FedEx Pilot In Contempt For Refusing to Pay Agreed Bonus
Shelby County Courthouse
Tennessee case summary on contempt for enforcement of settlement after divorce.
Suzanne Elaine Crawley Cowan v. Robert Elmo Cowan, Jr.
The husband and wife in this Shelby County, Tennessee, case were married in 1986, and the wife filed for divorce in 2016. The trial court granted the wife a divorce in 2017 on the grounds of irreconcilable differences. The parties had entered into a marital dissolution agreement, and the court’s decree incorporated that agreement. Among other things, the agreement provided that if the husband received a bonus, even upon his retirement, that half would be payable to the wife. The agreement also provided that reasonable attorney’s fees would need to be paid in the event of a breach of the agreement.
The husband retired as a FedEx pilot in 2018. His employment contract called for a bonus to be paid under certain conditions, and the husband met those conditions. The bonus of about $59,000 ($44,000 net) was paid in 2018.
The wife demanded half of the bonus, but the husband stated that he didn’t believe the agreement applied. The wife then took him to court, and the case was heard by Judge Mary L. Wagner, who agreed with the wife and ordered payment of the bonus. The court also held the husband in civil contempt for refusing to pay, and ordered the husband to pay over $10,000 in attorney’s fees, which was later increased by about $2000. After some post-trial motions, the husband appealed to the Tennessee Court of Appeals.
After stating the relevant standard of review, the appeals court turned to the interpretation of the marital dissolution agreement, which the court noted is subject to the normal rules of contract interpretation.
The appeals court held that the agreement was unambiguous, and that the wife was entitled to half of the bonus. The agreement stated that the wife was entitled to half of a bonus in connection with the husband’s retirement, and the court held that that was exactly what this bonus was.
The appeals court also held that contempt was the proper remedy in the case. It first held that the original decree was a lawful order, and the evidence showed that the husband had failed to abide by it. The court rejected the husband’s argument that the order was too ambiguous to be enforced with contempt penalties. It therefore affirmed the contempt finding.
The court also agreed with the lower court that the award of attorney’s fees was appropriate. And since the wife had to defend the husband’s appeal, it held that she was entitled to her attorney’s fees on appeal as well. Therefore, it ordered such an award, and remanded the case to the lower court for calculation of the proper amount.
For these reasons, the court affirmed the lower court’s ruling and remanded the case.
No. W2019-00179-COA-R3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. Apr. 24, 2020).
See original opinion for exact language. Legal citations omitted.
To learn more, see The Tennessee Divorce Process: How Divorces Work Start to Finish.
