Argued
September 11, 2018
Procedural
History
Action
for the dissolution of a marriage, and for other relief,
brought to the Superior Court in the judicial district of
Stamford-Norwalk, where the court, Hon. Stanley
Novack, judge trial referee, rendered judgment
dissolving the marriage and granting certain other relief;
thereafter, the court, Emons, J., approved the
stipulation of the parties to open the judgment as to
financial issues; subsequently, the court, Schofield,
J., issued certain orders; thereafter, the court,
Schofield, J., granted the defendant's motion
for reargument and issued certain orders, and the defendant
appealed to this court, which vacated the judgment and
remanded the case for further proceedings; subsequently, the
defendant, on the granting of certification, appealed to our
Supreme Court, which remanded the case to this court for
reconsideration. Affirmed.
Thomas
C. C. Sargent, for the appellant (defendant)
Norman
A. Roberts, II, with whom, on the brief, was Tara C. Dugo,
for the appellee (plaintiff)
Keller, Bright and Beach, Js.
OPINION
BRIGHT, J.
This
case returns to us on remand from our Supreme
Court.[1] The defendant appeals from the judgment of
the trial court opening the judgment of dissolution and
reissuing financial orders. On appeal, the defendant claims
that the trial court erred in its method of dividing the
parties' assets because it failed to take into account an
advance payment made by the plaintiff to the defendant.
Although the defendant raises this claim for the first time
on appeal, we exercise our discretion to consider the claim
on the merits, and we affirm the judgment of the trial court.
The
following undisputed facts and procedural history are
relevant to our resolution of this appeal. On January 16,
2008, the plaintiff, Beatrice Forgione, commenced this
dissolution action against the defendant, Mennato Forgione.
On July 7, 2008, the parties entered into a prejudgment
stipulation in which they agreed that the plaintiff would
have exclusive possession of the marital home, and, in
exchange, the plaintiff would pay the defendant $60, 000 as
an ‘‘advance'' against the
defendant's equitable distribution. The $60, 000 advance
represented approximately one half of the total equity in the
marital home at that time. The plaintiff later testified that
she obtained the $60, 000 by way of a personal loan from one
of her friends and, thereafter, paid the advance to the
defendant. This testimony was corroborated by the
plaintiff's itemization of a $60, 000 liability, which
she specifically identified as a ‘‘[l]oan for
[a]dvance to [h]usband re property [distribution], ''
on her August 26, 2009 financial affidavit.
On
August 26, 2009, the court rendered judgment dissolving the
marriage of the parties. The dissolution judgment
incorporated the parties' stipulated agreement that
resolved, among other things, the issues of custody,
insurance, distribution of marital assets and liabilities,
child support, and alimony. The parties stipulated, in
relevant part, that the defendant would transfer his interest
in the marital residence to the plaintiff in consideration of
the $60, 000 advance that the plaintiff previously had paid
to the defendant, and that the parties each would retain the
remaining assets listed on their respective financial
affidavits, including ‘‘deferred
compensation'' plans.
On
March 12, 2012, the plaintiff filed a motion to open the
dissolution judgment on the ground that the defendant
intentionally had failed to disclose commissions he had
received just prior to the dissolution judgment. On May 30,
2012, the parties entered a postjudgment stipulation to open
the dissolution judgment for the purpose of redetermining
‘‘all issues of a financial nature . . .
.'' On the same date, the court approved the
stipulation and opened the judgment.
On
November 6, 2013, after a three day trial, the court issued a
memorandum of decision in which it entered new financial
orders concerning, among other things, child support,
insurance, property distribution, liabilities, bank accounts
and retirement funds, and counsel fees. As for property
distribution, the court, in its new orders, recognized that
the plaintiff previously had paid the $60, 000 advance to the
defendant and, thus, ordered the defendant to transfer his
title to the marital residence to the plaintiff. As for bank
accounts and retirement funds, the court ordered, in relevant
part, that the ‘‘parties shall equally divide the
remaining financial assets of the marriage.'' On
November 22, 2013, the defendant filed a motion seeking
reargument of the court's new financial orders regarding
insurance and sanctions, and clarification as to the
operative date that should be utilized when equalizing the
parties' financial assets.
On
February 3, 2014, after a hearing, the court issued a
memorandum of decision addressing the disputes as to
insurance and sanctions, and, further, deferring the
selection of the ‘‘operative date of equalization
of financial assets'' until after the court received
additional briefing from the parties. Accordingly, on
February 26, 2014, the plaintiff filed a brief contending
that the operative date should be the date of dissolution,
August 26, 2009, and proffering a mathematical calculation of
the parties' financial assets-bank accounts and
retirement funds-on that date. On March 12, 2014, the
defendant filed a brief concurring that the operative date
should be August 26, 2009; however, he disagreed that the
plaintiff's calculation ‘‘should have been
made a part of the legal memorandum and, therefore, wishe[d]
[it] stricken.'' The defendant provided no
substantive objection to the plaintiff's calculation, and
provided no calculation of his own.
On June
3, 2014, the court issued a memorandum of decision dividing
the ‘‘remaining financial assets of the
marriage.'' Therein, the court determined that the
plaintiff's financial assets listed on her August 26,
2009 affidavit totaled $45, 946, that the defendant's
financial assets listed on his August 26, 2009 affidavit
totaled $135, 500, [2]and, consequently, the court ordered the
defendant to pay the plaintiff an equalization payment of
$44, 777. The court adopted the method of calculation set
forth by the plaintiff in her posttrial brief and only
incorporated the financial assets that were itemized in the
‘‘bank accounts'' and
‘‘deferred compensation plans''
categories of the parties' respective affidavits. Thus,
the court's calculation did not include the $60, 000
advance payment received ...