Turley v. Turley

562 S.W.2d 665, 1978 Ky. App. LEXIS 474
CourtCourt of Appeals of Kentucky
DecidedFebruary 17, 1978
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 562 S.W.2d 665 (Turley v. Turley) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Kentucky primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Turley v. Turley, 562 S.W.2d 665, 1978 Ky. App. LEXIS 474 (Ky. Ct. App. 1978).

Opinions

PARK, Judge.

This is an appeal from a judgment dissolving the marriage between the appellant, Wardie Ellen Turley and her husband, Ernest Loyd Turley, the appellee. Mrs. Tur-ley raises three issues: (1) whether the trial court arbitrarily assigned erroneous values to marital property; (2) whether the trial court’s division of the property accumulated during the marriage was erroneous; and (3) whether the trial judge should have disqualified himself because of kinship with counsel for Mr. Turley.

The parties were married for twenty-three years. At the time of the commencement of the action, Mrs. Turley was forty-nine years of age, and Mr. Turley was sixty-three years of age. There were no minor children. Mr. Turley suffered a stroke in 1974, and he has not worked since that time. Mrs. Turley had been employed by General Electric Company. At the time of the hearing she was on sick leave as a result of an injury and was “drawing compensation.”

I

The trial judge found that the property owned by the parties at the time of their separation had a value of approximately $15,000.00. Mrs. Turley contends that the values assigned by the trial court to the various items of property were erroneous. The only testimony respecting value was offered by Mr. Turley himself. Mrs. Turley did not contradict his estimates, and she offered no evidence of her own as to value. Considering the state of the record submitted to the trial judge for determination, we conclude that his findings as to the value of the items of personal property were not clearly erroneous. CR 52.01.

A more difficult question is presented by the trial court’s finding that the parties’ equitable interest in a lot and mobile home had a value of $5,000.00. The evidence did show that $3,500.00 from the sale of Mr. Turley’s farm in 1956 had been invested in the purchase and improvement of the lot. The mobile home had been purchased four years before the separation for $9,995.00. The purchase of the mobile home was financed over a twelve year period, and at the time of separation the balance due was $13,000.00 which included interest charges and insurance premiums for eight years in the future. No proof was offered to indicate what portion of the balance due was attributable to the unaccrued finance charges and insurance premiums. Mr. Turley testified that, in his opinion, the mobile home itself was worth not more than $8,000.00. An eighty foot strip had been sold off the original lot for $500.00. This constituted all of the evidence respecting the value of the mobile home and lot. Mrs. Turley offered absolutely no evidence respecting the value of the mobile home and lot. With such scanty proof as to the value of the lot and mobile home and with Mrs. Turley having offered no evidence whatever as to value, we cannot find that the value assigned by the trial court was clearly erroneous. In the absence of any other evidence in the record, the trial judge was entitled to draw on his own experience and knowledge. Certainly, we cannot say that the value assigned was excessive when the complaining party offered no evidence respecting the principal asset owned by the parties.

II

At the time of their marriage, Mrs. Tur-ley had approximately $500.00 in cash. The sum was used by the parties during the [668]*668marriage, and it could not be traced into any present asset owned by them. At the time of the marriage, Mr. Turley owned a farm which was subsequently sold during the marriage for $3,500.00. The proceeds were invested by the parties in the purchase and improvement of the lot upon which the parties resided in the mobile home at the time of their separation. At the time of the marriage, Mr. Turley also owned a car and some furniture which was valued by the trial court at $2,200.00. During the marriage, he inherited the sum of $1,684.40. The automobile, the furniture, and the inheritance were used by the parties during the marriage, and could not be traced into any present asset owned by them.

In dividing the property belonging to the parties, the trial court assigned the bulk of the property to Mrs. Turley. However, the trial court directed that she pay to her husband the sum of $9,360.70. According to the findings of fact, conclusions of law, and judgment of the trial court, this sum represented one half of the marital property, plus the value of the property owned by Mr. Turley at the time of the marriage or inherited by him during the marriage, less the value of the marital property assigned to him.

In making this award, the trial court erred in failing to take into account the sum of $659.00 withdrawn by Mr. Tur-ley from an account at the People’s Bank. This sum should have been taken into account in making a division of marital property. Mrs. Turley further contends that the trial court erred in its division of the property of the parties because Mr. Turley did not trace the proceeds of the inheritance received by him and the furniture and automobile owned by him at the time of the marriage into specific assets owned at the time of the separation. We agree that this also was error.

KRS 403.190(2) defines “marital property” to include all property acquired by either spouse subsequent to the marriage except:

(a)Property acquired by gift, bequest, devise or descent;
(b) Property acquired in exchange for property acquired before the marriage or in exchange for property acquired by gift, bequest, devise, or descent;
(c) Property acquired by a spouse after a decree of legal separation;
(d) Property excluded by valid agreement of the parties; and
(e) The increase in value of property acquired before the marriage to the extent that such increase did not result from the efforts of the parties during [the] marriage.

Subparagraph (3) of KRS 403.190 then provides that all property acquired by either spouse after the marriage is presumed to be marital property without regard to record title. This presumption is overcome only by a showing that the property was acquired by one of the five exceptions listed in subsection (2) of the statute.

In this case, Mr. Turley failed to show that any property owned by the parties at the time of the separation was acquired by use of his inheritance or from the proceeds from the sale of the automobile and furniture owned by him prior to the marriage. Because he did not trace the inheritance or the proceeds, if any, from the disposition of the automobile and furniture, it was error for the trial court to award him the value of such items. Sharp v. Sharp, Ky., 516 S.W.2d 875, 878 (1974); Farmer v. Farmer, Ky., 506 S.W.2d 109, 112 (1974). Likewise, the trial court erred in awarding Mrs. Tur-ley the sum of $500.00 which she owned at the time of the marriage and which she could not tracé*into specific assets owned by the parties at the date of separation. Mr. Turley did trace the proceeds from the sale of the farm which he owned at the time of the marriage into the lot which was owned by the parties. Consequently, it was not error for the trial court to award him that sum as nonmarital property in lieu of the lot itself.

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Bluebook (online)
562 S.W.2d 665, 1978 Ky. App. LEXIS 474, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/turley-v-turley-kyctapp-1978.