Krystina Summers
LA265
Unit 7
Chamberlain v. Eisinger, So.3d (Fla. 4th DCA 2015)
This case is being heard in the District Court of
Appeal of Florida. The mother had appealed for past due child support and
alimony. The Nineteenth Judicial Circuit Court ordered modified timesharing and
ordered the mother to pay child support and the father to pay alimony. The
mother appealed and the father cross-appealed.
In June 2007 in Maryland, the mother was awarded
physical custody of four minor children (two girls, two boys) while the father
was to pay $1,200/month in child support and $2,000/month in alimony. He then
moved to Florida while the mother and children lived in Maryland.
In 2009, the father was granted primary sole custody
of the eldest daughter while the mother remained the primary sole custodian of
the younger three children.
In March 2010, the Maryland courts found the father in
contempt because he had not made an alimony payment. Instead of being
incarcerated, the father paid a lump sum of $8,000 dollars for alimony and a
payment of $1,200 for child support. In July 2010, the mother surprisingly
moved to Florida while the father was summer timesharing with his children. A
month later, the father filed a Supplemental Petition to Modify Parenting
Plan/Time Sharing Schedule and Other Relief, along with an Emergency Motion
requesting that the mother have a psychological evaluation and supervised
visitation. The courts granted the Emergency motion and allowed the younger
daughter to live with the father; the sons would have equal timesharing with
the mother and father; the doctor would prepare a family plan and the mother
and father would submit a psych evaluation; they both would have daily phone
contact with the boys; and the children would go to therapy and counseling with
their parents.
In March 2011, the father filed Amended Supplemental
Petition for Modification of the Parenting Plan/Timesharing Schedule, which
lead to a four-day trial. During this time, the aforementioned doctor testified
that the two daughters displayed extreme stress and turmoil while the older son
seemed to be very impacted by the situation between his parents and blamed his
mother. The courts ordered that the father have majority timesharing with the
older daughters while they attend counseling with their mother; the father was
also given majority timesharing with the older son and the mother would have
him for alternate weekends. The younger son had equal timesharing between the
parents. Additionally, the mother was ordered to pay $533/month for child
support.
The court then denied the Father's Supplemental Petition
for Modification of Alimony because there had not been a major reduction in his
income sine the Maryland judgment.
After reviewing the information included for this
case, the Court of Appeals found that the trial court was correct in their way
of dealing with the issues. The Court of Appeals ultimately affirmed in part
and reversed and remanded in part; the holdings were that: “a substantial
change in circumstances warranted modification of timesharing arrangement and
was in children's best interests; unpaid alimony payments could not be excluded
from father's income and included in mother's income when calculating mother's
retroactive child support obligation; and trial court erred in imputing income
to father for child support purposes, absent the requisite findings as to how
the $73,000 income was derived.”
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