Opinion ID: 2505374
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Return of Money

Text: In their brief before this Court, petitioners maintain that the trial court and the Court of Appeals erred in requiring them to return the entire $28,800 to respondent because this result does not give them credit for bills paid on respondent's behalf out of these funds. We disagree. The trial court found that petitioner Burbage removed $73,800 from a joint account at Carolina First in five separate transactions between October 24, 2006, and January 4, 2007, depositing all monies into her own account. Viewed in the light most favorable to petitioners, there is a passage in Ms. Burbage's deposition where she stated that the two transfers in December 2006 totaling $4,800 into her money market account would have been paid to the nursing facility where respondent lived until December 2006. However, the only evidence of the nursing home bill was respondent's testimony that it was around $2,000 per month. A review of the partial bank records in the Appendix suggests that the December 2006 nursing home charge was paid from the joint checking account on November 14, 2006. There is no evidence that any January 2007 nursing home bill was paid at all, much less that it was paid from Burbage's money market account, especially as respondent had left the facility before January 1, 2007. The trial court's order is silent on the issue whether petitioners were entitled to an offset against the funds admittedly moved out of respondent's account for monies spent for respondent's care. In their appellate brief, however, petitioners argued that [t]he [circuit] court erred in ordering the return of any funds which had been expended in support of [respondent]. Then, as now, petitioners are unable to specify evidence of any such payments in the appellate record. The Court of Appeals held that petitioners' claim for a credit against the money Burbage took from the Carolina First account was not preserved for direct appeal since the petitioners never argued to the circuit court that any of these funds were used for respondent's care. On certiorari, petitioners contend the Court of Appeals erred in finding this claim not preserved. We disagree. In order to preserve an issue for appellate review, a party must both raise that issue to the trial court and obtain a ruling. E.g., Linda Mc Co., Inc. v. Shore, 390 S.C. 543, 703 S.E.2d 499 (2010). Here, petitioners did neither, and the Court of Appeals properly declined to address this claim. Moreover, a careful review of the record discloses no evidence that any of the monies transferred to petitioner Burbage's account and then to her siblings was actually expended on their father's care.