Court Opinion

ID: 9633290
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 11:42:07.701779+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:16:04.381826
License: Public Domain

SUMMERS, Justice,
dissenting, with whom WILSON, Chief Justice, joins.
I respectfully dissent. In my opinion the bankruptcy which occurred after the original divorce decree resulting in discharge of the property settlement still owing to the wife is sufficient to amount to a change of condition warranting modification of the divorce decree.
Title 48 O.S.Supp.1991 § 134 reads in relevant part:
D. Except as other wise provided in subsection C of this section, the provisions of any divorce decree pertaining to the payment of alimony as support may be modified upon proof of changed circumstances relating to the need for support or ability to support which are substantial and continuing so as to make the terms of the decree unreasonable to either party. Only those installments accruing subsequent to the motion for modification may be modified. (emphasis added)
The majority reads this section to permit modification only when alimony has been allowed in the first instance. I do not read the statute so narrowly. The first sentence of the statute expressly states that any provision pertaining to alimony may be modified. The statute does not limit such modifications to those instances in which alimony has been granted. In the present case the decree contained a provision stating that alimony was not proper, because both parties could support themselves. Thus, there was a provision in the decree pertaining to alimony. Nothing in § 134 forbids this trial court’s consideration of alimony modification if the proper circumstances have been shown.
Courts have repeatedly and uniformly held that a bankruptcy discharge of a property settlement can amount to a change of circumstances warranting a modification in support alimony. Richardson v. Richardson, 868 P.2d 259 (Wyoming 1994); Siragusa v. Siragusa, 27 F.3d 406 (9th Cir.1994); Low v. Low, 777 S.W.2d 936 (Ky.1989); In re Marriage of Myers, 54 Wash.App. 233, 773 P.2d 118 (1989); Eckert v. Eckert, 144 Wis.2d 770, 424 N.W.2d 759 (App.1988); Coakley v. Coakley, 400 N.W.2d 436 (Minn.Ct.App.1987) See also Borzillo v. Borzillo, 259 N.J.Super. 286, 612 A.2d 958 (1992)(attorney’s fees incurred as a result of defending a bankruptcy discharge can amount to a change of condition). In Siragusa v. Siragusa, 108 Nev. 987, 843 P.2d 807 (1992)(related to the above cited case), the Nevada Supreme Court held that a husband’s property settlement obligation which had been discharged in bankruptcy could be considered a change of condition. There, the wife filed a motion for the modification of the divorce decree after the husband obtained a bankruptcy discharge of his property settlement obligations to her. The husband urged that a modification of the support alimony provisions would result in a re-imposition of debt that had been discharged by a bankruptcy court. The Nevada Supreme Court held that it indeed resulted in a change of circumstances, and that federal law did not prohibit the modification of a support alimony provision.
Similarly, in the present case Section 134 does not prohibit the modification of a provision if there is a sufficient showing that circumstances have changed and that the terms of the decree have become “unreasonable” with regard to either party. Traczyk v. Traczyk, 891 P.2d 1277 (Okla.1995). Al*828though the majority relies on Jones v. Jones, 402 P.2d 272 (Okla.1965) to support the proposition that a divorce decree cannot be modified to add a provision which was omitted, Jones has no application in the present case. Here, there was a provision in the decree pertaining to and denying support alimony. Modification of this provision does not require the addition of a provision; it merely changes the one already in existence.
I would answer the federal certified question in the affirmative.