Harrington v. Harrington

759 S.W.2d 664, 1988 Tenn. LEXIS 189
CourtTennessee Supreme Court
DecidedOctober 24, 1988
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 759 S.W.2d 664 (Harrington v. Harrington) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Tennessee Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Harrington v. Harrington, 759 S.W.2d 664, 1988 Tenn. LEXIS 189 (Tenn. 1988).

Opinion

OPINION

HARBISON, Chief Justice.

In this case the judgment creditor appealed from an order of a circuit judge permitting the judgment debtor to pay the judgment in installments. A narrative summary of a small portion of the evidence heard by the trial judge comprised the record on appeal.

The Court of Appeals reversed the judgment of the trial court and remanded the case to the trial judge to fix an increased amount. The majority of the Court of Appeals held that, as a matter of law, installment payments on judgments, authorized pursuant to T.C.A. §§ 26-2-216, et seq. must be fixed in an amount at least sufficient to defray annual interest on the judgment and some portion on the principal debt. A dissenting member of the Court of Appeals concluded that the trial judge did not follow the procedures set out in the statutes above cited and would have vacated the trial judge’s order on that ground.

This Court granted review. We remand for further proceedings. The appellate record is so sparse that review of the facts is rendered very difficult. We respectfully disagree with the Court of Appeals, however, as to the legal requirements for minimum payments under the statutes.

The suit was instituted in the Circuit Court of Sumner County, Tennessee, to enforce a final judgment rendered in the Circuit Court of Floyd County, Indiana, in the amount of $27,600.00 plus costs and attorneys’ fees. The judgment was for accrued child support which the appellant had been ordered to pay in connection with Indiana divorce proceedings commenced many years previously. The final judgment of the Indiana court awarding a lump sum against the appellant was entered on February 26, 1985. Questions concerning the validity of the Indiana judgment and the proceedings leading up to it were originally raised when the present action was commenced in Tennessee. All such questions were resolved in the trial court and are not involved here.

The trial judge heard oral testimony on two occasions, October 28, 1986, and December 2, 1986. Orders of judgment pursuant to each of these hearings were entered. The initial judgment found that the appellant might be entitled to a credit against the judgment for child support payments previously made. It allowed the creditor twenty days within which to produce evidence with respect to this issue. Apparently a second hearing was held thereafter, following which a final judgment was entered finding that the appellant was not entitled to the credit sought.

Only part of the pleadings and motions filed in the trial court were transmitted on appeal. The first judgment entered by the trial judge recited that the appellant had filed a motion “to be allowed to pay the judgment under a slow pay plan presented to the Court.”

[666]*666That motion and any affidavit filed with it were not included in the record on appeal. However, the first judgment order recited that the trial judge had “entertained” such a motion and that the trial judge was pleased to grant it. The court directed that no execution issue against any judgment so long as the appellant “pays the judgment at the rate of $100.00 per month until said judgment is paid in full.”

The second judgment order, entered following the December 2,1986, hearing, indicated that the court had reconsidered “the slow pay plan theretofore approved by the Court,” and the second judgment order also directed that the appellant be permitted to pay the judgment at the rate of $100.00 per month. Apparently there was no request for additional findings of fact. Instead, the original plaintiff appealed to the Court of Appeals, presenting a single issue as to whether the trial judge erred in permitting payment of the judgment in monthly installments of $100.00 each.

Almost no evidentiary record has been supplied on appeal. There is no statement or other showing that a verbatim transcript was unavailable as required by Rule 24(c), T.R.A.P. Nevertheless, the only documents accompanying the record on appeal were a six paragraph “statement of the evidence” which purports to be “a portion of the testimony of the defendant/appellee Paul Harrington, heard by the Court on October 28, 1986.”1

This statement contains no evidence whatever concerning Mr. Harrington’s financial situation or the amount of the installment payment. It simply recites that the parties were divorced in Indiana in 1974 and that Mr. Harrington was then a resident of Tennessee and continues to be such. The statement recites that Mr. Harrington has been employed by Stouffer Chemical Company continuously since 1974 and that he has not remarried. It also states that the children of the parties had reached their age of majority. An exhibit introduced at the October 23, 1986, hearing by Mr. Harrington was attached to the summary of the evidence. This exhibit consists of a list of “Assets and Liabilities Per Month” apparently filed by Mr. Harrington, without explanation or elaboration. These show total expenses each month of $1,594.00 and net take-home pay of $1,567.00, or a deficit of $27.00. The list, however, includes such things as $200.00 per month for entertainment in addition to cable television charges. It includes a number of other items which probably were explained or elaborated upon in the oral testimony given at trial, but there is no transcript or other summary included in the record on appeal.

In our opinion, this was a wholly inadequate record to present to an appellate court for review of an installment payment. Apparently neither side objected, however, and counsel for the debtor did not file any supplemental or additional transcript. In our opinion, the appellate court would have been justified in dismissing the appeal or in directing the furnishing of a more adequate record “to convey a fair, accurate and complete account of what transpired in the trial court with respect to those issues that are the bases of appeal.” Rule 24(g), T.R.A.P.

Generally, we tend to agree with the Court of Appeals that the amount of $100.00 per month will do little ever to discharge the judgment in question, the principal amount of which was $27,500.00, plus $250.00 attorneys’ fees and an unspecified amount of court costs. We also agree with the Court of Appeals that the monthly payments ordered would not even pay the interest on the principal, and certainly the judgment could never be discharged with an installment payment so low. Without an evidentiary record, however, and without any information as to any other debts or obligations of the husband, it is extremely difficult from this record to determine whether the trial judge erred factually in setting the amount of the monthly payment.

The Court of Appeals held that the trial judge erred as a matter of law, not as a [667]*667matter of fact, and held that any installment payment must be in a minimum amount to discharge annually the interest on the principal debt and to reduce to some degree the principal.

While this conclusion is quite logical and sensible, it adds criteria and requirements to the statutes which the General Assembly has not specified.

The briefs of the parties treat “slow-pay” plans as originating with Tenn. Public Acts 1978, chapter 915. It is true that the present statutes, codified at T.C.A. §§ 26-2-216 et seq., are based upon the 1978 statute. That statute, however, had antecedents going back to Tenn. Public Acts 1939, chapter 139, when the first “slow-pay” provisions were enacted.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
759 S.W.2d 664, 1988 Tenn. LEXIS 189, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/harrington-v-harrington-tenn-1988.