Court Opinion

ID: 9776158
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 19:20:33.856022+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:32:34.826953
License: Public Domain

Rogers, Judge, dissenting. I write in dissent to the majority’s holding that appellant owns all of the funds in the parties’ joint checking account. It would appear that the judges deciding this case agree on the rule of law applicable to this issue: Once property is placed in the names of persons who are husband and wife without specifying the manner in which they take, there is a presumption that they own the property as tenants by the entirety, and clear and convincing evidence is required to overcome that presumption. See Cole v. Cole, 53 Ark. 140, 920 S.W.2d 32 (1996); Mathis v. Mathis, 52 Ark. App. 155, 916 S.W.2d 131 (1996). However, for all intents and purposes, the majority opinion has modified that law. The majority opinion holds that the chancellor’s finding that appellant rebutted this presumption by clear and convincing evidence is not clearly erroneous and relies on the following facts to which appellant testified: (1) that appellee wrote checks on this account only after first discussing it with him; (2) that the parties understood the separate nature of their checking accounts; and (3) that appellant had not intended to give appellee an interest in the funds in the joint account. These justifications simply do not hold up under scrutiny. At trial, appellee testified that the joint account was not solely under appellant’s control. In fact, appellant admitted that appellee had written ten percent of the checks on this account. Can there be any reasonable doubt that the number of checks that appellee wrote on this account over the duration of their seven-year marriage was substantial? As for the parties’ “understanding” about the separate nature of their checking accounts, one cannot ignore the fact that household expenses, benefitting both parties, were paid out of the joint checking account. Thus, we are left with appellant’s statement that, when he deposited his funds into the joint checking account, he intended that the money would remain his separate property. Surely it is not the law that, when depositing money into a joint checking account, someone’s intent controls whether it is separately or jointly held. If intent is the controlling factor, divorce litigants will, regardless of their actions, always be able to avoid the effect of this presumption by later testifying that they intended to keep this money separate. I submit that more is required to overcome the presumption that such accounts are held as tenants by the entirety. This case illustrates a disturbing trend to devalue the efforts of one spouse in a marriage and to emphasize the financial contribution of the other spouse by disregarding the efforts of the spouse who often provides care and supervision within the family unit.