Court Opinion

ID: 9771877
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 16:57:30.207777+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:38.799343
License: Public Domain

REEVES, Justice,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
While I concur with most of the majority’s opinion in this case delivered on April 30, 1986, I respectfully dissent to that portion of the majority’s opinion which places the burden on the movant to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the respondent has the ability to make the child support payments. The majority seems to base their reasoning, in part, upon Lowry v. State, 692 S.W.2d 86 (Tex.Crim.App.1985) (en banc). In Lowry, the respondent was charged with intentionally and knowingly failing “to provide support that he can provide ... for his children ... ”. TEX.PENAL CODE ANN. § 25.05. The Court of Criminal Appeals found unconstitutional that part of the statute which stated that “It is an affirmative defense ... that the actor could not provide the support that he was legally obligated to provide” since the statute shifts the burden of disproving an element of the offense to the defendant, in violation of the due process clause of the Constitution. In a child support enforcement action, respondent’s inability to pay is not an element of the offense of nonsupport; it is a defense to the charge of contempt.
In the present case, the parties’ ability to support the children was determined at the original hearing and it is assumed that a reasonable amount of support, within respondent’s ability to pay, was set. In the event of a material and substantial change of circumstances which would prohibit respondent from complying with the original order, he should seek the change and it should be incumbent on the respondent to produce evidence supporting a change in *957the original order. TEX.FAM.CODE ANN. § 14.08(c)(2).
Our Supreme Court has held that the inability to comply with a child support order is a good defense, but that the burden of proof is on the respondent. Ex parte Padfield, 154 Tex. 253, 276 S.W.2d 247, 251 (1955); Ex parte Kollenborn, 154 Tex. 223, 276 S.W.2d 251, 253-54 (1955). The Padfield and Kollenbom cases have been routinely followed in this state for thirty years. The latest court of appeals case to place the burden of proof on the respondent is Ex parte Burroughs, 687 S.W.2d 444 (Tex.App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 1985, no writ). The majority has shown no compelling reason to overrule these cases.
The majority’s opinion, if upheld, will force the movant in a child support enforcement action to produce evidence on the nonmovant’s financial status, an onerous burden and not in the best interest of the child.