BROWN VS. BROWN (CHILD SUPPORT)

Statutes cited

Key holdings

Practitioner summary

The Court (Manoukian, J.) reversed a summary judgment that had accorded full faith and credit to a foreign (Idaho) judgment for child support arrearages entered without notice to the obligor. Courts must give full faith and credit to sister-state judgments, U.S. Const. art. IV, sec. 1; Wicker v. Wicker, 85 Nev. 141, 143, 451 P.2d 715, 716 (1969), but the rendering court must have had jurisdiction over the parties and subject matter consistent with due process, which requires notice and an opportunity to be heard, Mullane v. Central Hanover Bank & Trust Co., 339 U.S. 306, 313 (1950). It was uncontradicted that appellant received no notice when respondent moved in Idaho to reduce the claimed arrearages to judgment. The Court distinguished authorities treating past-due support installments as final judgments (e.g., Brown v. Brown, 165 P.2d 886 (Idaho 1946); Burke v. Burke, 255 P.2d 740 (Colo. 1953)) because they did not involve interstate enforcement and, in each, the obligor had an opportunity to present defenses. It found Griffin v. Griffin, 327 U.S. 220 (1945), controlling: a foreign judgment consolidating arrearages, entered without notice, violated due process and deprived the rendering court of jurisdiction, and the obligor was entitled to present any defense available under the forum's law. Because appellant was deprived of an opportunity to present defenses otherwise available under Idaho law against the entry of judgment for accrued child support, there was a want of in personam jurisdiction and a lack of due process, so Nevada need not afford full faith and credit. Davidson & Co. v. Allen, 89 Nev. 126, 129, 508 P.2d 6, 7 (1973). The Court reversed and remanded, directing that on remand respondent be permitted to amend to enforce arrearages under the valid 1958 Idaho decree and that appellant be allowed to assert available defenses (including a statute-of-limitations bar and alleged deprivation of visitation), with the district court to determine the applicable forum law and the validity of the claimed defenses.

In plain language

Ronald and Leona Brown divorced in Idaho in 1958. Leona got custody of their child, and Ronald was ordered to pay $60 a month in child support until the child grew up. He made no payments until 1968, when he began paying under a Nevada order that grew out of an interstate support case; he then paid correctly until the child reached adulthood in 1974. In 1977, Leona went back to the Idaho court and got a judgment against Ronald for $6,840 in claimed back child support - but she did this without giving Ronald any notice, so he had no chance to show up and defend. She then sued in Nevada to collect on that Idaho judgment, and the Nevada court gave her summary judgment, treating the Idaho judgment as one Nevada had to honor under the U.S. Constitution's 'full faith and credit' rule. The Nevada Supreme Court reversed. It explained that a state must honor another state's judgment only if the other state's court had proper power over the person, which requires that the person got notice and a chance to be heard. Because Ronald received no notice before Idaho turned the claimed arrears into a lump-sum judgment, he was never able to raise defenses he might have had - such as that some of the claimed arrears were too old under a statute of limitations. The court relied on a U.S. Supreme Court case with very similar facts and held that a judgment entered without notice is not entitled to full faith and credit. It sent the case back so the Nevada court could let Leona proceed under the valid 1958 decree and let Ronald raise whatever defenses were available to him.