Misesu E. Knighton v. James Knighton (Appeal from Montgomery Circuit Court: DR-21-900558.03).

• Court: Court of Civil Appeals of Alabama
• Decided: May 23, 2025
• Docket: CL-2024-0863
• Status: Published

Opinion

Rel: May 23, 2025

Notice: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the advance sheets of Southern Reporter. Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Alabama Appellate Courts, 300 Dexter Avenue, Montgomery, Alabama 36104-3741 ((334) 229-0650), of any typographical or other errors, in order that corrections may be made before the opinion is published in Southern Reporter.

ALABAMA COURT OF CIVIL APPEALS OCTOBER TERM, 2024-2025 _________________________

CL-2024-0863 _________________________

Misesu E. Knighton

v.

James Knighton

Appeal from Montgomery Circuit Court (DR-21-900558.03)

HANSON, Judge.

This appeal arises from a June 2024 judgment entered in an action

(case no. DR-21-900558.03) initially brought by James Knighton ("the

father") in November 2023 in the domestic-relations division of the

Montgomery Circuit Court ("the trial court") seeking to hold Misesu E. CL-2024-0863

Knighton ("the mother") in contempt. The parties, who are the parents

of two minor children, Ez. K. and El. K. ("the children"), were apparently1

divorced in September 2022 by a judgment of the trial court that awarded

the parties, among other things, joint physical custody of the children on

an alternating-week basis and certain property rights as to the parties'

former marital home ("the residence"). The prevailing "week-on, week-

off" custody arrangement as to the children seems to have remained in

effect even after modification proceedings had taken place in the trial

court, and the trial court appears to have issued another judgment or

order in October 2023 (in case no. DR-21-900558.02) addressing certain

mechanics of the eventual ultimate disposition of the residence.

The action leading to this appeal encompasses claims asserted by

the father (acting pro se) in a petition filed in November 2023 (acting pro

se) to the effect that (1) the mother, in contempt of the divorce judgment,

had refused to sign documents that would have allowed the father to put

the former marital home on the real-estate market, and (2) the mother

1The appellate record does not contain any of the orders or judgments entered by the trial court in the litigation involving the parties other than the final judgment in the contempt action (case no. DR-21- 900558.03) and the order denying the mother's postjudgment motion filed in that case. 2 CL-2024-0863

had contemptuously committed a number of discrete violations of the

custody provisions of the divorce judgment. 2 The mother, also acting pro

se, submitted an answer in which she counterclaimed for contempt

sanctions against the father, averring that he had not utilized the

resources of a particular bank to acquire the mother's equity in the

residence as purportedly directed in the October 2023 order.

After an ore tenus proceeding, at which the father and the mother

appeared pro se and gave testimony (including, as to the father's

contempt claim regarding alleged custody violations, testimony

regarding events occurring during the pendency of the action), the trial

court entered a judgment declining to find the father in contempt,

declining to find the mother in contempt as to her conduct regarding

disposition of the residence (but warning the mother to cooperate "with

all requirements for [its] listing and sale"), and finding the mother in

contempt as to the father's claim that she infringed on the father's

custodial rights; the mother was directed to pay a $500 fine within 30

2Although certain allegations in papers appended to the father's

petition appear to have sought prospective changes to the parties' custodial rights, the trial court ruled from the bench that those claims were not properly before the court, and neither party has challenged that ruling on appeal. 3 CL-2024-0863

days or be subject to arrest and incarceration. The mother, acting

through counsel, filed a timely motion pursuant to Rule 59(e), Ala. R. Civ.

P., challenging the trial court's judgment, which motion was denied after

a hearing.

The mother appeals, stating one issue for review: whether the trial

court properly held the mother in contempt when, she says, no evidence

of any willful disobedience of the prevailing custody judgment on her part

was adduced and, she says, the trial court instead acted out of bias

against her. The father has not favored this court with an appellate brief.

