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JEFFREY v. JEFFREY

Supreme Court of Georgia1949-10-11No. No. 16774
206 Ga. 41

Summary

Holding. The court affirmed the judgment, holding that the jury's alimony award of $150 per month was not excessive as a matter of law and that the trial court's instruction on condonation was proper and not misleading.

In this divorce case, the husband challenged both the alimony award and the trial court's instructions on condonation. Regarding alimony, the husband argued that the jury's award of $150 monthly was excessive. The court examined the financial circumstances of both parties: the husband's net weekly take-home pay of $100.35 (accounting for travel expenses), and the wife's earnings of $160 per month from a temporary position. The court held that alimony cannot be determined by mathematical calculation alone, and juries have considerable discretion in setting amounts based on the specific facts of each case.

The husband also contended that the trial judge's jury instruction on condonation was improper or confusing. The wife had testified that after the alleged cruel acts and separation, she and the husband had sexual relations in a hotel room, during which he asked her to deny the encounter ever happened. She refused his demand. The court found that the instruction properly charged the jury on the legal doctrine of condonation—that voluntary resumption of marital relations after cruel treatment may defeat a divorce claim—and that any awkward phrasing in the instruction was not misleading or prejudicial to the husband.

Summary generated by law.co from the public-domain opinion. The opinion text itself is public domain.

Key issues

  • Whether an alimony award of $150 monthly is excessive given the parties' respective earnings
  • Whether the trial court properly instructed the jury on condonation as a defense to divorce based on alleged cruelty
  • Whether evidence of post-separation marital relations constitutes condonation under state law

Procedural posture

The husband appealed from a divorce judgment that included an alimony award and was granted based on alleged cruel treatment.

Authorities cited

No cited authorities resolved to law.co cases yet.

Opinion

majority opinion

Atkinson, Presiding Justice.

(After stating the foregoing facts.) It is insisted that the verdict is excessive. There was evidence that, though the husband’s base pay was larger, his net “take-home” pay was $100.35 per week. That he had to travel most of the time «and was allowed $6 per day expenses while away from his headquarters, though the $6 per day was two or three dollars less than his expenses incurred. His estimate was that he was away about 17 days a month. Computing his weekly pay into monthly pay, it would be $434.20 per month, $34 of which would be used to cover expenses at $2 per day while away from headquarters. His net earnings, in addition to his living expenses being paid for 17 days of each month, would therefore be $400.35.

As to the wife, there was evidence that she was earning $160 per month. She stated: “I have only a temporary appointment, and I understand that those temporary appointments will terminate between now and the first of the year.”

The question of alimony can not be determined by a mathemathical formula, as the facts and circumstances in each case are different. The jury is allowed a wide latitude in determining the amount to be awarded, and we can not say that the verdict of $150 per month in the instant case is, as a matter of law, excessive.

Error is assigned upon the following charge: “As set out in the answer of the defendant, gentlemen, that she contends that there was nothing to be condoned or forgiven, but if there had been such acts that they were condoned by the plaintiff in this case by their resuming the marital relationship and cohabiting on or about the 26th of November, 1946. If you find that there was such marital relationship existing or did exist between the parties on the date of November 26, 1946, then I charge you that would be what the law terms condonation of any alleged cruelty, and it would defeat the plaintiff in his claim for divorce. If there was either no such acts of condonation, or you do not find from the evidence that the alleged acts of condonation, by resuming marital relationship [took place], then it would be a question for you to decide whether or not the acts, from the evidence in this case, was such cruel treatment as, under the terms of the law as I have given you in charge, constituted cruel treatment sufficient to grant a divorce to the plaintiff.”

The wife had testified that subsequently to the acts which the husband relied upon as constituting cruel treatment, and after the separation, she spent several hours with him alone in a hotel room, and further stated: “When I was there in the hotel room with Mr. Jeffrey that night, Mr. Jeffrey and I had marital relations, and he further told me I must say that never took place, then I realized he hadn’t come back for a reconciliation; after the relationship took place, he said, you must say this never happened; I told him I would do nothing of the kind.”

Under the Code, § 30-109, it is provided that, where there has been voluntary condonation and cohabitation subsequent to the acts complained of, then no divorce should be granted. In view of this evidence, it was proper to charge on the law of condonation, and though in the latter part of the above-quoted charge there is an awkward or incomplete expression, it is not such as would mislead or confuse the jury and be injurious to the plaintiff for any reason assigned.

Judgment affirmed.

All the Justices concur.