TN Dad’s Income Not Imputed Amount from Earlier Appeal
Tennessee child support case summary on income determination in divorce and family law.
Gretchen Michele Benedict v. Donald Lester Benedict, Jr.
The husband and wife in this Tennessee case were divorced in 2000 and had two children. The trial court ordered the father to pay child support of $3,200 per month and the father brought an appeal to the Tennessee Court of Appeals. In 2014, that court ruled that the lower court had miscalculated the father’s income. In that first appeal, the appeals court held that the father’s income had suffered a major hit, but he had not “intentionally torpedoed his career prospects.” Therefore, the Court of Appeals had set his earning capacity at $75,000 for purposes of child support, a figure lower than the trial court had used. It sent the case back to the trial court for a redetermination of child support.
On remand, the trial court heard evidence regarding the father’s income for 2010-2014. It found that his income had ranged from a low of about $60,000 in 2010, to a high of almost $200,000 in 2013. But based upon the language from the first appeal, the lower court found that the “law of the case” set the father’s income at $75,000, and based child support on that amount. It then set the father’s support obligation at $1,259 per month. This time, the wife appealed to the Tennessee Court of Appeals.
In the second appeal, the appeals court agreed with the mother that the trial court had erred in its interpretation of the first opinion. It noted that the $75,000 figure applied to the years through 2009, but that it did not automatically apply to later years.
In the second appeal, the court reiterated that the lower court should have used the father’s actual income in making child support calculations for years after 2009. For 2007-2009, it was to use the figure of $75,000, but for later years, it should use the higher levels of actual income.
For these reasons, the Court of Appeals reversed the lower court’s ruling and sent the case back for a second time for a recalculation of child support.
No. E2015-01427-COA-R3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. May 25, 2016).
See original opinion for exact language. Legal citations omitted.
To learn more, see Child Support Laws in Tennessee.
See also Tennessee Parenting Plans and Child Support Worksheets: Building a Constructive Future for Your Family featuring actual examples of parenting plans and child support worksheets from real cases available on Amazon.com.
