109 T he mother ’s homeschool- ing of the minor child was a factor that should have been considered in setting her spousal support, according to a Louisiana appellate court decision. In Rhymes v. Rhymes , 125 So3d 377 (La App 2013), both parents were mechani- cal engineers. At the time of the birth of their daughter, by mutual consent, the mother stopped working to stay home with the child. Four years later, a second child was born. Perceiv- ing the public school system in Baton Rouge to be inadequate and the private school sys- tem too expensive, the parties decided the wife would home- school the children. She had instructed the children since they were fi ve years of age. The trial court found she was enti- tled to support in the amount of $500 per month for a period of 12 months and to a payment not to exceed $2,400 for a course of study, which would enable her to update her training as a mechanical engineer. However, this ruling was reversed. As in other jurisdictions, the applicable statute stated that “The court shall consider all relevant factors in determin- ing the amount and duration of fi nal support.” This is followed by a nonexclusive list of spe- cifi c factors. The father could afford the additional payments requested. Evidence elicited from the court-appointed educational evaluator showed the children were well-educated and thriv- ing in their homeschool environ- ment. Testimony further showed the mother’s obligation to home- school the children had an effect on her earning capacity, as she spent approximately 27.5 hours per week on this activity. EQUALIZING PAYMENT BASED ON FUTURE EARNINGS To place the parties in a long- term marriage (more than 25 years) in “roughly equal” fi nan- cial positions, a court may con- sider the parties’ future earnings, according to a Washington appel- late court decision. Marriage of Wright , 2013 WL 7137154 (Wash App 12/16/2013), explained that a trial court was not required to place the parties in precisely equal fi nancial positions at the moment of dissolution. Rather, if the spouses were in a long-term marriage of 25 years or more, the court’s objective was to place the parties in “roughly equal fi nancial positions” for the rest of their lives. To reach this objec- tive, the court could account for each spouse’s anticipated postdissolution earnings in its property distribution by looking forward. The court awarded each party more than $8 million, then applied an equalizing pay- ment and three years of spousal maintenance to the wife, leav- ing an immediate imbalance of $3,369,196 in her favor. But, “looking forward,” as was required in a long-term mar- riage, the court also determined that the husband would earn at least $10 million in 2.5 years after dissolution from his surgery practice. On this basis, he would ultimately end up with nearly $2.7 million more than the wife in the long run. S ...

1. 109
T
he mother ’s homeschool-
ing of the minor child
was a factor that should
have been considered in setting
her spousal support, according
to a Louisiana appellate court
decision. In Rhymes v. Rhymes ,
125 So3d 377 (La App 2013),
both parents were mechani-
cal engineers. At the time of
the birth of their daughter, by
mutual consent, the mother
stopped working to stay home
with the child. Four years later, a
second child was born. Perceiv-
ing the public school system in
Baton Rouge to be inadequate
and the private school sys-
tem too expensive, the parties
decided the wife would home-
school the children. She had
instructed the children since
they were fi ve years of age. The
trial court found she was enti-
tled to support in the amount
of $500 per month for a period
of 12 months and to a payment
not to exceed $2,400 for a course

2. of study, which would enable
her to update her training as a
mechanical engineer. However,
this ruling was reversed.
As in other jurisdictions, the
applicable statute stated that
“The court shall consider all
relevant factors in determin-
ing the amount and duration of
fi nal support.” This is followed
by a nonexclusive list of spe-
cifi c factors. The father could
afford the additional payments
requested. Evidence elicited from
the court-appointed educational
evaluator showed the children
were well-educated and thriv-
ing in their homeschool environ-
ment. Testimony further showed
the mother’s obligation to home-
school the children had an effect
on her earning capacity, as she
spent approximately 27.5 hours
per week on this activity.
EQUALIZING PAYMENT
BASED ON FUTURE
EARNINGS
To place the parties in a long-
term marriage (more than 25
years) in “roughly equal” fi nan-
cial positions, a court may con-
sider the parties’ future earnings,

