Appellant Claims Trial Court Failed To Distribute All Marital Liabilities

In the case of Pukin v. Pukin, the former husband and wife were married on June 30, 2007. Two children were born of the marriage and both were minors at the time of the divorce proceedings. On June 25, 2019, the former husband filed a Petition for the Dissolution of Marriage and Partition. The former wife filed a Counter-Petition for Dissolution of Marriage with Minor Children and Other Relief. A five-day trial was held between the two parties. Over the court of the trial, the magistrate submitted his “Report and Recommended Final Judgment of Dissolution of Marriage with Minor Children. The document had attachments including a parenting plan, equitable distribution of the marital estate, and child support guidelines and worksheets. The trial court entered the final order on December 15, 2021. Both parties disagreed with the final order and filed a motion for rehearing. The motion was summarily denied. The appeal soon followed. The appeals court found three issues raised that required it to reverse the final judgment in part and remand the issue to the trial court.

Trial court failed to identify all marital liabilities

The former husband claimed that the trial court erred when it failed to identify, value, and distribute all marital liabilities. Specifically, there was one promissory note in the amount of $11,500 executed during the parties’ marriage that was owed to the former husband’s father. Section 61.075(6), Florida Statutes provides that marital debts are all those which occurred during the marriage. The debt was thus held jointly by the spouses as part of the marital estate but was not considered by the trial court during proceedings.

Section 61.075(3) holds that:

“The distribution of all marital assets and liabilities, whether equal or unequal, shall include specific written findings of fact as to the following: … (c) Identification of the marital liabilities and designation of which spouse shall be responsible for each liability; (d) Any other findings necessary to advise the parties or the reviewing court of the trial court’s rationale for the distribution of marital assets and allocation of liabilities.”

A final judgment that fails to identify and value all of the parties’ assets and liabilities must be reversed. In other words, if the trial court fails to include all marital assets and debts in an equitable distribution plan, it violates section 61.075, Florida Statutes, and must be reversed.

During trial, the former husband testified that the parties owed his father $11,500 for a loan he offered them in 2012. At trial, the former husband testified that this loan had not been paid off, and that the balance was still $11,500. The former wife offered no testimony to rebut the former husband’s assertion other than saying it was “kind of convenient” and that the loan should have been forgiven. Nonetheless, the final judgment did not consider this debt at all and so the appeals court overturned the ruling of the trial court and remanded the issue back to the trial court to consider the debt.

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Source:

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