Court Opinion

ID: 9778969
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 21:29:38.346459+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:33:17.493662
License: Public Domain

ON MOTION FOR REHEARING OR REHEARING BY THE COURT EN BANC and APPLICATION TO TRANSFER TO SUPREME COURT OF MISSOURI
PER CURIAM.
In a post-opinion motion per Rule 84.17, John avers this court’s opinion is wrong in four respects.
First, says John: “[T]his Court inadvertently misinterpreted and overlooked material matters of law and fact by holding that an alternate payee’s rights to receive distribution from a pension plan are vested at the time the plan receives a copy of a domestic relations order not yet qualified and concluding that the issue of whether the trial court could properly prohibit the plan administrator from amending the plan after the plan received QDRO-1 is moot.”
Although the motion does not identify the point relied on in John’s brief which precipitated the ruling about which he now complains, we infer he is challenging this court’s ruling on his sixth point. John’s complaint, as we grasp it, is that Beth had no “vested” rights in the Plan until a domestic relations order awarding her an interest therein was “deemed qualified.” John argues: “In the instant case, no domestic relations order was qualified until the trial court’s June 26, 1997, order.”
As explained in the opinion, the trial court signed QDRO-1 on March 1, 1996; John, administrator of the Plan, received a copy of QDRO-1 sometime between then and May 16, 1996, the date lawyer Seiler sent Beth’s lawyer the letter mentioned in the opinion. We surmised in the opinion that at the time John received QDRO-1, the Plan allowed “lump sum distribution” to an alternate pay*135ee prior to John’s attainment of retirement age. That assumption was apparently correct, as John does not now argue otherwise.
John’s motion avers that an amendment to the Plan which took effect January 1, 1997, “does not provide for a lump sum distribution.” The motion alleges the amended version of the Plan was in effect on the date the trial court signed QDRO-2 (June 24, 1997). Therefore, insists John, when Beth obtained her right to distribution from the Plan pursuant to 29 U.S.C. § 1056(d)(3)(H), the Plan did not provide for lump sum distribution. Consequently, reasons John, the judgment requires him to breach his fiduciary duties as Plan administrator by compelling him to distribute funds in a manner contrary to Plan documents.
The gist of John’s contention is that when a pension plan administrator receives a domestic relations order awarding an alternate payee the right to receive a lump sum distribution as authorized by the existing terms of the plan, the plan administrator (or whoever is empowered to amend the plan) may nullify the right the alternate payee had at the time the domestic relations order was received by amending the plan between that date and the date the domestic relations order is determined to be a qualified domestic relations order (or the date a replacement domestic relations order meeting ERISA’s requirements for qualification is received). As noted in the opinion, John cites no authority supporting that hypothesis.
John’s contention was considered and rejected in our opinion. The opinion underscored the mischief that could result were John’s hypothesis adopted. The opinion held Beth’s right to receive a lump sum distribution from the Plan at the time John, the Plan administrator, received QDRO-1 could not thereafter be abrogated by amending the Plan.
Nothing in John’s motion persuades us that our holding was improvident. Had we embraced John’s position, we would have established precedent allowing a plan administrator to annul the right of an alternate payee at whim. We are unpersuaded the Congress of the United States, in enacting ERISA, intended such knavery.
Our belief is buttressed by 29 U.S.C. § 1056(d)(3)(H)(i), which requires a plan administrator to separately account for the amounts which shall become payable to the alternate payee if the domestic relations order is ultimately determined to be a qualified domestic relations order. Nothing there suggests such amounts can be diminished or eliminated by amending the plan during the interval between receipt of the domestic relations order and the determination that it is qualified.
Having held Beth’s right to receive distribution from the Plan is the right she had at the time John, the Plan administrator, received QDRO-1, our opinion concluded that any issue as to whether the trial court could properly prohibit John from amending the Plan after receiving QDRO-1 is moot, as any such amendment would not divest Beth of the right with which she was vested when John received QDRO-1, and no other alternate payee’s rights are at issue in these appeals.1
For the forgoing reasons, we find no merit in John’s first attack on the opinion.
John’s second attack challenges the opinion’s ruling on the second claim of error in the third point relied on in his brief. For the reasons set forth in the opinion, we held the assignment of error was not preserved for review. We adhere to that ruling.
The assignment of error, had it been preserved, would have hypothesized that the trial court “erred in calculating the amount of pension funds due [Beth] because its ... award of interest and earnings for the Plan funds as a whole from June 7, 1996 forward rather than awarding actual earnings on $216,252.50 which was segregated at the request of [Beth] and pursuant to court order ... was contrary to the law and a misapplication of the law in that ... 29 U.S.C. §§ 1104 and 1056 require a plan administrator to pay *136actual interest and earnings on segregated accounts and 29 U.S.C. § 1104(1) suggests that when a beneficiary exercises control over her portion of plan funds she must bear any losses resulting from this control.”
