absenting himself from the wife and from the matrimonial domicile, in engaging' in social drinking w;ih other women and in being cold and indifferent toward his wife, constituted mental cruelty.
In the present case, the plaintiff wife had been going out with Ellis Green for a period of about two years. Defendant asked her to stop seeking Green, but she refused and continued the affair. She saw Green frequently without defendant's knowledge and under circumstances which reasonably led the defendant to believe that she and Green were engaged in an illicit relationship.
Counsel have not briefed the effect of any possible reconciliation which might have occurred on the night of Thursday, December 13, 1973. Of course, if as defendant testified, the parties actually slept together, there was a reconciliation, and the plaintiff wife could not urge as grounds for her demand for separation any prior acts of cruelty. There is no evidence of any acts of cruelty by the husband after the reconciliation. On the other hand, the husband testified that after the reconciliation he saw plaintiff with Ellis Green on several occasions, and this testimony is corroborated by the two disinterested witnesses. This continued affair with Ellis Green after the reconciliation constituted new grounds for separation, as to which the evidence of prior relationships was admissible for the purpose of corroboration, LSA-C.C. Article 153; Maynor v. Maynor, 234 So.2d 426 (La.App. 1st Cir. 1970).
The final issue concerns the trial judge's rejection of plaintiff's demand for alimony pendente lite. The plaintiff wife testified she works for the public schools as a home visitor in the "Follow Through Program". She earns a gross of $399 per month and take-home pay of $307 per month. At the time of the trial, she was living in a rent house, apparently owned by plaintiff and defendant, and was not paying any rent. She listed total living expenses of $610 per month.
The defendant husband is a cement worker on construction jobs and earns an average gross wage of $500 to $600 per month. He claims monthly expenses of $702.
Under LSA-C.C. Article 148 the wife is entitled to alimony pending the suit for separation, proportioned to her needs and the means of her husband. She is entitled to this alimony regardless of whether she is at fault in the separation. The trial judge indicated he rejected the wife's demand for alimony pendente lite because she was at fault in the separation. This is error. Under the circumstances of this case we find the wife should receive $75 per month as alimony pendente lite.
For the reasons assigned, the judgment appealed is amended to award the plaintiff wife the sum of $75 per month as alimony pendente lite under LSA-C.C. Article 148. Otherwise the judgment is affirmed. All costs of this appeal are assessed against the defendant husband, as head and master of the community.
Affirmed as amended.
MILLER, J., concurs in part, dissents in part and assigns written reasons.