Court Opinion

ID: 9676898
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 05:37:14.630779+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:52.212722
License: Public Domain

ohn B. Robbins, Judge, dissenting. I cannot agree to reverse the decision of the chancellor in this case. Moreover, I cannot ignore the fact that, of the five-judge majority, four issued opinions to express their distinctly different views. There should be a clearly stated consensus by those who would reverse a chancellor’s decision in a case bearing on the lives of children, to whom custody will be vested, and the myriad of persons affected by this decision. While we perform a de novo review of the record, we are obligated to give substantial deference to the chancellor’s superior position to evaluate the evidence and the witnesses in these fact-intensive inquiries. A finding is clearly erroneous when, although there is evidence to support it, the reviewing court on the entire evidence is left with the definite and firm conviction that a mistake was committed. See Wagner v. Wagner, 74 Ark. App. 135, 45 S.W.3d 852 (2001). I am not left with such a conviction. The majority fairly expresses some basic facts relevant to this appeal, but more are necessary for our de novo review. Sheree’s parents, Keith and his parents, and several of their respective relatives lived in and around northwest Arkansas. Sheree had no relatives in Tennessee, other than her new husband, whose military career required that he be away from home much of the time. Sheree planned to join her new husband at his military base, Fort Campbell, in Clarksville, Tennessee, regardless of the chancellor’s decision. Though Sheree was staying with her parents pending the litigation, she and her husband had already set up a household in Tennessee. Sheree had worked as a waitress in northwest Arkansas and stated that she intended to work parttime as a waitress after moving to Tennessee. In fact, she already had a job “lined up” in Tennessee prior to the litigation ensuing, and the only reason she had not commenced her waitress job there was because she had stayed in Arkansas pending these proceedings. Her testimony reflects that there would be some period of time wherein she could rely solely on her new husband’s income before her re-employment, but she was planning on putting the children in 'a day-care setting. She candidly admitted that she could not articulate any advantages specific to the town of Clarksville, Tennessee, over what the children enjoyed in northwest Arkansas, and the children had never been to Clarksville to date. Keith planned to finish his degree at the university and make a down payment on a house in the near future, with assurances from his mother that she could help with the children. If Keith were permitted to have custody, the children had friends in the neighborhood, and Ethan’s school that he would be attending for kindergarten was located at the end of the street. Keith testified that the move would be hard on the children because they had no family or friends in Tennessee other than Sheree and Bruce, and that the children’s needs were paramount and would be better served in the home that they have had all their lives in northwest Arkansas. The first finding made was that the initial burden to demonstrate some real advantage to Sheree and the children was not carried. I cannot say that this is clearly erroneous. Obviously the move holds significant advantages for Sheree because she will be living with her new husband, she plans to be a stay-at-home mother for a while, and she will enjoy housing and lesser overhead costs provided by her husband’s career. However, it is not apparent that there would be any real advantage to the children. They would have substantially less contact with their highly involved father, extended relatives, and the familiar surroundings they have known all their lives. When this petition to relocate was filed, Sheree and her husband were adjusting to a new marriage of seventeen days and a new home, and Sheree was unaware that she would be expecting a child at that time. Sheree’s husband would be absent a great deal of time due to his military obligation, and he had not spent much time with the children to date for this reason. The only real benefit to the established family unit as it stood (Sheree and the children) would be that it would remain intact, which would be true in every petition to relocate and cannot equate to meeting this threshold burden placed on the party seeking to relocate. I cannot say that the chancellor clearly erred in so finding. The majority acknowledges our precedent in those cases in which we held that a “real advantage” would occur where the custodial parent trained to work in a certain career and has a compelling job opportunity, see e.g. Hass v. Hass, 74 Ark. App. 49, 44 S.W.3d 773 (2001), or the chance to finish an education, see Wagner v. Wagner, 74 Ark. App. 135, 45 S.W.3d 852 (2001), or where there is generally less of an attachment with the noncustodial parent/relatives as compared with relatives where the move would take them. See Wagner, supra. However, no “real advantage” was found on facts similar to the present appeal in Hickmon, supra. The chancellor noted Hickmon when rendering her findings. I disagree that the chancellor was wrong to note the similarity of facts, as the majority holds. I also disagree that the present appeal is wholly distinguishable on the basis that psychologists testified that the move in Hickmon would have a detrimental psychological effect on the children. [Wjhere, as here, that has been the visitation pattern [weekly visitation], a court should be loathe to interfere with it by permitting removal of the children for frivolous or unpersuasive or inadequate reasons. . . . [Nevertheless,] the court should not insist that the advantages of the move be sacrificed and the opportunity for a better and more comfortable lifestyle for the [custodial parent] and children be forfeited solely to maintain weekly visitation by the [non-custodial parent] where reasonable alternative visitation is available and where the advantages of the move are substantial. D’Onofrio v. D’Onofrio, 144 N.J. Super. 200, 365 A.2d 27, 30 (App. Div. 1976). We must give due deference to the superior position of the chancellor to view and judge the credibility of the witnesses. Noland v. Noland, 330 Ark. 660, 956 S.W.2d 173 (1997). Such deference to the chancellor is even greater in cases involving child custody, as a heavier burden is placed on the chancellor to utilize to the fullest extent his or her powers of perception in evaluating the witnesses, their testimony, and the best interest of the children. Anderson v. Anderson, 18 Ark. App. 284, 715 S.W.2d 218 (1986). The chancellor herein did not clearly err, and we usurp the fact-finding function of the chancellor by holding otherwise in this case. I respectfully dissent. I am authorized to state that Stroud, C.J., Crabtree, and Roaf, JJ., join in this opinion.