Mom Can’t Be Held in Contempt for Telling Son Not to Take “Treasures” from Sunken Boat

The parents in this Davidson County, Tennessee, case were married in 2014 and had a child in 2016.  In 2021, the mother was awarded a divorce on the grounds of irreconcilable difference.  The case prompted a first appeal to the Tennessee Court of Appeals, which issued a ruling in 2023 on the mother’s petition for contempt.

While that case was pending, the father filed his own petition for contempt.  He alleged that the mother was guilty of 29 violations of the permanent parenting plan.  The mother argued that some of the violations, based upon the Parental Bill of Rights, were barred by the constitution, but the trial court, Judge Phillip R. Robinson, disagreed.  It found the mother guilty of seven counts of contempt, and sentenced her to 29 consecutive days in jail.  It stayed the jail time, pending her strict compliance with court orders.  It also awarded the father attorney’s fee of over $6000.  The mother again appealed to the Tennessee Court of Appeals.

The appeals court first noted that Tennessee had a long history of granting the courts the power to punish contempt, dating back to 1831.  The party has the right to notice and an opportunity to respond, and the proceedings are neither wholly civil nor criminal in nature.

The mother argued that the order was not clear and specific, and did not support a finding of contempt.  In particular, she pointed to the provisions of the Parental Bill of Rights incorporated into the order.  She pointed out that a provision regarding derogatory remarks was not enforceable.  The allegation in support of this was that the mother “spoke badly about” the father.  Specifically, he referred to an incident regarding a sunken boat that had been there for years.  The mother told the child that the father took the light off the sunken boat, and that was stealing.

The incident involved the child, while he was with the father, removing a navigation light from a partially sunken pontoon boat and showing it off to his mother.  The child commented that he needed to get all the treasures off the boat, and the mother said it was stealing.

The appeals court held that, even if taking the light amounted to stealing, the comment was not about the father or directed at the father.  She simply told the son not to take further items off the boat, and that she thought it was stealing.  For these reasons, the Court of Appeals reversed this portion of the ruling.

Similarly, the father objected to his failure to get notice of a kindergarten parent orientation.  But the appeals court found that the alleged violation was in relation to a provision regarding extracurricular activities, and school was not an extracurricular activity.

After reviewing the entire order, the Court of Appeals concluded that all of the counts of contempt should be reversed.  It also granted the mother her attorney’s fees, and remanded the case for computation of the amount. 

The decision of the Court of Appeals was authored by Judge Kenny Armstrong, and joined by Judges J. Steven Stafford and Carma Dennis McGee.

No. M2023-00325-COA-R3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. June 6, 2024).

See original opinion for exact language.  Legal citations omitted.

To learn more, see Child Custody Laws in Tennessee and our video, How is child custody determined in Tennessee?

See also Tennessee Parenting Plans and Child Support Worksheets: Building a Constructive Future for Your Family featuring examples of parenting plans and child support worksheets from real cases available on Amazon.com.