If you have questions about divorce, legal separation, alimony entitlement, or alimony in Connecticut, please feel free to call the experienced divorce attorneys at Maya Murphy, P.C. in Westport today at 203-221-3100 or email Joseph C. Maya, Esq. at JMaya@Mayalaw.com.

Although an increase in an Ex’s income, by itself, isn’t enough to justify an increase in a divorced person’s alimony obligation, it can lead to an increase in child-support payments.

That is the essence of a state Supreme Court decision issued Monday in the closely watched case of Maria F. McKeon, a successful Hebron lawyer who worked part-time while caring for her three children, against her ex-husband, William P. Lennon, an even better-paid Electric Boat executive. McKeon is a former chairwoman of the Hebron Board of Education.

After the couple’s 2007 divorce, McKeon filed motions for increases in her husband’s child-support payments in 2008 and 2010, citing in the second motion her increased expenses and decreased net income as well as her increased ex’s income. A trial judge denied both motions and actually reduced Lennon’s child-support payments after one of the couple’s children turned 18.

McKeon appealed to the state Appellate Court, which upheld the trial judge’s rulings. It said the legal requirements for modifying alimony and child-support were the same and cited a 2014 state Supreme Court decision holding that an increase in a divorced person’s income wasn’t, by itself, enough to justify an increase in that person’s alimony obligation.

Thus, the Appellate Court said, McKeon had to show circumstances beyond her ex-husband’s increased income to get increased child support.

That was a sufficiently significant issue in the field of matrimonial law to attract the attention of several legal groups, which filed “friend of the court” briefs after the state Supreme Court agreed to hear a further appeal in the case.

Legal aid groups warned in one of the briefs that the Appellate Court decision could harm children from less-affluent families.

The groups said in the brief that Connecticut’s “income shares” model for calculating child support is based on the “principle that children should share in their parents’ income both at its level during a parents’ union, but also at whichever level it attains as long as they are children.” The groups added that the Appellate Court decision “is at odds with this principle.”

Joining in that brief were Greater Hartford Legal Aid, the New Haven Legal Assistance Association, Connecticut Legal Services, and the Children’s Law Center.

The Supreme Court essentially agreed with the legal aid groups’ reasoning.

The decision, written by Justice Peter T. Zarella for a unanimous six-justice panel of the seven-member court, emphasized the difference between alimony and child support.

Zarella quoted the high court’s 2014 decision on alimony, which said there is “little, if any, legal or logical support … for the proposition that a legitimate purpose of alimony is to allow the supported spouse’s standard of living to match the supporting spouse’s standard of living after the divorce, when the supported spouse is no longer contributing to the supporting spouse’s income earning efforts.”

In contrast, Connecticut’s child-support guidelines are based on the “income shares” model, which “considers the income of both parents and ‘presumes that the child should receive the same proportion of parental income as he or she would have received if the parents lived together,’” Zarella wrote, quoting from the preamble to the child-support guidelines.

“This means that, unlike when considering a request for the modification of an alimony order, the trial court may consider a substantial increase in the supporting spouse’s income, standing alone, as sufficient justification for granting a motion to modify a child-support order to ensure that the child receives the same proportion of parental income that he or she would have received if the parents had remained together,” Zarella concluded.

The Supreme Court didn’t decide how much child support Lennon should pay, leaving that for a trial judge to decide based on the principles set forth in its decision.

For a free consultation, please do not hesitate to call the experienced family law and divorce attorneys at Maya Murphy, P.C. in Westport, CT at 203-221-3100. We may also be reached for inquiries by email at JMaya@mayalaw.com.

Source: The Journal Inquirer