GREENWALD V. GREENWALD

SUPREME COURT CASES

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State: Florida

Court: Florida Southern District Court

Docket No: 3D08-2999

Case Date: 03/24/2010

Plaintiff: GREENWALD

Defendant: GREENWALD

Preview:Third District Court of Appeal
State of Florida, January Term, A.D. 2010
Opinion filed March 24, 2010 Not final until disposition of timely filed motion for rehearing. ________________ No. 3D08-2999 Lower Tribunal No. 05-19678 ________________

Gerald Greenwald,
Appellant, vs.

Cheryl Gale Rivkind-Greenwald,
Appellee.

An Appeal from the Circuit Court for Miami-Dade County, Scott M. Bernstein, Judge. Paul Morris; Lisa A. Baird, for appellant. Robert J. Moraitis, for appellee.

Before COPE, LAGOA and SALTER, JJ. COPE, J.

The husband in a dissolution action appeals an assessment of attorney's fees against him. We agree that the attorney's fee award cannot stand. Husband Gerald Greenwald and wife Cheryl Gale Rivkind-Greenwald were married on May 18, 2004. Fourteen months later, the couple separated and sought divorce. The wife claimed entitlement to permanent alimony. According to the wife, the husband induced her to quit her lucrative job. At trial, it was proven by way of email evidence that the wife wanted to quit her job prior to the marriage and the proposition that the husband induced her to quit was false. The judgment stated: The parties met online through J-Date, a computer dating service, in February, 2004. They were both mature adults who already had grown children. The husband was 63 and the wife was 57. There were no minor children born of this marriage and none are contemplated. The husband had survived cancer multiple times and was receiving disability payments of about $28,000.00 per month; earlier in his life, he had been a practicing dermatologist. The wife was working for Cox Radio, had been employed there for almost 30 years, and received a compensation package of over $100,000.00 per year. They married on May 18, 2004, within three months of their first online introduction. The relationship seemed unstable from the beginning. The wife did not move into the husband's home right away, then she did move in, then she moved out, then she moved in again, then she moved out againseveral separations interspersed with short interludes together. The parties finally separated over the summer of 2005. At least one prior dissolution of marriage petition was filed and abandoned. If the Court added up 2

all the days and nights these parties were together, it would amount to no more than 14 months. Yet this subsequent litigation has been pending more than twice as long. ALIMONY The major issue in dispute in this case is the wife's claim for alimony. She claims that, even though this was a short term marriage, the husband induced her to quit her lucrative job to become a full-time wife. The husband testified that the wife chose on her own to quit. He also testified that the wife offered to keep "seeing" him after the final separation, but only if he would pay her $2,500.00 per month. This Court had the opportunity to observe the wife carefully as she testified. The Court simply does not find credible her claim that the husband forced or induced her to quit her job with Cox Radio. The wife was apparently unhappy with her job and had looked for new job opportunities before she even met the husband. The wife also received a substantial severance package when she left Cox Radio; the severance package included a release by the wife of claims against Cox Radio for discrimination. Moreover, the wife's demeanor at trial, and especially her refusal to make eye contact when discussing her former job, leads this Court to conclude her testimony that the husband forced or induced her to leave her employment at Cox Radio is unworthy of belief. The trial court entered a final judgment of dissolution of marriage wherein the wife was not awarded alimony. The court reserved jurisdiction to award attorney's fees and costs to either party.

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An attorney's fee hearing was held where both parties sought attorney's fees and stipulated as to the financial findings made in the final judgment. The court awarded the wife $65,000 in attorney's fees. The husband has appealed. Respectfully, the trial court should have denied the wife's attorney's fee claim on authority of Rosen v. Rosen, 696 So. 2d 697 (Fla. 1997). This was an extremely short term marriage -- fourteen months. Permanent alimony is

generally inappropriate in a short term marriage. According to one treatise, "to justify an award of permanent alimony to the spouse of a short-term marriage, there must be a genuine inequity arising from an inability by the requesting spouse to be self-supporting. Further, the lack of ability to be self-supporting must have resulted from something that transpired during the marriage, although it need not result from something for which the non-requesting spouse is responsible." 1 Brenda M. Abrams, Florida Family Law

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