In reaching its determinations regarding the parties' claims, the

trial court set forth the following pertinent findings of fact in its

judgment:

"The Court finds that the [mother] violated the custody order by withholding or not otherwise allowing the [father] his custodial periods on November 19, 2023, and December 17, 2023. The [mother] made a unilateral decision to deny the [father] his custodial periods with the minor children which violated the Court's order[] and w[as] not otherwise justified. As to the … residence, the Court finds that the [father] failed to secure refinancing and/or a loan … as ordered [DR-21- 900558.02] on October 6, 2023. The Court notes however that the [father] attempted to s[ell] the [residence] and pay the [mother] her equity[;] however[,] the [mother] refused to cooperate with the same."

4 CL-2024-0863

The mother, in her appellate argument, asserts that the trial court's

judgment finding her in contempt was erroneous because, she says, the

judgment was not supported by clear and convincing evidence that she

had willfully defied the trial court's custody judgment. As a component

of her argument, she cites Rule 70A(a)(2)(D), Ala. R. Civ. P., and various

cases that address the nature and standards of proof applicable in the

context of civil contempt. We disagree, however, that those authorities

properly govern our appellate review. As the mother concedes, civil

contempt is, by definition, a "willful, continuing failure or refusal of any

person to comply with a court's lawful writ, subpoena, process, order,

rule, or command that by its nature is still capable of being complied

with." Rule 70A(a)(2)(D), Ala. R. Civ. P. (emphasis added). In contrast,

under Rule 70A(a)(2)(C)(ii), "[w]illful disobedience or resistance … to a

court's lawful … order" that gives rise to a contempt finding whose

"dominant purpose … is to punish the contemnor" (as by means of

levying a fine, such as the unconditional $500 fine imposed by the trial

court in this case) constitutes a species of criminal contempt. See also

Lester v. Lester, 378 So. 3d 555, 565 (Ala. Civ. App. 2022) (citing

International Union, UMWA v. Bagwell, 512 U.S. 821, 829 (1994), for the

5 CL-2024-0863

proposition that a flat fine judicially imposed without conditions and

without affording the contemnor an alternate means of purging the

contempt constitutes a criminal sanction). The mother was found to have

committed two specific past violations of the custody provisions of the

divorce judgment and was directed to pay $500 within 30 days or suffer

incarceration; the sanction imposed had no direct effect of coercing the

mother's future compliance.

Because the trial court's judgment, properly construed, found the

mother in criminal contempt, we must ascertain " ' " 'whether the

evidence is sufficient to justify the trial judge, as trier of the facts, in

concluding beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was guilty, and

that such evidence is inconsistent with any reasonable hypothesis of …

innocence.' " ' " Shook v. Shook, 385 So. 3d 65, 86 (Ala. Civ. App. 2023)

(quoting Ex parte Ferguson, 819 So. 2d 626, 629 (Ala. 2001)). According

to the trial transcript, the father testified (without objection) that the

mother had a history of repeatedly failing to timely deliver the children

to him for his custodial periods, and he identified two specific instances

when he had been entitled to exercise custody under the trial court's

judgment but when the mother, he stated, had completely failed to bring

6 CL-2024-0863

the children to him: once between November 19-23, 2023, preceding the

Thanksgiving holiday (November 23, 2023), and once between December

17-20, 2023, preceding the Christmas holiday (December 25, 2023).

Although, as we have noted, only the trial court's judgment and order

denying the mother's postjudgment motion appear in the appellate

record, counsel for the mother included, in the mother's postjudgment

motion, a purported excerpt from the divorce judgment pertaining to each

party's right to have the children for "special family events" after

providing advance written notice, which right was subject to the proviso

that "no such periods shall, without the other parent's prior consent,

interfere with nor deprive a parent of his or her holiday … periods with

the child(ren)" and that expressly listed Thanksgiving and Christmas as

examples of such holidays.

