Court Opinion

ID: 9716568
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 06:43:59.614907+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:46.876756
License: Public Domain

BUCHANAN, Judge,
dissenting.
I do not agree with the majority's conclusion that no substantial change in cireum-stances has occurred. Joe's petition is, in my opinion, properly considered a petition to modify pursuant to Ind.Code 81-1-11.5-17(a) (1988).1 Accordingly, Joe must establish that a substantial and continuing *654change in cireumstances has occurred that makes the terms of the original order unreasonable. This he has done.
In order to determine whether a sufficient change in circumstances has occurred the totality of the circumstances must be considered. Blickenstaff v. Blickenstaff (1989), Ind.App., 539 N.E.2d 41; McCallister v. McCallister (1986), Ind.App., 488 N.E.2d 1147.
The trial court's and a party's, awareness, of the facts inevitably are a part of the totality of the cireumstances. The trial court which entered the dissolution decree, and ordered the support, believed that Joseph was Joe's child. Had that belief been otherwise, Joe would not have been ordered to support Joseph. When the truth became known, the trial court's awareness changed. As that awareness was a crucial circumstance in the determination of Joe's support obligation, the change in that circumstance is substantial and continuing, so much so that the terms of the original order are now unreasonable.
The amount of time which elapsed between the original order and the petition to modify is irrelevant. The trial court has continuing jurisdiction, during the minority of the child, to make modification in the support order. State ex rel. Werthman v. Superior Court of Marion County (1983), Ind., 448 N.E.2d 680. A petition to modify has never been denied on the basis of being untimely.
I also cannot agree with the majority's conclusion that public policy considerations militate in support for continuing Joe's child support obligation. The touchstone of each of the policies discussed in R.D.S. v. S.L.S. (1980), Ind.App., 402 N.E.2d 30 (Buchanan, J. dissenting), was that a person's conduct could impose the duty to support a child only if the person knew the child was not theirs. My dissent in R.D.S. was based on the fact that R.D.S. knew the child was not his when he married S.L.S.; not that someone must support a child as a matter of public policy.
Joe's uncontested assertion that he had no reason to question Joseph's paternity cannot be dismissed as merely unproven. The stipulated record shows that Mary knew Joe testified he had no reason to question Joseph's paternity, and she produced no evidence to rebut that contention. Record at 54. The only evidence before the court is that Joe did not know, and that he had no reason to believe, Joseph was not his child.
For approximately twelve years Joe supported a child ke believed to be his. When he discovered the truth, he immediately began the legal procedures necessary to end that support. He never agreed to support another man's child.
To now impose the burden of support of another man's child upon Joe because he has previously supported a child pursuant to a court order, over a long period of time, unaware that the child was not his, is inequitable, even outrageous. No public policy dictates such a result, nor are there any cases to that effect. The net result of affirming the trial court's judgment is to unjustifiably fasten an albatross around Joe's neck.
Because Joe has demonstrated a substantial change in circumstances, which renders the terms of his original support order unreasonable, I would reverse the trial court's judgment.

. IC 31-1-11.5-17(a) provides:
"Provisions of an order with respect to child support ... may be modified or revoked. Such modification shall be made only upon a showing of changed circumstances so substantial and continuing as to make the terms unreasonable."