HILDA ORR, APPELLANT,
v.
JOHN COUTURE, INC., A DISSOLVED FLORIDA CORPORATION, ET AL., APPELLEES

Fla. 3d DCA | 1977-05-03
No. 76-853
Before PEARSON and BARKDULL, JJ., and CHARLES CARROLL (Ret.), Associate Judge.
345 So. 2d 394 Florida District Court of Appeal, Third District (1977) Positive Treatment
Cited by 2 cases

AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.

Synopsis

Hilda Orr appealed the dismissal of her complaint seeking an equitable interest in a dissolved corporation owned by her former husband. The court reversed, holding that a prior divorce judgment did not bar her claims because the corporation was not a party to the divorce action and the property rights were not properly adjudicated there.


Holding

The court held that the prior divorce judgment does not operate as a bar to the ex-wife's claims of interest in the corporation because the property rights were not proper to be enforced or adjudicated in the divorce action, as the corporation was not a party thereto.


Headnotes

[1] A court loses jurisdiction to modify or enlarge a final judgment regarding property rights once that judgment has become final.

[2] A final decree in an equity suit settles all property rights of the parties and bars subsequent actions to determine those rights.

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Key Quotes

“We find that these issues were not properly presented to the trial judge as the corporation was not a party to the litigation”

Establishes the court's prior finding that corporate property claims could not be properly adjudicated in the divorce action without the corporation as a party

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Facts & Procedural History

Hilda Orr and John Couture were former spouses. During their divorce proceedings, Orr sought to establish a one-half equitable interest in assets and …

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Opinion of the Court
CHARLES CARROLL (Ret.), Associate Judge.

CHARLES CARROLL (Ret.), Associate Judge.

This appeal is by the plaintiff below from an order dismissing with prejudice her complaint filed against John Couture, Inc., a dissolved Florida corporation, and its last known directors as trustees thereof, including John Couture, her former husband. By her action plaintiff sought to establish a one-half equitable interest in the assets of the dissolved defendant corporation and in the accrued profits thereof, predicating her claim on having equally with her former husband supplied the consideration by which the corporate property was acquired and having equally with him conducted the business of the' corporation.

In their prior dissolution of marriage action, in which the corporation was not a party, the wife had sought to establish such equitable ownership in the corporation. In that action the trial court held the wife had no interest in the corporate property, and that she had no interest in the corporate stock. On her appeal therefrom this court modified and amended the marriage dissolution judgment by striking therefrom the paragraphs so holding. With reference thereto this court stated: “We find that these issues were not properly presented to the trial judge as the corporation was not a party to the litigation”. See Couture v. Couture, 307 So. 2d 194 (Fla.3d DCA 1975).

The ground upon which the complaint in the instant case was dismissed with prejudice, as stated in the order, was: “The court finds that the claims set forth in plaintiff’s complaint were presented to this court and/or should have been presented to this court in plaintiff’s original dissolution of marriage action”. That finding was not in accordance with our finding on the matter on the appeal from the dissolution judgment.

In Finston v. Finston, 160 Fla. 935, 37 So. 2d 423 (Fla.1948), the Supreme Court said: “The rule seems well settled that a final decree in an equity suit settles all property rights of the parties and bars any action thereafter brought by either party to determine the question of property rights”. The Court made reference there to the rule of civil procedure for compulsory counterclaims. However, that rule would have no bearing here, where the plaintiff wife attempted to raise such property issues in the dissolution action, but for the reason stated above the same were not proper to be adjudicated there.

In Finston v. Finston, supra, sometime after the divorce judgment the husband petitioned in the divorce action for a sup plemental decree to require the ex-wife to release her rights as beneficiary under some insurance policies and in a certain tax refund, and to account for disposition of some personal property. In that case, as the Supreme Court there noted, those property rights had been presented in the pleadings and were properly before the court in the divorce action, and were there adjudicated.

The situation in the present case is materially different. Here, although raised in the dissolution case in the plaintiff’s pleadings, the property rights in question were held by this court not to have been properly before the trial court in the dissolution action, and an adjudication thereon by the trial court in that action was stricken.

It would be inconsistent and unjust to hold that the ex-wife was barred from maintaining this action for determination of her said property interest claims, on the basis of the rule that a marriage dissolution judgment determines the property rights of the parties which were or could have been there litigated, when the property right or rights thus subsequently asserted have been held by this court to be such as were not proper to be enforced or adjudicated in the dissolution action.

In the circumstances applicable to this case, the prior dissolution judgment does not operate as a bar to the ex-wife to assert her said claims of interest in the corporation or corporate stock.

The order appealed from is reversed, and the cause is remanded for further proceedings.


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Citator

Cited By

  • Rosman Charles Diejuste v. Davis, 400 So. 2d 981 (Fla. 4th DCA 1981)
    …o dealt with before the master and not adjudicated by the judgment of August 9, 1972, the parties are at liberty to litigate them in other separate proceedings. An exception to the rule was apparently made by the court in Orr v. John Couture, Inc., 345 So. 2d 394 (Fla.3d DCA 1977) where action by the court itself in the dissolution proceeding precluded the disposition there of the wife’s claims to certain property. In Mariness v. Sirilo, 310 So. 2d 760 (Fla.2d DCA 1975) conduct of the wife at the time of th…
  • Wooten v. Nichola Rhodus, 470 So. 2d 844 (Fla. 5th DCA 1985)
    …ion suit. It would now be manifestly unjust to allow her to claim res judicata in the partition suit — on the ground the dissolution court should have heard the matter. Robertson v. Robertson, 61 So. 2d 499 (Fla.1952); See Orr v. John Couture, Inc., 345 So. 2d 394 (Fla. 3rd DCA 1977), cert. denied, 355 So. 2d 515 (Fla.1978). Accordingly, we reverse the final judgment and remand this cause to the trial court for determination of Wooten’s equitable claim, on the merits. The trial court may rely upon the eviden…

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