TN Husband Must Pay Attorney’s Fees in Addition to Property Settlement

Tennessee law case summary on attorney’s fees in Tennessee divorce and family law from the Tennessee Court of Appeals.

Linda M. Pettigrew v. Dennis A. Pettigrew – Tennessee Husband Must Pay Attorney’s Fees in Addition to Property Settlement

The wife, Linda M. Pettigrew, and the husband, Dennis A. Pettigrew, were married for 31 years and had two grown children.  The wife, 54 and the husband, 64 were both highly educated.  The wife had a master’s degree in social work and was looking for work as a grief counselor, but had not been employed since 2005.   The wife filed for divorce and alleged irreconcilable differences.

Financial issues included division of property and alimony.  The court ordered the husband to pay the wife $500,000 from the marital property.  The wife also asked for both temporary and permanent support since she had not worked outside of the home for many years.   The Court found the wife was clearly at a financial disadvantage since she had not held a job for many years.   The court found that rehabilitative alimony, that is, alimony to help the wife acquire additional education or training to enable her to reach the same standard of living, was not feasible.   The court also found that alimony in futuro, to be provided until the wife remarried or until the husband died, was not appropriate because of the husband’s age and employment uncertainties.   Instead, the court held that transitional alimony, aimed at providing financial assistance in order to adjust to the divorce and it’s consequences, would be the best choice to help the wife become self-sufficient.

Based on the wife’s monthly needs of close to $8,000 a month and the husband’s excess income of over $11,000 a month, the trial court ordered the husband to pay seven years of traditional alimony.  The payments were for $4,500 per month in the first year, and then reduced by $500 per year, placing the year seven payments at $1,500 per month.

The court also awarded the wife her attorney’s fees in the amount of close to $20,000, as alimony in solido, or a lump-sum payment.  The husband appealed the alimony in solido decision, arguing that the court abused its discretion in making this award since her fees should be paid from the property settlement she received.

The court of appeals upheld the lower court decision.   The higher court could rule that there was an abuse of discretion only if the lower court applied incorrect legal standards, reached an illogical conclusion, made a mistaken assessment of the evidence, or used reasoning that created an injustice.  The appeals court, however, cannot replace its own judgment for that of the lower court’s judgment.  The appeals court agreed with the lower court and it’s weighing of the various factors, including the husband’s greater earning capacity, his income of $35,000 a month from his severance package, the long duration of the marriage and the fact that neither spouse had serious health problems.

While the appeals court accepted that attorney’s fees are not generally paid if a spouse has adequate income or property, it noted that this award is appropriate if the spouse seeking the award would have to “deplete” her resources in order to pay the fees.  In this case, since the wife was unemployed, she would be required to use the resources she had been awarded in order to pay for her lawyer.  This warranted an award of alimony in solido.

No. E2011-02706-COA-R3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. Nov. 15, 2012).

See original opinion for exact language.  Legal citations omitted.

For more information, see Attorney’s Fees in Tennessee Divorce Law FAQs.

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