Court Opinion

ID: 9780952
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 14:08:18.700891+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:09:42.290039
License: Public Domain

Third District Court of Appeal
                               State of Florida

                        Opinion filed August 30, 2023.
       Not final until disposition of timely filed motion for rehearing.

                            ________________

                             No. 3D22-2216
                       Lower Tribunal No. 07-15687
                          ________________

                             Marcia Stivelman,
                                Appellant,

                                     vs.

                       Jacques Claudio Stivelman,
                               Appellee.

     An Appeal from the Circuit Court for Miami-Dade County, Ivonne
Cuesta, Judge.

     Lorenzen Law, P.A., and Dirk Lorenzen, for appellant.

      Nancy A. Hass, P.A., and Nancy A. Hass, (Fort Lauderdale), for
appellee.

Before EMAS, SCALES and HENDON, JJ.

     SCALES, J.
      Appellant Marcia Stivelman (“Former Wife”) appeals a November 30,

2022 order of the trial court granting the motion of appellee Jacques C.

Stivelman (“Former Husband”) for a setoff of Former Husband’s monthly

alimony payments against a debt that Former Wife owed and failed to pay

Former Husband (“setoff order”). Upon careful consideration, we vacate the

setoff order because the lower court lacked case jurisdiction to enter this

challenged order.

      On July 5, 2021, Former Wife filed an appeal in this Court challenging:

(i) a January 7, 2021 order modifying the alimony obligation of Former

Husband (“modification order”); and (ii) a related June 10, 2021 order

concluding that the alimony modification would be retroactive (“retroactivity

order”) (Case No. 3D21-1404; “Stivelman I”). The retroactivity order

contained language, whereby it appears the trial court sought to reserve

jurisdiction to quantify the amount of retroactive alimony to be awarded. 1

1
  The retroactivity order contains the following language: [“T]he Court directs
the Former Husband to calculate the retroactive amount relative to his
overpayment of alimony based on this Court’s . . . [modification order]. Once
the retroactive amounts are calculated, the Court directs the Former
Husband to include the amount in a Notice of Filing so the Court may amend
the . . . [modification order].” The trial court’s language plainly envisions
further judicial labor, thus it is possible that neither the alimony order nor the
retroactivity order was an appealable final order. S.L.T. Warehouse Co. v.
Webb, 304 So. 2d 97, 99 (Fla. 1974) (“Generally, the test employed by the
appellate court to determine finality of an order, judgment or decree is
whether the order in question constitutes an end to the judicial labor in the

                                        2
       On July 6, 2021, the day after Former Wife filed her Stivelman I notice

of appeal, the trial court entered an order quantifying the amount of

retroactive alimony due as $410,756.56 ($375,226.36, plus $35,531.20 in

accrued interest) (“quantification order”).

      Notwithstanding what appears to be the trial court’s attempt, in the

retroactivity order, to “reserve jurisdiction” to enter the quantification order,

in all likelihood, Former Wife’s filing of her July 5, 2021 notice of appeal

(challenging the modification order and the retroactivity order) deprived the

lower court of case jurisdiction to enter the quantification order. See Spencer

v. DiGiacomo, 56 So. 3d 92, 93-94 (Fla. 4th DCA 2011) (holding that a trial

court loses jurisdiction after a notice of appeal has been filed, with limited

exceptions). Neither party requested the Stivelman I Court to relinquish

jurisdiction to allow the trial court to enter the quantification order. As outlined

below, (and referenced in footnote 1, above), however, this jurisdictional

issue was likely rendered moot by our decision in Stivelman I.

      While Stivelman I was pending in this Court, the trial court, albeit

without jurisdiction to do so, continued to adjudicate matters that are

cause, and nothing further remains to be done by the court to effectuate a
termination of the cause as between the parties directly affected.”). As
discussed below, though, this issue was rendered moot by our Stivelman I
holding.

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inextricably intertwined with, and dependent upon, the modification order

and retroactivity order that were under review in Stivelman I. Specifically, on

November 30, 2022, the trial court rendered the setoff order that is the

subject of this appeal (Case No. 3D22-2216; “Stivelman II”). The setoff order

requires Former Wife to pay Former Husband the alimony amount

adjudicated in the quantification order by way of setoffs from future alimony

payments due from Former Husband to Former Wife. On December 23,

2022, Former Wife filed her notice of appeal of the setoff order.