3. according to a Washington appel-
late court decision. Marriage of
Wright , 2013 WL 7137154 (Wash
App 12/16/2013), explained that
a trial court was not required
to place the parties in precisely
equal fi nancial positions at the
moment of dissolution. Rather, if
the spouses were in a long-term
marriage of 25 years or more,
the court’s objective was to place
the parties in “roughly equal
fi nancial positions” for the rest
of their lives. To reach this objec-
tive, the court could account
for each spouse’s anticipated
postdissolution earnings in its
property distribution by looking
forward.
The court awarded each
party more than $8 million,
then applied an equalizing pay-
ment and three years of spousal
maintenance to the wife, leav-
ing an immediate imbalance
of $3,369,196 in her favor. But,
“looking forward,” as was
required in a long-term mar-
riage, the court also determined
that the husband would earn
at least $10 million in 2.5 years
after dissolution from his surgery
practice. On this basis, he would
ultimately end up with nearly

4. $2.7 million more than the wife in
the long run.
STUDENT LOAN NOT
AUTOMATICALLY ASSIGNED
TO STUDENT
The trial court could not
automatically assign the wife’s
$40,000 in debt incurred for her
nursing school studies to her, an
Ohio appellate court has held.
Polacheck v. Polacheck , 2013 WL
6869941 (Ohio App 12/21/2013),
rejected the premise that the wife
was the sole benefi ciary of her
degree and, as such, she should
shoulder the entire marital debt.
Instead, the appellate court said
that a primary consideration in
the allocation of marital student-
loan debt entailed the evaluation
of the relative economic circum-
stances of the parties. Because
repayment will require a stream
of future income, the parties’
relative abilities to repay the
student-loan debt was an appro-
priate equitable factor to con-
sider. In addition to the economic
circumstances of the parties, the
HOMESCHOOLING A SPOUSAL SUPPORT FACTOR
FEATURES
FAIRSHARE CASES: MISCELLANY

5. 110 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF FAMILY LAW
trial court should consider any
fact it found to be relevant and
equitable. It criticized the trial
court pointing out that the rel-
evant surrounding circumstances
of the parties were not fully
developed.
SURVEYING BUSINESS
TRANSMUTED INTO
MARITAL PROPERTY
The husband’s premarital
land-surveying business was
transmuted into marital prop-
erty, the South Carolina Supreme
Court has held. Pittman v.
Pittman , 2014 WL 130497 (SC
1/15/2014), relied on the wife’s
testimony that all business deci-
sions were made jointly. The
court added that the mere use
of the business in support of the
marriage was further evidence of
transmutation.
PREMARITAL BUILDING
TRANSFORMED INTO
MARITAL ASSET
The husband’s premaritally

6. owned building was transformed
into a marital asset, a Florida
appellate court has ruled. Jordan
v. Jordan , 127 So3d 794 (Fla App
2013), explained that the wife was
an instrumental part in coordinat-
ing and helping with the “vast
improvements” that were done
to the building, which included
replacing walls, installing new
fl ooring, adding columns and
a fl ag pole to the front, modify-
ing lighting and other electrical
work, adding an additional park-
ing lot, replacing the roof, and
putting in new doors and win-
dows. Contrary to the husband’s
arguments, these actions went
beyond “mere maintenance” but
were considered improvements
that enhanced the value of the
building.
LAND VALUED AT ITS
PROPERTY TAX ASSESSMENT
Valuation of land owned by the
parties based on its property tax
assessment was affi rmed by the
Alaska Supreme Court. Urban v.
Urban , 314 P3d 513 (Alaska 2013),
rejected the husband’s argument
that value should have been
derived from a real estate agent’s
valuation, which suggested that
the four-parcel property was

7. worth only $35,800. The agent val-
ued one parcel and then extrapo-
lated the value of all four parcels.
The agent testifi ed that local real
estate values had dropped dra-
matically after the property was
purchased for $98,000.
The wife submitted a county
tax assessment showing a total
value of $92,424, which had
been discounted by 50 percent
from the previous year. The real
estate agent testifi ed that the tax
valuation did not adequately
DIVORCE QUIZ (1) ANSWER
No, according to a recent Indiana appellate court decision.
Ryan v. Janovsky, 999 NE2d 895 (Ind App 2013), a matter of fi
rst impression in Indiana, reversed the
trial judge who had ruled that the wife had waited too long. The
dissolution decree provided for
an equal division of the husband’s monthly pension benefi ts
calculated as of the date of the decree.
Although the appellate court agreed with the trial judge that the
wife’s delay was “inordinate,” and
noted that she offered no explanation for the extremely long
period of time before preparing the
QDRO, it did not agree that the delay caused the forfeiture of
her right to a portion of the pension
benefi ts.
The court explained that the wife’s right arose from the
settlement agreement; the QDRO only cre-

