Deborah Kay Logsdon and Mark Allen Logsdon v. Mark Edward Logsdon

Court of Appeals of Texas·Decided November 25, 2015·No. 02-14-00045-CV·Published

Opinion

COURT OF APPEALS

SECOND DISTRICT OF TEXAS

FORT WORTH

NO. 02-14-00045-CV

DEBORAH KAY LOGSDON AND APPELLANTS MARK ALLEN LOGSDON

V.

MARK EDWARD LOGSDON APPELLEE

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FROM THE 233RD DISTRICT COURT OF TARRANT COUNTY TRIAL COURT NO. 233-510709-12

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MEMORANDUM OPINION1

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I. INTRODUCTION

This is an appeal from a final decree of divorce following a bench trial. The trial court made a disproportionate award of the community estate in favor of Appellee Mark Edward Logsdon (Husband) after finding that Appellant Deborah

1 See Tex. R. App. P. 47.4.

Kay Logsdon (Wife) had committed actual fraud against the community estate by transferring and expending community funds to benefit herself and the couple’s adult son, Appellant Mark Allen Logsdon (Son). In support of its judgment, the trial court made twenty-two findings of fact and twenty conclusions of law.2 Wife raises eight issues, complaining that the trial court erroneously included Son’s property in the community estate, erroneously found that she had committed actual fraud on the community, erred in its disproportionate division of the community estate, failed to issue additional findings of fact, failed to award her child support, and erroneously awarded attorney’s fees to Husband on her tort claims. Son raises three issues complaining that the trial court wrongly included property he owned in its division of Husband and Wife’s community property.

Because we hold that Husband’s settlement offer on Wife’s tort claims did not comply with the procedures and time limits set forth in chapter 42 of the Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code and Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 167,

2 Although the trial court’s findings and conclusions were issued outside the time period contemplated by the rules of civil procedure, we nonetheless consider them. See Goldman v. Olmstead, 414 S.W.3d 346, 359 (Tex. App.— Dallas 2013, pet. denied) (explaining rules do not preclude belated findings by trial court nor their consideration by appellate court); Robles v. Robles, 965 S.W.2d 605, 610 (Tex. App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 1998, pet. denied) (same); see also Kramer v. Weir SPM, No. 02-13-00093-CV, 2014 WL 3953928, at *2 (Tex. App.—Fort Worth Aug. 14, 2014, pet. denied) (mem. op.) (holding failure to timely file findings and conclusions harmless because appellant could not show late-filed findings and conclusions hampered his ability to request additional findings and conclusions or to properly present his appeal).

we will modify the trial court’s judgment to delete the attorney’s fees of $3,120 that were awarded to Husband in defending against Wife’s tort claims, and we will affirm the judgment as modified.

II. FACTUAL OVERVIEW3

Husband and Wife married in 1984. Son was born in 1989, and M.L.

(Daughter) was born in 1996. Husband and Wife owned and operated a family business called Champion Sweeping, which performed parking lot, property, and building maintenance. Husband’s duties included obtaining customers, performing the work, and maintaining the equipment. Wife handled the books for the company from 1984 or 1985 until August 2012. Through the years, Wife paid the family’s personal expenses directly from the Champion Sweeping account. 4 Son helped out at Champion Sweeping from the time he was seven years old and worked there through college as the office manager.

Husband and Wife separated in September 2010, and Husband moved out of the family residence. On December 26, 2011, Husband admitted that he was having an affair, and in January 2012, Wife began depleting the Champion Sweeping account; she wrote backdated checks, cashed them, and transferred the money into accounts in her name and in Son’s name. On February 4, 2012,

3 A more detailed factual discussion is set forth, as necessary, in connection with our discussion of the parties’ issues below.

4 When asked what personal expenses were paid through the Champion Sweeping account, Wife answered, “Everything.”

Wife caught Husband with another woman, and six days later, Wife filed for divorce. Husband answered and filed a counterpetition for divorce.

Due to the parties’ difficulties in continuing to jointly operate the business, Husband filed a motion for the appointment of a receiver, which the trial court granted. The receiver initially allowed Wife and Husband to attempt to run the business together, but when that became unworkable, the receiver took over running Champion Sweeping in September 2012. The receiver discovered and documented that on January 20, 2012, Wife had written backdated checks that she had made payable to herself, to Husband, and to Son and had negotiated all of the checks herself.

Husband later filed a motion for leave to add Son as a necessary third-

party, claiming that through discovery, he had learned that large sums of money—which Husband believed constituted community property—were being held in Son’s name and that Son had “borrowed the money” to buy two new vehicles. The trial court granted Husband’s motion. Husband then amended his counterpetition for divorce to add claims against Son for fraud and civil conspiracy. Husband pleaded that Son was the record title holder and/or registered owner of certain property belonging to the community estate, including “a Jeep Wrangler, a Ford F[-]150 motor vehicle, and certain monetary funds” held in Son’s name or in trust for Son. Husband’s pleading sought a judgment against Wife and Son for actual and exemplary damages and requested the trial court to find that the assets listed were transferred to Son by commission of a fraud on

Husband’s community interest in the assets, to set aside the transfers, to declare the assets to be community property, and to order Son to return any funds paid to him. Son filed a general denial.

Two weeks before the divorce trial commenced, Wife amended her petition to add causes of action for assault, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and breach of fiduciary duty by Husband. Husband attempted to settle these claims for $100 before trial, but Wife did not accept the settlement offer.

During trial, a court-appointed appraiser testified regarding the value of Champion Sweeping. The receiver testified regarding the alleged fraudulent transfers that Wife had made to herself and to Son. Wife and Husband testified regarding assets owned by the community estate, and each provided a proposed property division. Wife and Husband also testified regarding the possession and conservatorship of Daughter.

At the conclusion of Wife’s case in chief and Husband’s case in chief, Son stipulated that the sum of $119,706.67 that the receiver had recovered from Son’s account was not Son’s property but was community property to be considered in the division of his parents’ community estate. Son then moved for a directed verdict as to the two claims Husband had pleaded against him––fraud and civil conspiracy––arguing that no evidence existed that he had participated with Wife in either a fraud or a civil conspiracy.5 After hearing arguments from

5 In his appellate brief, Son points out that his motion should have been labeled a motion for judgment, not a motion for directed verdict, because there

Son’s attorney and Husband’s attorney concerning the motion for directed verdict, the trial court ruled that although evidence existed of Son’s involvement in the actual fraud perpetrated by Wife, no evidence existed of any independent damage to the community caused by Son. Accordingly, the trial court concluded that the damage to the community, if any, was a property-division consideration under Schlueter.6 The trial court then granted Son’s motion for directed verdict.

At the conclusion of the trial, the trial court granted the divorce and took all other issues under advisement. The trial court signed a final decree of divorce several months later, signed a corrected final decree from which Wife and Son appeal, and signed findings of fact and conclusions of law.

III. STANDARDS OF REVIEW

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