Court Opinion

ID: 9741726
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 21:01:05.8728+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:25.685389
License: Public Domain

MORGAN, Justice
(dissenting).
I dissent from that portion of the majority opinion that affirms the judgment of contempt that is wholly unsupported by adequate findings.
Further, in reviewing the record I do not find sufficient acts on the part of the defendant that would in my opinion support a finding of willful or contumacious disobedience so as to constitute contempt, which I consider a serious offense.* The nonpayment of medical bills which were covered by insurance was explained. The reduction in support payments when one child left the plaintiff’s custody was in accord with the decreed provision. The fact that the defendant didn’t employ counsel to come into court and secure a “paper approval” appeared to be dictated more by finances than by contumacity or willfulness. Defendant was absolved of part of the charge of getting property out of the house and as to the other, it was so minor as to be frivolous. As to the alleged irregularity in the support payments which didn’t appear to me to be all that irregular, the trial court finally availed itself of the remedy of requiring payments to the clerk of courts, a remedy it could have exercised long before it did.
I would hold contempt punishment for far more important deviations.
I am authorized to state that Chief Justice WOLLMAN joins in this dissent.

 Lacking the finding that the acts on the part of the defendant were willful or contumacious I do not feel constrained to follow the clearly erroneous rule under which we usually review the trial court’s findings.