Military Husband Must Share Pension With Wife, Also in Military

Military pension retirement in divorce

Tennessee case summary on military pension retirement in divorce.

Roger Dale Grice v. Dawn Marie Grice

The husband and wife in this Montgomery County, Tennessee, case were married in 1998 and had no children.  During the marriage, both were on active duty in the military, and retired during the marriage.  In 2019, the husband left the marital home and filed for divorce.  At the time of the divorce trial, the husband was 44 years old and the wife, 42.  As a result of their service, both spouses were disabled.  The husband’s disability was set at 100%, and the wife’s at 90%.

The husband had a gross monthly retirement benefit of about $2400, and the wife received about $2000 in VA disability payments.  Both were enrolled in the Thrift Savings Plan, and the wife’s balance of about $47,000, and the husband’s $3000.

The trial court, Judge Kathryn Wall Olita, entered a divorce and divided the property.  The lower court held that the husband’s retirement constituted marital property, based upon the fact that 195 months of the marriage overlapped with his 263 month army career.  Therefore, it held that 74% of the pension was marital property, and awarded 37% to the wife.  The husband was awarded half of the wife’s Thrift Savings Plan, and all of his.  After other issues were decided, the husband appealed to the Tennessee Court of Appeals with respect to his pension.

The husband conceded on appeal that the military retirement was marital property, but argued that a different method of division should have been used, based upon the unique factors of the case.  He argued that since both spouses had similar military careers, there was “no sacrifice” by the wife of the type that a spouse would normal make when receiving a share of a pension.  The appeals court, however, disagreed, noting that both parties had multiple deplo9yments, and the trial court’s division had been equitable under the circumstances.

The husband also argued that the wife had a greater earning capacity, but the appeals court disagreed.  It noted that both spouses, despite physical and mental diagnoses, were both young and had reasonable earning capacities.

For these reasons, the Court of Appeals affirmed the order of the trial court.

The appeals court opinion was authored by Judge John W. MacClarty and joined by Judges Thomas R. Frierson, II, and Kristi M. Davis.

No. M2020–00931-COA-R3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. Oct. 20, 2021).

See original opinion for exact language.  Legal citations omitted.

To learn more, see Tennessee Divorce Law on Retirement.