Court Opinion

ID: 9648227
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 14:10:29.050062+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:30:04.640931
License: Public Domain

LOWENSTEIN, Judge,
concurring.
I concur in reversing the judgment and ordering a remand. I do not concur in the directions governing what is to occur on remand. Scoggins filed the original motion to modify child support upward. Timmerman moved to reduce, and filed the only Form 14 in the case, which created a rebuttable presumption that the amount of support calculated pursuant to the guidelines was correct. The trial court did not feel the Form 14 amount was proper, and left support at $450. The majority wipes out any requirement of findings as to how the $450 figure was selected. On remand, the majority merely requires a written conclusion that Timmer-man’s figures on his Form 14 were incorrect, the presumed amount was “unjust or inappropriate,” and the conclusion of $450 was just. The ease authority overturned today would have required the trial court to have issued specific factual findings as to why the guideline amount was incorrect, or how the $450 figure was correct.
Though cited by the majority for numerous propositions, In re Marriage of Short, 847 S.W.2d 158 (Mo.App.1993), while having some of the same facts as here, does not support the majority’s declaration of the trial court’s function on remand. In that dissolution action, Ms. Short filed the only Form 14. Her calculation of support was rejected by the court without utilizing the magic words, “after consideration of all relevant factors, [the Form 14 amount] is unjust or inappropriate.” Id. at 164. The trial court’s decree, (as reprinted at pages 163-64) found the support amount “[was] not in conformity” with Form 14, but that due to Ms. Short’s *140amount of indebtedness, deviating from the Form 14 amount was reasonable. Id. at 163. In addition, the trial court order also pointed to specific evidence showing Ms. Short was capable of gainful employment, which also justified the deviation. Id. at 163. The decree recited that the judge had considered the provisions of § 452.340 in considering the support amount decreed, and reiterated that Mr. Short “has sustained large business losses” and much of his income “has been used to service this debt.” Id. at 163-64.
The factual specificity of the decree in Short far exceeds the standard now set in the majority opinion, for as stated in Short, “[T]he trial court set forth its reasons for that decision.” Id. at 164. The “reasons,” or findings made in Short certainly provided the underpinning for the rulings and language quoted-in the majority opinion, where Ms. Short’s points on appeal were denied. With the factual specificity laid out by the court in Short, there was no reason for the Southern District to send the case back, nor to require the trial court to slavishly adhere to Ms. Short’s Form 14, or to calculate another Form 14. Id. at 165. However, the fact remains the trial court in Short laid forth specific evidence in its finding that the Form 14 amount was to be deviated from. The missing “magic language” that the guideline amount “is unjust or inappropriate” was not the fatal flaw in Short, nor should it be in other cases when there are specific factual findings by the court in its order to lead the reader to that unmistakable conclusion. However, without those specific factual findings, a fatal flaw does exist as appellate courts must themselves then rifle through the record to see upon which of the possible factors the trial court based its deviation.
The interest of judicial economy would best be served, I believe, in interpreting Rule 88.01, to require specific findings to support a result which differs from the Form 14 figures, rather than by an interpretation of the rule to merely allow a general pronouncement that the Form 14 amount was inappropriate, followed by an appeal debating what in the record supports the judgment. Language supporting specificity is found in Mehra v. Mehra, 819 S.W.2d 351, 354 (Mo. banc 1991). Mehra, a case concerned with extending awards beyond the support guidelines: “The amounts indicated on the schedule are but a presumption of the proper level of support, given the monthly level income of the parties,- and we find the trial court’s mode of extrapolation beyond the confines of the schedule unjustified in the absence of any specific finding that the $1,550 figure is unjust or inappropriate.” Id. “Further, the record does not reflect how the court determined that husband must pay $800 per month towards the children’s ‘special needs,’ which include private educational expenses of $1,133.33 per month”. Id.
Therefore, I would concur in reversing and remanding, but would not change the case law on a deviation from the presumed amount of child support.