8. ated her right to be paid directly from the pension plan. Neither
of these rights was yet enforceable
because the pension benefi ts were not yet payable to anyone.
The settlement agreement provided
that the wife would begin receiving her portion of the
retirement benefi ts when the husband began
receiving his. Presumably, these benefi ts would be paid in
monthly installments. When an obligation
was payable in installments, the statute of limitations ran as to
each installment as it became due. The
applicable statute of limitations would therefore not begin to
run until the date of the fi rst distribu-
tion from the pension plan, at the earliest. The court concluded
that, although it may be a good idea to
have the paperwork in place well in advance, there was no
reason to require a QDRO be entered prior
to this date, which had not yet occurred.
FEATURES 111
account for the recent decline in
the real estate market. According
to the appellate court, absent an
appraisal, a trial court may rea-
sonably choose to rely on a tax
valuation over a real estate bro-
ker’s estimate. The trial court
made a reasonable decision that
the tax valuation was more reli-
able than the real estate agent’s
opinion.
HUSBAND’S CRIMINAL
CONDUCT WAS FINANCIAL

9. MISCONDUCT
The husband’s criminal con-
duct was deemed fi nancial mis-
conduct, by the Supreme Judicial
Court of Maine , which was a
relevant factor in the parties’
property distribution. In Lesko v.
Stanislaw , 2014 WL 117351 (Me
1/14/2014), the husband was
arrested, indicted, and convicted
of multiple counts of sexual
abuse of girls who had been his
piano students. The state high
court found that the trial court
methodically evaluated the way
the husband’s criminal con-
duct, convictions, and incarcera-
tion had and would continue
to fi nancially affect the house-
hold. Specifi cally, it found that
his criminal conduct resulted in
the expenditure, from the mari-
tal estate, of “tens of thousands
of dollars in legal fees;” his con-
duct, particularly his victimiza-
tion of some of the patients from
her medical practice, caused her
to lose income through the loss
of patients; his “lengthy” incar-
ceration, which would likely
extend into their son’s adult-
hood, would cause her to suffer
the loss of a fi nancially contrib-
uting coparent; his incarceration
would adversely affect his cur-

10. rent and future earning poten-
tial; and the specifi c nature of
his criminal conduct would pre-
clude him from doing many of
the jobs for which he was quali-
fi ed. Importantly, the trial court
did not consider the evidence
of the husband’s criminal con-
duct for purposes of discern-
ing moral fault and expressly
excluded the introduction of
sentencing transcripts, witness
statements, and other materials
bearing on the specifi c offenses
for which he was convicted, stat-
ing that this evidence “would be
at best cumulative and at worst
infl ammatory.”
NO RELOCATION
PRESUMPTION IN JOINT
CUSTODY CASE
The presumption favor-
ing relocation only applied in
cases in which a parent had been
granted sole or primary custody
of a child, the Arkansas Supreme
Court has decided. In Singletary v.
Singletary , 2013 WL 6504746 (Ark
12/12/2013), the parents had
joint custody. The appellate court
affi rmed the grant of sole custody
to the father due to the mother’s
relocation as a result of her new

11. husband’s job transfer. Because the
trial court correctly found that the
parties had a “true joint-custody
relationship,” the presumption
favoring relocation did not apply.
AFFAIRS WITH TWO
MEN FAVORED FATHER’S
CUSTODY
Awarding custody of the
divorcing parties’ two children to
the father was supported by the
mother’s affairs with two men,
according to a Mississippi appel-
late court ruling. In Borden v.
Borden , 130 So3d 1168 (Miss
App 2014), the mother argued
(unsuccessfully) that she was
being unfairly punished for her
extramarital affairs. However, the
lower court found that the fol-
lowing factors favored the father:
age, health, and sex of the chil-
dren; parenting skills, willing-
ness and capacity to provide
primary child care; moral fi tness
of the parents; home, school, and
community record of the chil-
dren; and stability of the home
environment. It found that only
the continuity-of-care factor
favored the mother.
STALKING PROTECTION

