Kevdzija v. Kevdzija

850 N.E.2d 734, 166 Ohio App. 3d 276, 2006 Ohio 1723
CourtOhio Court of Appeals
DecidedApril 6, 2006
DocketNo. 85896.
StatusPublished
Cited by11 cases

This text of 850 N.E.2d 734 (Kevdzija v. Kevdzija) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Ohio Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kevdzija v. Kevdzija, 850 N.E.2d 734, 166 Ohio App. 3d 276, 2006 Ohio 1723 (Ohio Ct. App. 2006).

Opinion

Karpinski, Judge.

{¶ 1} Appellant, Joseph Kevdzija, appeals multiple rulings of the trial court in his divorce from Mary Kevdzija. Joseph and Mary were married on October 24, 1988, and had three children, all of whom were minors at the time of the divorce.

{¶ 2} The parties agreed to restrict the formal hearing to the issue of the divorce only and to submit the remaining issues for the court to decide on their briefs. After the court made its rulings, Joseph took issue with the majority of the trial court’s findings of fact and conclusions of law. He timely appealed, stating 16 assignments of error. The first states:

I. The lower court abused its discretion and erred when it failed to hold an evidentiary hearing for the purposes of taking testimony and admitting exhibits into evidence regarding the parties’ separate and marital property interests, the parties’ income, education and employment capabilities and the contemporaneous opinion of the guardian ad litem regarding the allocation of parental rights and responsibilities.

{¶ 3} In his first assignment of error, Joseph claims that, despite his stipulation that the trial court should decide the division of marital assets using only the documents he and Mary submitted with their briefs, the court erred in deciding the matter this way.

{¶ 4} By agreement of the parties, the trial court was to provide “a Judgment Entry for Divorce in this matter based upon those briefs and proposed entries.” In his appellate brief, Joseph states, however, that he “believed that the trial court would scrutinize the parties’ trial brief exhibits and. arrive at a considered and balanced result.” 1 If the court erred in failing to hold an evidentiary hearing *281 on these matters, it was clearly invited error. Accordingly, the first assignment of error is overruled.

{¶ 5} We will discuss assignments of error two, three, and 16 together:

II. The lower court’s findings of fact and conclusions of law are arbitrary and against the manifest weight of any admitted or stipulated evidence before the court.
III. If the exhibits submitted with the parties’ respective final trial briefs were properly before the lower court as admitted evidence, then, nonetheless, the trial court’s determination of the separate property interests of the defendant was contrary to law and the manifest weight of the evidence.
XVI. Defendant/appellant by agreeing to submit proposed judgment entries to the court with trial briefs and attached exhibits did not waive his right to insist that the trial court’s findings of fact and conclusions of law be supported by the preponderance of admitted evidence before the trial court.

{¶ 6} An appellate court reviews the trial court’s decision in domestic matters under an abuse-of-discretion standard.

A trial court exercises broad discretion when making an equitable division of marital property and awarding spousal support. Blakemore v. Blakemore (1983), 5 Ohio St.3d 217, 218 [5 OBR 481], 450 N.E.2d 1140. Therefore, a trial court’s decision on these matters will not be overturned absent an abuse of discretion. Id. An abuse of discretion amounts to more than a mere error of judgment, but implies that the court’s attitude was unreasonable, arbitrary, or unconscionable. Id. at 219 [5 OBR 481], 450 N.E.2d 1140. Appellate “review of the trial court’s classification of property as marital or separate is limited to whether that determination is supported by the manifest weight of the evidence.” Marcum v. Marcum (1996), 116 Ohio App.3d 606, 613, 688 N.E.2d 1085.

Bell v. Bell, Miami App. No. 2002 CA 13, 2002-Ohio-5542, 2002 WL 31317322, ¶11.

{¶ 7} As a threshold issue, we must describe the condition of the record. The court held a brief hearing on the parties’ actual grounds for divorce; that transcript is included in the record on appeal. The remainder of the record before us consists of the pleadings, several support and visitation motions, the depositions of the parties, an expert report filed by Mary, and the multiple briefs and responses filed for the court’s consideration in making its decision on the final divorce decree. The record also contains the trial court’s findings of fact and conclusions of law and related motions. Additionally, the parties stipulated *282 that the parenting order could be adopted by the court, 2 but reserved for the trial court’s decision any issues therein affecting child support only.

{¶ 8} Submitted with Joseph’s trial brief were over 206 numbered but loose pages. His brief occasionally refers to supporting documents by name, but for the most part, never indicates where these documents are located. 3 In a few circumstances, the documents are too poor a copy to be completely readable and some are unlabeled. Nowhere in the typed trial brief are there any citations of specific pages. Mary also submitted documents, but in an indexed and organized form. 4 From an appellate perspective, we find that the procedure the lower court followed has left the record in a shambles. Because no one complained of this bizarre procedure, however, we will presume regularity for the case at bar.

{¶ 9} In what appears to be a Herculean effort, the trial court prepared and filed a decision granting the divorce and issuing orders on the remaining issues. In response to Joseph’s request, the court issued findings of facts and conclusions of law. Joseph filed with this court 16 assignments of error and the same loose, disorganized documents that the trial court so heroically dealt with in lieu of a trial.

{¶ 10} In his second assignment of error, Joseph objects to the trial court’s decision as stated in the court’s findings of fact and conclusions of law. The disarray in which Joseph presented his documentation to the trial court, however, precludes a thorough review of the record. First, we note that Joseph’s attachments to his trial brief violate Cuyahoga County Loc.R. 8(A), which requires motions filed with the court to be “securely bound at the top.” Joseph’s documents were attached to his trial brief by only a rubber band.

{¶ 11} Additionally, these attachments, while numbered, are not indexed or named in the table of contents or otherwise organized or tabbed for the court. In his first trial brief, Joseph often refers to a document without providing the court with any guidance as to where to find it in the over 200 loose pages he supplied with his first trial brief.

' {¶ 12} In his second trial brief, Joseph disputes arguments raised in Mary’s trial brief. Although he refers to tax returns and other documents, he made no effort whatsoever to direct the trial court to any of them in his attachments.

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Bluebook (online)
850 N.E.2d 734, 166 Ohio App. 3d 276, 2006 Ohio 1723, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kevdzija-v-kevdzija-ohioctapp-2006.