Opinion ID: 1979819
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: 1. Motion to reduce child support.

Text: López argues that the trial court abused its discretion by denying his second motion to reduce child support without considering his support payments for his other children since the denial of his first motion to reduce child support. Under the District of Columbia Code, a child support order may be modified upon a showing that there has been a substantial and material change in a party's ability to pay since the order was issued. See D.C.Code § 30-504(a) (1998); see also D.C.Code § 16-916.1( o )(10) (1997) (party may move to modify a child support order at any time). When a party seeks to modify an existing child support order, the trial court must conduct a hearing, make a finding, and enter a judgment pursuant to the child support guideline. See D.C.Code § 16-916.1(a). Whether a child support order should be modified is a question committed to the sound discretion of the trial court, and this court will not reverse absent a clear showing of abuse of discretion. Burnette v. Void, 509 A.2d 606, 608 (D.C.1986) (citation omitted). In this instance, the trial court did not conduct a full evidentiary hearing on López's motion to reduce his child support payments to Ysla, despite López's representations that he had documentation showing that he had made child support payments to Barbara Kolb, the mother of his three older children, between July 1994 and June 1995. [9] Instead, the trial court summarily denied López's second motion based on its belief that the motion, filed two weeks after the trial court's July 14, 1994 order denying López's first motion to reduce child support, was a frivolous attempt to relitigate the same issue. However, as López explained at the hearing, he filed the second motion soon after his first motion was denied in an attempt to ensure that any future reduction would be retroactive to the second motion's filing date of July 29, 1994. [10] See supra notes 6 and 7. This claim is supported by the language of the second motion, in which López recognizes the condition under which the trial court would be willing to entertain another motion to reduce, namely that he establish a consistent payment record of at least five months, but asks the court to make any future reduction retroactive to the July 29, 1994 filing date. In addition, in his second motion López requested a hearing on or about January 1, 1995, approximately five months from the motion's July 29, 1994 filing date. We consider it immaterial whether or not the trial judge authorized López to file a second motion to reduce child support. Court permission is not usually necessary before a litigant may seek judicial redress contemplated by law. Here, there was no prohibition on further filings, but rather a judicial cautionary note indicating that further motions to reduce would also be denied unless López proved his claim of competing child support payments by presenting a record of consistent payment of such other child support. In any event, the hearing on López's second motion was not in fact held until March 1, 1996, eighteen months after the motion was filed. At that hearing, the burden of proving changed circumstances was on López, as the party seeking modification. See Guyton v. Guyton, 602 A.2d 1143, 1145 (D.C.1992). The record supports that the trial court did not permit López to provide proof of changed circumstances based, apparently, on a misunderstanding regarding the basis for López's second motion. Although there is no doubt that the second motion was filed before López had established the required payment record, López appears to have renewed his motion immediately after the court's denial of his first motion to preserve his right to a retroactive reduction in payments, see D.C.Code § 30-504(c) (modification may be permitted for the period during which a petition for modification is pending), and stated that he was prepared, when the hearing was held eighteen months later, to prove his child support payments to Kolb. Therefore, we conclude that the trial court abused its discretion in denying López's second motion to reduce child support without first considering his alleged proof of child support payments between July 1994 and June 1995. [11]