      On February 8, 2023, we rendered our opinion in Stivelman I, and

reversed both the modification order and the retroactivity order because

neither order contained the findings mandated by Section 61.08 of the

Florida Statutes (2021). Stivelman v. Stivelman, 355 So. 3d 1021, 1023 (Fla.

3d DCA 2023). Because of our Stivelman I holding, we did not reach Former

Wife’s arguments on the merits. 2      We remanded the case for further

2
   Our Stivelman I opinion inadvertently characterized the appealed
retroactivity order as having “awarded Former Husband $375,225.36,
representing the alimony overpayment, plus prejudgment interest, for a total
of $410,756.56.” Id. at 1022. As stated, supra, though, the trial court’s
quantification of the retroactive alimony amount did not occur until the
rendering of the quantification order, an order rendered after the Stivelman I
notice of appeal was filed. While Former Wife purported to include the
quantification order in the Stivelman I appeal – by virtue of a July 20, 2021
amended notice of appeal identifying the quantification order as a challenged
order – because of our Stivelman I holding, this Court never reviewed the
quantification order.

                                      4
proceedings in the lower court consistent with Stivelman I. Id. at 1023.

Neither party sought rehearing, and this Court’s Stivelman I mandate issued

on February 24, 2023. Hence, it was not until February 24, 2023, that the

trial court regained case jurisdiction to decide issues related to the orders

challenged in Stivelman I. See Anton v. State, 976 So. 2d 6, 8 (Fla. 2d DCA

2008) (“Under Florida law, it is appellate court action – i.e., the issuance of

the mandate – that returns jurisdiction to the trial court.”).

      Former Wife filed her Stivelman II initial brief on January 3, 2023,

Former Husband’s filed his answer brief on June 7, 2023, and Former Wife

filed her reply brief on July 6, 2023. The case is now fully briefed and before

the merits panel.

      We do not, though, reach the merits of the trial court’s entry of the

setoff order. We are compelled, rather, to vacate the setoff order, because

Former Wife’s July 5, 2021 notice of appeal in Stivelman I divested the trial

court of case jurisdiction to further adjudicate the challenged setoff order.

See Herbits v. City of Miami, 197 So. 3d 575, 579 (Fla. 3d DCA 2016)

(holding that, because a notice of appeal divested the trial court of

jurisdiction, any subsequent order was null and void). 3

3
  In Stivelman II, on March 9, 2023, shortly after the Stivelman I mandate
was issued, Former Wife unsuccessfully sought to have this Court relinquish
jurisdiction to allow the trial court to vacate the setoff order in light of our

                                        5
      The instant case’s muddled procedural history provides the precise

rationale for this rule. Obviously, given our reversal in Stivelman I of both the

modification order and the retroactivity order, any appellate review of the

setoff order (or the quantification order) would be conditional, at best, and at

worse, a prohibited advisory opinion. See Younkin v. Blackwelder, 331 So.

3d 686, 689 (Fla. 2021).

      The lower court docket reveals that the trial court has not yet, on

remand from Stivelman I, entered new modification or retroactivity orders;

and, the trial court may, in fact, revisit its earlier adjudications of the motions

that resulted in those orders. An affirmance or a reversal opinion of the setoff

order issued at this time by this Court could improperly influence the trial

court’s consideration of the precursor issues that the trial court must revisit

based on our Stivelman I remand instructions. Similarly, from a practical

perspective, those precursor issues should be adjudicated on remand from

Stivelman I by the trial court before a subsequent, interdependent issue

(setoff) is adjudicated by this Court. Indeed, the trial court’s adjudication of

such issues could change the parameters of the parties’ subsequent

Stivelman I decision. We note the irony in our ultimately granting, albeit for
different reasons and on different grounds, the same relief (vacatur of the
challenged setoff order) that Former Wife sought earlier in this appellate
proceeding.

                                        6
arguments, or altogether moot a subsequent appeal. 4 We, therefore, vacate

the setoff order.

      So ordered.

4
 Again, we express no opinion on the merits of the arguments made by the
parties in Stivelman I. Similarly, we express no opinion on the merits of the
parties’ arguments in Stivelman II.

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