Rice v. Rice

584 S.E.2d 317, 159 N.C. App. 487, 2003 N.C. App. LEXIS 1496
CourtCourt of Appeals of North Carolina
DecidedAugust 5, 2003
DocketCOA02-953
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 584 S.E.2d 317 (Rice v. Rice) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of North Carolina primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Rice v. Rice, 584 S.E.2d 317, 159 N.C. App. 487, 2003 N.C. App. LEXIS 1496 (N.C. Ct. App. 2003).

Opinions

BRYANT, Judge.

Jean Marie (plaintiff), formerly Jean H. Rice, appeals from an order denying her request for a new evidentiary hearing and from amended equitable distribution and alimony judgments dated 19 October 2001.

On 5 July 1995, plaintiff brought an action against her husband Charles E. Rice, III (defendant) seeking a divorce and equitable distribution of the marital property. Plaintiff later amended her complaint to also request alimony. Plaintiff and defendant had married on 14 February 1982, separated on 16 April 1994, and were divorced on 27 October 1995. In an equitable distribution judgment filed 12 November 1998, the trial court concluded that the evidence and distributional factors found by the trial court supported an unequal division of the marital estate in defendant’s favor. In a concurrent judgment, the trial court denied plaintiff’s claim for alimony on the basis that she was not a dependent spouse. Plaintiff appealed from these judgments, and this Court reversed the November 12 equitable distribution and alimony judgments and remanded the case to the trial court for additional findings and conclusions on the valuation of defendant’s law practice and the former marital residence, the issue of fault, and the parties’ accustomed standard of living. See Rice v. Rice, 138 N.C. App. 710, 536 S.E.2d 662 (2000) (COA99-513) (unpublished) [hereinafter Rice i]. On remand, plaintiff requested a new evi-dentiary hearing, but the trial court denied the motion in its 19 October 2001 order. The trial court then entered an amended equitable distribution judgment, which included the following findings:

Defendant’s Law Practice
A. . . . Defendant was a partner in a law practice known as Jackson & Rice from June 1992 through April 1993, and beginning in May 1993, . . . [defendant began practicing as a sole practitioner. As of the date of separation, . . . [defendant's solo law practice had been in existence less than one year.
B. . . . Defendant was expected to receive a share of the fees from two cases . . . handled by the Jackson & Rice firm, but [491]*491these fees had not been received by the Jackson & Rice firm before that firm dissolved. . . . Defendant ultimately received these “carryover” fees in four installments, as follows:
(1) The sum of $50,000.00 approximately five months prior to the date of separation ....
(2) The sum of $100,000.00 on April 19, 1994, of which sum . . . [defendant transferred to . . . [p]laintiff the sum of $22,554.96 on May 2, 1994.
(3) Two further payments totaling approximately $42,811.00 in June 1994, of which . . . [defendant transferred to . . . [p]laintiff the sum of $11,773.10 on June 24, 1994.
C.The “carryover” fees received after the date of separation, totaling $142,811.00, although arguably derived from “marital” effort, were not acquired before the date of separation. Accordingly, these fees do not fall within the definition of marital property[] and are properly excluded from the marital estate. However, the [trial] [c]ourt will consider these post-separation funds as a “distributional factor,” also to be included in . . . [defendant's separate estate.

In subsequently valuing defendant’s law practice at $7,400.00, the trial court in essence adopted the valuation of plaintiff’s expert but subtracted the $100,000.00 carryover fee received by defendant on 19 April 1994, which plaintiff’s expert had included in his calculations, based on the trial court’s conclusion that these funds were defendant’s separate property.

With respect to the parties’ Parmele Boulevard property, the trial court concluded it was a mixed asset, part marital and part separate, and found:

B. The fair market value on [the] date of marriage was $90,000[.00].
C. The property was encumbered by a mortgage at the date of marriage, with a principal balance due of $28,125[.00]. The [trial] [c]ourt accepts the parties’ classification of this mortgage as a marital debt.
D. The net value on the date of marriage was $61,875[.00].
E. The fair market value on the date of separation was $185,000[.00].
[492]*492F. On the date of separation, the principal balance of the mortgage was $16,443[.00] . . . [and] was paid off shortly after the date of separation with “carryover” fees from Jackson & Rice .... This use of... [defendant's separate funds to reduce marital debt should be treated as a distributional factor ....
G. The net value on the date of separation was $168,557[.00],
H. Between the date of marriage and the date of separation, the net value of this property increased by $106,682[.00 ]. . . .
I. Between the date of marriage and the date of separation, the principal balance of the mortgage . . . was actively reduced by $11,682[.00] through the use of marital funds. This portion of the active increase in net value should be classified as marital property.
(1) . . . Plaintiff has apparently contended that a portion of the funds used to reduce the principal balance of the mortgage during the marriage [] were her separate funds from an inheritance. However, mortgage payments during the marriage were paid from the parties’ joint account, into which . . . [p]laintiff occasionally deposited and commingled her separate, inherited funds. . . . Plaintiff has failed to trace any such separate funds through the joint account as having been specifically “applied” to payment of the mortgage .... Accordingly, . . . [p]laintiff has failed to establish by a preponderance of the evidence the “source of funds” that she now claims to have been her separate property.
J. During the marriage, the parties spent approximately $30,000[.00] for improvements to the property, of which approximately $12,000[.00] (or 40%) was marital and $18,000.00 (or 60%) was the separate property of . . . [plaintiff. These improvements actively increased the net value of the property by $11,500[.00] as of the date of separation. Accordingly, $4,600[.00] of this portion of the active increase in net value should be classified as marital. . . and $6,900[.00] ... as [plaintiffs] separate property ....
K. The remaining $83,500[.00] of the total increase in net value as of the date of separation appears to have been the result of passive appreciation .... Although there is no exact way to divide this passive appreciation between the marital estate [493]*493and the separate estate of.. . [p]laintiff, the [trial] [c]ourt will attempt to provide a proportionate return on the “investment” of each estate.
L. During the marriage, the “principal” (active) contribution of . . . [p]laintiff’s estate to the net value of this property totaled $68,775[.00] (i.e., $61,875[.00] + $6,900[.00]), and the “principal” (active) contribution of the marital estate was $16,282[.00] (i.e., $11,682[.00] + $4,600[.00]). The combined “principal” (active) contribution of the marital and separate estates during the marriage totaled $85,057[.00]. The proportion of this combined total that was marital was 19.14% and the proportion . . . that was separate was 80.86%.

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Rice v. Rice
584 S.E.2d 317 (Court of Appeals of North Carolina, 2003)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
584 S.E.2d 317, 159 N.C. App. 487, 2003 N.C. App. LEXIS 1496, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/rice-v-rice-ncctapp-2003.