AMIE VS. AMIE (DIVORCE PROPERTY & ALIMONY)

Key holdings

Practitioner summary

Wages earned during the marriage are community property. Where community property is omitted from a divorce decree - neither mentioned in the findings nor disposed of in the decree - the former spouses hold the omitted property as tenants in common, and either may bring a separate independent action in equity to partition it. First Nat'l Bank v. Wolff, 66 Nev. 51, 56, 202 P.2d 878, 881 (1949). The court distinguished McCarroll v. McCarroll, 96 Nev. 455, 611 P.2d 205 (1980), where the later-asserted claim (fraudulent concealment) had been available for litigation during the divorce; here the wages were omitted from the parties' written property settlement agreement and never came within the field of the divorce litigation, and neither party claimed exclusive entitlement. An equitable independent action for relief from a prior judgment is not necessarily barred by res judicata where the policies furthered by granting relief outweigh the purposes of former adjudication. Nevada Indus. Dev. v. Benedetti, 103 Nev. 360, 365, 741 P.2d 802, 805 (1987). Summary judgment for Frederick reversed and remanded for partition of the wage claim. The court declined to decide whether the general tort and punitive damages awards constituted unresolved community property because that question was neither litigated below nor briefed.

In plain language

After Frederick and Deborah Amie divorced, Frederick recovered a judgment against a former employer for wrongful termination. The judgment included about $46,945 in wages he had earned during the marriage, plus general tort damages and punitive damages. Because wages earned during marriage are community property, and because this wage money had never been mentioned or divided in the divorce, Deborah sued for her half. The trial court granted summary judgment for Frederick, but the Nevada Supreme Court reversed. Under a longstanding decision, First National Bank v. Wolff, community property that is left out of a divorce decree is not lost: after the divorce, the former spouses hold the omitted property as "tenants in common," and either may bring a separate, independent action in equity to divide (partition) it. The court distinguished a case Frederick relied on (McCarroll), in which the later-asserted issue (fraudulent concealment) had actually been available to litigate during the divorce; here the wages were simply omitted from the parties' written settlement agreement and never came within the field of the divorce litigation, and neither party claimed exclusive entitlement. The court also held that res judicata did not bar Deborah's separate equitable action, because the policies favoring relief outweighed the purposes of former adjudication. Deborah was therefore entitled to seek partition of half the wages. The court declined to decide whether the general tort and punitive damages awards were also unresolved community property, because that question was not litigated below or briefed. Reversed and remanded for partition of the wage claim.