Opinion ID: 1852434
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 11

Heading: Property Distribution Math Computation

Text: [¶ 23] Roland asserts the trial court erred in using valuations of the parties' property submitted by Jenese while not using any valuations submitted by Roland. The trial court's decisions in distributing marital property between spouses are findings of fact reviewed on appeal under the clearly erroneous standard. N.D.R.Civ.P. 52(a). A choice between two permissible views of the evidence is not clearly erroneous when the trial court's findings are based upon physical or documentary evidence, inferences from other facts, or on credibility determinations. Fox v. Fox, 2001 ND 88, ¶ 14, 626 N.W.2d 660. [¶ 24] In its initial findings of fact, the trial court summarized the total debt of the parties and understated that debt by $111,888. Consequently, we remanded the case to the trial court under N.D.R.App.P. 35(b) for reconsideration of the property distribution in light of the correct total debt amount. Upon remand the trial court corrected the total debt figure in its findings of fact and explained the error was a clerical error which had no adverse effect on the court's property distribution: The North Dakota Supreme Court has remanded this matter to this Court because the trial court understated the parties[`] debt by $111,888. This error was clerical, not substantive. In other words, the trial court, after a five day trial, was as aware of the parties' estate as it could be. The Court's ultimate debt and asset allocation was precisely as it intended. This fact is apparent in the specificity with which the Court, in both its original Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law, identified and allocated specific, enumerated debts. The only place in which the $111,888 error appears is in the totalling of the enumerated debt as set forth in the concise summary. .... The Court was well aware of this debt and allocated liability therefor[e] in the manner it intended. It simply made a clerical omission in failing to modify the debt total stated in the Summary. [¶ 25] Roland has failed to demonstrate that the trial court's clerical error in summarizing the total debt resulted in a clearly erroneous distribution of the marital property. The trial court has satisfactorily explained the error was strictly clerical, not substantive, and the trial court corrected the total debt amount in its findings entered after our remand. We conclude, therefore, the understatement of the total debt amount was merely a clerical mistake and does not constitute reversible error.