The point relied on (from which the excerpt quoted in the preceding paragraph is taken) does not identify the portion of the judgment which contains the allegedly erroneous ruling. We have reexamined the argument which follows the point in John’s brief. There, we are told that the trial court’s “method of calculation of the amount due [Beth] is outlined in [QDRO-2] and in the [judgment filed June 26,1997].” In studying the portions of those documents specified in John’s argument, we find nothing that demonstrates the trial court, in John’s words, “fail[ed] to consider actual earnings on $216,-252.50 which was segregated at the request of Beth.” If indeed that was the effect of QDRO-2 or the June 26, 1997, judgment, it was John’s burden, as the appealing party, to demonstrate the error. Linzenni, 937 S.W.2d at 725[3]. Nowhere in the argument in John’s brief are we informed as to wherein or how QDRO-2 or the June 26, 1997, judgment reveal that the trial court committed the alleged error John unsuccessfully sought to present in the second component of his third point.
For the reasons above, we hold John’s second attack on the opinion is meritless.
John’s third attack impugns the opinion’s holding on the fifth point relied on in his brief. In the opinion, we deduced from a reference to the legal file in the statement of facts in John’s brief that the point was directed toward paragraph “D” of the June 26, 1997, judgment.2 John’s post-opinion motion confirms our supposition was correct.
John’s motion avers our opinion wrongly holds there is no conflict between paragraph “D” of the judgment and Opinion 94-32A (an opinion letter of the Department of Labor, quoted in pertinent part in our opinion). John appears to construe paragraph “D” of the judgment as requiring that all expenses incurred in determining whether QDRO-1 and QDRO-2 satisfied ERISA requirements are “to be allocated to John as participant.”
That was not the meaning our opinion ascribed to paragraph “D” of the judgment. Our opinion notes that reasonable expenses of administering the Plan may be paid from Plan assets (97.5 percent of which represent John’s and Beth’s shares). Our opinion further notes that payment of reasonable expenses of administering the. Plan from its assets will have an adverse effect on the interests of both John and Beth until (if ever) Beth obtains everything due her from the Plan. However, our opinion emphasizes that reasonable expenses of administering the Plan do not include expenses incurred by John in an effort to benefit himself financially by defeating or delaying the E5 award. John should understand that, as he was present at the Master’s hearing when lawyer Callison testified:
“[T]he comment was made earlier by [John’s lawyer] that ... [John] intended to charge his costs for all these lawyers and consultants and whatever to the plan. To the extent that these costs are unreasonable or benefits [sic] [John] or are designed to benefit [him] personally as opposed to benefitting the plan, that is an impermissible use of plan assets, and he should bear those costs himself or let his corporation bear those costs.”
Nowhere in the fifth point relied on in John’s brief, or in the argument following it, or in John’s post-opinion motion does he identify the expenses he believes should be borne by the Plan instead of by him individually. . We have reexamined the record and have espied no such itemization. Consequently, it was impossible for the trial court or this court to list the expenses John, as Plan administrator, could properly pay from Plan assets.
Given the arcane record, we construed paragraph “D” of the judgment as being consistent with the excerpt from Opinion 94-32A. Additionally, to ensure our holding was clear, our opinion cited ERISA provisions authorizing payment of reasonable expenses of administering a plan from plan assets. However, our opinion provided a caveat that if, when John pays Beth the E5 award, she *137believes he, as Plan administrator, has improperly charged expenses against Plan assets that he should have paid personally, she can seek redress. John’s motion concedes that remedy is available to Beth.3
John’s third attack on the opinion is without merit.
John’s final attack avers this court erred in affirming the trial court’s award of $7,500 to Beth and her lawyers for attorney fees and expenses in responding to appeal 21808.
The trial court, apparently observant of John’s demonstrated resolve to circumvent the dissolution decree — despite its affirmance in the first appeal — and apparently familiar with the tenacity of John’s counsel, accurately foresaw that Beth would be compelled to respond to a multitude of intricate issues in appeal 21808. The length of our opinion and this post-opinion order confirm the trial court’s clairvoyance.
John’s complaint about the attorney fee award is too meritless to deserve further comment.
John’s motion per Rule 84.17 is denied.
Simultaneously with that motion, John filed an application per Rule 83.02 for transfer of this case to the Supreme Court of Missouri. The application is likewise denied.

. As noted in the opinion, John’s and Beth’s shares in the Plan total 97.5 percent of the Plan's assets.

. Paragraph "D" of the judgment is quoted in the opinion.

. A footnote in John’s motion reads: “If there is any question as to the propriety of allocating particular QDRO-related expenses to the plan, Beth, as well as any other participant or beneficiary could bring an action against John Under ERISA for breach of his fiduciary duty.”