Court Opinion

ID: 9711270
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 04:27:43.435995+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:03.270273
License: Public Domain

HOFFMAN, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. First, I do not believe the motion to set aside the judgment alleging fraud and the existence of newly discovered evidence should have been treated as a motion to correct errors under these circumstances.
Second, the majority too broadly interprets the pertinent portions of the agreement. The sections, when taken together, require the parties to fully disclose the existence of assets. The husband had fully complied by disclosing his ownership of the stock. At no time did the husband value the stock. His failure to disclose that a possible merger could alter the wife’s valu*764ation of the stock cannot amount to constructive fraud because no duty existed. Even if the agreement could arguably give rise to a duty, the facts in the present case preclude such a finding. The husband could not be held accountable on the date of the agreement for a possible increase in the value of the stock based upon an event not certain to occur in the future.
Third, the majority and concurring opinions leave one with the impression that it is manifestly unfair for a party in a dissolution to fail to disclose a substantial change in valuation of assets which occurs in temporal proximity to the execution of the agreement. Fairness should not be measured in subjective terms which require more than compliance with the terms of the agreement.
By way of analogy, IND.CODE § 31-1-11.5-11 requires only that courts divide property acquired “prior to final separation of the parties” or that property acquired by joint efforts. The legislature has determined that no disclosure and division is required when the parties acquire additional property after the date of final separation but before the dissolution becomes final. It is the obvious intention of the legislature that some date certain serve as the point of termination, after which all claims by one estranged party to the other’s assets are extinguished. The parties in the present case had reached that point, even through the agreement.
For the foregoing reasons I would vote to affirm the trial court’s decision.