Opinion ID: 1669017
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Did the chancellor commit manifest error in failing to award appellant past-due child support, past-due medical expenses, and attorney's fees?

Text: The real question presented to this Court is whether or not the lower court erred in declining to enforce the provisions of the former decree fixing child support for Paul Gee Swartzfager, III, at $200.00 per month, in failing to find appellee in contempt for not paying the support and medical expenses, and in dismissing the petition. The appellee cites Cole v. Hood, 371 So.2d 861 (Miss. 1979), relied upon by the lower court in denying relief. In that case, the ex-wife and her new husband, on cross-examination, admitted that they had purposely concealed the child from the father, who had no knowledge of their whereabouts and did everything in his power to locate them. That case is distinguished from the facts of the present case. Here, the appellant declined to give appellee their exact address and wanted to communicate with him through her relatives. [1] There was evidence of telephone calls to appellee by the boy. Appellee knew where appellant's relatives were, and it is indicated that he knew generally where his former wife and child resided. Under the facts, the appellee could have taken proper steps to relieve himself from the support payments. The court probably would have directed him what, if anything, should be done toward discontinuing the support payments. The court could have entered an order relieving him from making the payments, or holding the payments in abeyance, or other alternatives. The lower court entered an order in 1976 for the payment of the support and, under the facts of this case, we think that the court had no authority to relieve appellant from payment of accrued child support. In Howard v. Howard, 191 So.2d 528 (Miss. 1966), which involved a contempt situation for nonpayment of support, the chancellor found appellant was not in contempt for his failure to pay the amounts due but adjudicated the amounts in arrears. The Court held that, as the payments became due, they became fixed and constituted a judgment against the appellant. See also Duncan v. Duncan, 417 So.2d 908 (Miss. 1982). We hold that the appellee here was not in contempt of the court for failure to make the payments but that, since the payments had become fixed as they were due, the appellant is entitled to a judgment against the appellee in the sum of $7,140.00. We further hold that, inasmuch as the record does not indicate appellee was furnished with medical bills or willfully declined to carry medical insurance covering the child, the chancellor should be affirmed on that issue. The chancellor is also affirmed on his denial of attorney's fees under the peculiar facts of this case where the appellant spirited away the child of the parties from Laurel, Mississippi, and failed to seek the court's enforcement of the provisions of the decree until after the boy became eighteen years of age, at which age he was permitted to reside with his father. AFFIRMED IN PART, REVERSED AND RENDERED IN PART. PATTERSON, C.J., WALKER and BROOM, P.JJ., and BOWLING, HAWKINS, PRATHER and ROBERTSON, JJ., concur. DAN M. LEE, J., dissents.