12. WITHOUT CRIMINAL
CONVICTION
A divorcing wife was entitled
to a protection order to prevent
stalking by the husband without
fi rst having to obtain a criminal
conviction of stalking, the South
Dakota Supreme Court has held.
Trumm v. Cleaver , 841 NW2d (SD
2013), explained that “domestic
abuse,” which was a necessary
fi nding for a protection order,
could be proven without requir-
ing a criminal conviction.
HALF ADVANCE PAYMENT
RETAINER TURNED OVER
TO OTHER SPOUSE
The husband’s attorney was
ordered to turn over to the
wife half of his advance pay-
ment retainer to level the play-
ing fi eld between the parties,
according to a recent Illinois
Supreme Court decision.
Marriage of Earlywine , 996 NE2d
642 (Ill 2013), rejected the argu-
ment by the husband’s attorney
that the fees were not subject
to disgorgement because they
were held in an advance pay-
ment retainer and became his

13. 112 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF FAMILY LAW
DIVORCE QUIZ (2) ANSWER
No, according to a recent Supreme Court of North Dakota
decision.
Bredson v. Mackey, 2014 WL 563796 (ND 2/13/2014), fi rst
noted that visitation was only awarded to
a nonparent if exceptional circumstances existed and it was in
the best interest of the child. An appro-
priate award of visitation to a nonparent may exist when the
nonparent was a psychological parent
or when the nonparent had an established relationship with the
child. A psychological parent was,
“A person who provides for a child’s daily care and who,
thereby, develops a close bond and per-
sonal relationship with the child … to whom the child turns for
love, guidance, and security.” A North
Dakota statute provided that grandparents and great-
grandparents may be granted visitation rights
in the best interest of the child; stepparent visitation may also
be ordered. In this case, the court found
that the facts did not meet the applicable standard. The father’s
new wife had spent only one day per
month over the previous 14 months with the child. The court
added that the father’s wish to have
his new spouse facilitate his visitation did not create
exceptional circumstances to justify nonparental
visitation.
property upon payment. The
court explained that in contrast
to a general retainer or a secu-
rity retainer, an advance pay-

14. ment retainer consisted of a
present payment to the lawyer
in exchange for the commitment
to provide legal services in the
future. Ownership of an advance
payment retainer passed to the
lawyer immediately upon pay-
ment. Accordingly, the funds
had to be deposited in the law-
yer ’s general account and could
not be placed in a client’s trust
account due to the prohibition
against commingling funds.
However, when, as in this case,
both parties lacked the fi nan-
cial ability or access to assets or
income to pay reasonable attor-
ney fees and costs, the court
could order disgorgement of
fees already paid to an attor-
ney. It added that it was clear
from the attorney–client agree-
ment that the advance payment
retainer in this case was set up
specifi cally to circumvent the
“leveling of the playing fi eld.”
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Applied Thought Paper
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would apply a relevant organization development (OD)
theory/framework or technique to address a specific challenge
in an organization or work group of your choice. The ATP
should included at least 3 (three) references. The Textbook is
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Your paper should include the following:
· Brief description of the organization and/or workgroup
selected for the project.
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and/or workgroup.
· Description of the organizational and/or workgroup challenge.
· Description of the OD theory/framework or technique you
have selected to address the challenge, and an explanation of
why you selected that approach/method.
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to address the identified challenge.
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indicators (how you will know and/or be able to measure the
effectiveness of the OD services provided).
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introduction has a thesis statement/central idea that is
developed in the body, and summarized or brought to closure in
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essay and each paragraph flows logically into the next.
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16. · The writer demonstrates the ability to analyze a subject from
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going to use it to provide visual support to a presentation on the
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Proviide a 3-line summary in the submission textbox to inform
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17. for students.
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