P.F. v. Department of Revenue (Lawyers Weekly No. 11-170-16)
NOTICE: All slip opinions and orders are subject to formal revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound volumes of the Official Reports.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-771 Appeals Court P.F. vs. DEPARTMENT OF REVENUE. No. 15-P-771. Norfolk. May 12, 2016. – December 6, 2016. Present: Cohen, Rubin, & Hanlon, JJ. Divorce and Separation, Child support, Modification of judgment. Parent and Child, Child support. Complaint for divorce filed in the Norfolk Division of the Probate and Family Court Department on February 22, 2004. A complaint for modification, filed on January 9, 2012, was heard by John D. Casey, J. P.F., pro se. Benjamin K. Golden, Assistant Attorney General, for the defendant. COHEN, J. The plaintiff, an incarcerated father, filed a complaint for downward modification of child support payments ordered following his divorce from the child’s mother. A judge of the Probate and Family Court denied the request, reasoning that the father’s loss of income was a foreseeable consequence of his conviction of indecent assault and battery on the child for whom he owes support. Before us is the father’s appeal. We conclude that, on the record before us, the judge’s refusal to reduce the father’s child support payments in accordance with the Massachusetts Child Support Guidelines (2013) (guidelines) was outside the range of his discretion. We therefore vacate the judgment and remand the case for further consideration.[1] Background. The father and the mother were married in September, 2000, and had one child together, a daughter. The marriage was short-lived. The father and the mother divorced in April, 2004, and the father subsequently was ordered to pay weekly child support of $ 72. In March, 2010, the father was convicted of indecent assault and battery on the child and was sentenced to five to seven years in State prison.[2] In 2012, the father filed a complaint seeking modification of his child support obligation, citing his inability to pay child support while incarcerated. On September 9, 2014, following a hearing at which the father represented himself,[3] and at which the child support enforcement division of the Department of Revenue (DOR) appeared on behalf of the mother,[4] a judge of the Probate and Family Court issued a judgment denying the father’s modification request, stating that “[i]t should have been a foreseeable consequence of [the father’s] criminal conduct that he would be incarcerated, lose his employment and thus lose his ability to earn income to pay support.” The intended […]