The mother admitted in her testimony at trial that she had notified

the father on October 25, 2023, that she "would be taking the children

with [her] up to Minnesota for Thanksgiving" on November 19, 2023,

which fell during the father's allocated time with the children; she also

admitted that the father had refused to give his consent when he had

been notified of the mother's plan. The mother further admitted that

7 CL-2024-0863

Thanksgiving "was not a special event" under the custody provisions of

the divorce judgment and that she had not offered the father any

alternate time with the children in exchange for her extra custodial days

resulting from her transportation of the children to visit with her

relatives in Minnesota. As to the second contempt finding, pertaining to

custody during the Christmas season of 2023, the mother admitted that

she had, in response to a text message from the father on December 17,

2023, stated to the father "you don't get them until the 20th," which was

contrary to the alternating-week provisions of the custody judgment, and

the father testified that the mother additionally had failed to report to

the appointed child-exchange location on December 20, 2023, at 9:00

a.m., the time apparently designated in the custody judgment for holiday

exchanges. The mother offered no justification in her trial testimony

with regard to that withholding of custody that might arguably have been

consistent with the custody provisions in the trial court's order.

The mother argues that the evidence presented, including that here

summarized, did not warrant a conclusion that the mother acted in bad

faith or intentionally with respect to the two denials of custodial time.

However, the evidence before the trial court gave rise to permissible

8 CL-2024-0863

inferences that the mother had engaged in a pattern of violating the

provisions of the divorce judgment as to custody even before the two

instances at issue in this appeal, and the trial court could properly have

concluded that her testimony offered no plausible defensive hypothesis of

innocence sufficient to warrant a finding in her favor. See Shook, supra,

385 So. 3d at 86; Marler v. Lambrianakos, 371 So. 3d 287, 310 (Ala. Civ.

App. 2022) (affirming criminal-contempt judgment as to denial of

visitation and referencing finding of contemnor's "ongoing pattern of

interference with and attempts to obstruct [that] visitation"). Neither

are we convinced by the mother's argument that the trial court's

judgment in favor of the father on the mother's contempt counterclaim as

to the father's alleged contemptuous failure to utilize a particular bank

to refinance or obtain a mortgage loan as a means of providing the mother

with her equity in the residence constitutes an indication of bias against

the mother -- not only are "[a]dverse rulings by themselves … not

sufficient to establish bias or prejudice," Tackett v. Jones, 575 So. 2d

1123, 1124 (Ala. Civ. App. 1990), but also the father adduced evidence

both that he had explored multiple means of satisfying the mother's right

to receive her equity and that the bank identified in the trial court's

9 CL-2024-0863

October 2023 order as a potential source of refinancing or loan funds

could not have disbursed funds within the specified 30 days because of

credit-evaluation and land-valuation considerations.

Although we conclude that the judgment of the trial court is due to

be affirmed as to the findings of criminal contempt, this court, ex mero

motu, notes the absence of the trial court's subject-matter jurisdiction to

impose a sentence consisting of a monetary sanction of $500. See Shook,

385 So. 3d at 89 (noting that, pursuant to Ala. Code 1975, § 12-11-30(5),

sanctions for criminal contempt are limited by statute to a maximum fine

of $100 and imprisonment not to exceed 5 days, and observing that "[t]he

imposition of a sentence concerns subject-matter jurisdiction" that " 'may

not be waived by the parties' "(quoting Ex parte Smith, 438 So. 2d 766,

768 (Ala. 1983))). The maximum fine that could properly have been

imposed in this case was $200, or $100 per instance of contempt found;

thus, to that extent only, we vacate the judgment of the trial court and

remand the cause with instructions to the trial court to direct the mother

to pay a fine within the limits specified in § 12-11-30(5). Accord Holland

v. State, 800 So. 2d 602, 605-06 (Ala. Crim. App. 2002) (remanding cause

for correction of excessive contempt fine).

10 CL-2024-0863

JUDGMENT VACATED IN PART; AFFIRMED IN PART; AND

REMANDED WITH INSTRUCTIONS.

Moore, P.J., and Edwards, J., concur.