M. B. v. S. A.

          Argued October 10, 2019

         Procedural History

         Application for custody of the parties' minor child, brought to the judicial district of Stamford-Norwalk and transferred to the judicial district of New Haven, where the court, Tindill, J., rendered judgment in favor of the defendant; thereafter the court granted the defendant's motions for contempt and awarded her attorney's fees, and the plaintiff appealed to this court. Affirmed.

          M. B., self-represented, the appellant (plaintiff).

          David M. Moore, for the appellee (defendant).

          DiPentima, C. J., and Lavine and Bishop, Js.

          OPINION

          BISHOP, J.

         The self-represented plaintiff, M. B., appeals from the trial court's orders, rendered in a child custody action, granting certain postjudgment motions for contempt filed by the defendant, S. A., and awarding her attorney's fees as a sanction against the plaintiff. Specifically, the plaintiff contends that the court erred in (1) finding him in contempt for nonpayment of support orders when the support orders were on appeal, (2) prioritizing the resolution of motions for contempt over a simultaneously pending motion pertaining to child visitation (3) failing to consider financial affidavits he had submitted, (4) awarding the defendant attorney's fees in connection with the granted contempt motions, and (5) accepting the defendant's affidavits of fees with incorrect docket numbers. We affirm the judgment of the trial court.

         The following facts, as evidenced by the record, and procedural history are relevant to this appeal. The plaintiff and the defendant are an unmarried couple who are the parents of their minor child, born in June, 2014. After the child's birth, the plaintiff filed an action seeking joint legal custody of the child. By way of a memorandum of decision issued on September 7, 2016, the trial court, Tindill, J., awarded sole legal and primary physical custody to the defendant. The award provided for the plaintiff to have parenting time on weekends, restricted entirely to the town of Greenwich. The plaintiff, who resided in New York City at the time, thereafter rented an apartment in Greenwich solely to exercise parenting time with his child. The award further ordered the plaintiff to pay $253 per week to the defendant in child support payments. Additionally, the court granted a number of motions for contempt filed by the defendant that were predicated on the plaintiff's failure to pay unreimbursed medical expenses and work-related child care, as ordered pendente lite, and the court calculated an arrearage. On November 18, 2016, the court issued a corrected memorandum of decision in which, inter alia, it corrected various grammatical and calculation errors.

         Prior to the issuance of the corrected memorandum of decision on November 18, 2016, the plaintiff filed an appeal on September 22, 2016, asking this court to consider whether the trial court erred in not considering how its orders impacted his rental expenses for the Greenwich apartment that he is required to maintain to have parenting time with his child.

         During the pendency of that appeal, between October, 2016 and June, 2017, the defendant filed multiple postjudgment motions for contempt against the plaintiff for failing to make both arrearage payments and child support payments as required by the September 7, 2016 support orders. On June 16, 2017, the court ordered the defendant to submit an affidavit regarding attorney's fees she had incurred in pursuing her postjudgment motions for contempt.

         On December 11, 2017, the court granted one of the defendant's motions for contempt, filed on October 17, 2016, finding that the plaintiff had failed to pay his required share of the work-related child care expenses. Following the plaintiff's failure to pay the arrearage by the date set by the court, January 31, 2018, the court ordered the plaintiff to be incarcerated, setting a purge amount of $15, 000. The plaintiff paid the purge amount that same day and was released from custody. On April 16, 2018, the court granted four more of the defendant's postjudgment motions for contempt, two of which were filed on December 21, 2016, and two others that were filed on March 9, 2017, determining that the plaintiff had failed to pay work-related child care costs, unreimbursed medical expenses, child support payments, and child support arrearages.

         In May, 2018, this court issued its decision in the prior appeal. This court determined that the trial court had abused its discretion in failing to analyze whether the plaintiff's significant visitation expenses warranted a deviation from the child support guidelines and remanded the matter for a new hearing on this issue. This court otherwise affirmed the judgment of the trial court.

         Also in May, 2018, the trial court issued an order vacating its findings of arrearages with respect to the expenses underlying the defendant's postjudgment motions for contempt.^[1] On October 15, 2018, the trial court ordered $9825 in attorney's fees to be paid by the plaintiff in connection with expenses incurred by the defendant for litigating those same motions for ...