Frost-Stuart v. Stuart (Lawyers Weekly No. 11-137-16)
NOTICE: All slip opinions and orders are subject to formal revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound volumes of the Official Reports. If you find a typographical error or other formal error, please notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Judicial Court, John Adams Courthouse, 1 Pemberton Square, Suite 2500, Boston, MA, 02108-1750; (617) 557-1030; SJCReporter@sjc.state.ma.us 15-P-100 Appeals Court MARGOT E. FROST-STUART vs. CHARLES F. STUART. No. 15-P-100. Middlesex. April 15, 2016. – September 27, 2016. Present: Cypher, Agnes, & Massing, JJ. Divorce and Separation, Alimony, Child support, Modification of judgment. Parent and Child, Child support. Contempt. Practice, Civil, Contempt. Complaint for divorce filed in the Middlesex Division of the Probate and Family Court Department on March 4, 2010. A complaint for modification and complaints for contempt were heard by George F. Phelan, J., and a motion for reconsideration was considered by him. Kelly L. Petrakis (Karen W. Stuntz with her) for the mother. Alexander D. Jones for the father. CYPHER, J. Margot E. Frost-Stuart (mother) appeals from a modification judgment, as amended, of the Probate and Family Court terminating alimony and increasing child support paid by her former husband, Charles F. Stuart (father), and also disposing of several complaints for contempt.[1] We affirm in part and vacate in part. Background. After fifteen years of marriage, the parties divorced in July, 2010, pursuant to a judgment of divorce nisi. The separation agreement (agreement), which was incorporated into the judgment, required the father to pay to the mother a minimum amount of $ 63,000 each year as alimony[2] and $ 4,750 each month as child support.[3] The agreement further provided that the father’s “support obligation may be reviewed and adjusted upon a change in circumstances, including but not limited to . . . his loss or change of employment, [or] the [mother’s] cohabitation with a dating partner.” The parties share legal custody of their three children, aged ten, seven, and four years at the time of the modification judgment. The father remarried and has two children with his new wife. The mother has cohabited with her boy friend since September, 2010. The father has been employed as a portfolio manager at two successive investment management companies, and the mother has been out of the workforce for many years. In March, 2013, the father filed a complaint for modification,[4] primarily seeking termination of alimony on the basis that the mother had been cohabitating with a dating partner for more than three months, and that the father had a new job with fee-based income and no longer received an annual bonus. The mother counterclaimed, requesting that the […]