Schroeder v. Winyard

SUPREME COURT CASES

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State: Illinois

Court: 2nd District Appellate

Docket No: 2-06-0630 Rel

Case Date: 08/07/2007

Preview:No. 2--06--0630 Filed: 8-7-07 ______________________________________________________________________________ IN THE APPELLATE COURT OF ILLINOIS SECOND DISTRICT ______________________________________________________________________________ RHONDA SCHROEDER, ) Appeal from the Circuit Court ) of Du Page County. Plaintiff-Appellant, ) ) v. ) No. 05--L--198 ) MELISSA R. WINYARD, ) Honorable ) Hollis L. Webster, Defendant-Appellee. ) Judge, Presiding. _____________________________________________________________________________ JUSTICE BOWMAN delivered the opinion of the court: Plaintiff, Rhonda Schroeder, brought suit against defendant, Melissa R. Winyard, alleging that defendant had alienated the affections of plaintiff's husband, Gennady Shvartsshteyn (Gene), resulting in their divorce. The trial court granted summary judgment for defendant on the basis that plaintiff's cause of action was discharged in defendant's bankruptcy. We affirm. I. BACKGROUND The following facts are undisputed. Plaintiff married Gene on May 31, 1997. Defendant worked with Gene at Royal Courier and Air Domestic Connect (Royal Courier) from June 28, 1999, through June 19, 2000. On July 5, 2001, defendant filed for chapter 7 bankruptcy protection. The bankruptcy trustee discovered no assets. On October 23, 2001, defendant was granted a discharge of her prior debts, and the bankruptcy case was closed on November 5, 2001. Plaintiff filed a petition

No. 2--06--0630 for dissolution of marriage on October 27, 2003, and her marriage to Gene was dissolved on November 21, 2003. Plaintiff filed her action against defendant on February 22, 2005, alleging as follows. There was mutual love and affection between plaintiff and Gene until the time of defendant's "interference." At some point during her employment with Royal Courier, defendant engaged in a course of conduct intended to alienate the affections of Gene from plaintiff. Specifically, defendant encouraged Gene to travel with her, buy her expensive and lavish gifts, and spend time away from plaintiff. Defendant pursued and seduced Gene "until she was finally able to alienate his affections from his wife and eventually caused him to have sexual intercourse with her and to destroy the marital relationship between Gene" and plaintiff. As a direct result of these actions and the destruction of the marital relationship, plaintiff divorced Gene, and he no longer provided financial support to her. As part of discovery, plaintiff produced a letter written to her by defendant sometime after her employment with Royal Courier ended. As this letter is relevant to our subsequent analysis of defendant's intent, we quote from it extensively: "So much pain and hurt has happened and to know I have contributed to that, literally kills me inside. I know the suffering I go through matters nothing to you, but if nothing else, I want you to know I never intentionally wanted any of this to happen. I never wanted to disrupt your marriage. If you can take a moment and remember the person you met before all of this. *** I know this is much too late to admit, but so many times I wanted to leave. I wanted things to go back like they were before. I wanted us to tan on our lunch, get our nails painted, talk about our significant others, have girls' night out and just be us. I entered a

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No. 2--06--0630 world that over whelmed [sic] me, and when I realized I couldn't handle the situation any longer, I didn't know what to do. Then Steve [defendant's ex-husband] started working with us and the situation increasingly became unbearable. I can honestly tell you that I pretended to be someone/thing I was truly not to make it through. The people closest to me saw the change, but I just didn't know how to get out. I know it's easy to say why didn't I just quit. I felt I couldn't because I didn't want to fail or let people down. Ironically in the end, I not only failed but I lost things so precious to me. *** I told Gene that maybe you fight so hard because you truly love him. He said he knows you love him. I then said for God's sake, try to win you back. I am nothing to either of you, and both of you have endured much diversity [sic] and still found a way to stay together. *** I am telling you this because I do not want you to lose your marriage and past years with your husband. I can not change the past but only try to learn from mistakes and make it better in the future. If God would grant me one wish, it wouldn't be to have my credit, house or any materialistic things back. I would ask that one day, you and Steve will find it in your hearts to forgive and be able to let go of the hate and anger this has caused. From the bottom of my heart, I am so sorry for all of this. I am sorry if I hurt you." Defendant moved for summary judgment on March 17, 2006, on the ground that any liability she had to plaintiff was discharged in her bankruptcy. The trial court granted the motion on May 24, 2006, and plaintiff timely appealed. II. ANALYSIS Summary judgment is appropriate only where the pleadings, affidavits, depositions, admissions, and exhibits on file, when viewed in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party,

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No. 2--06--0630 show that there is no genuine issue of material fact and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Zekman v. Direct American Marketers, Inc., 182 Ill. 2d 359, 374 (1998). Summary judgment should be denied where material facts are disputed or where reasonable persons could draw divergent inferences from undisputed facts. Adams v. Northern Illinois Gas Co., 211 Ill. 2d 32, 43 (2004). While the nonmoving party is not required to prove his case at the summary judgment stage, he must present a factual basis arguably entitling him to a judgment in his favor. Brown, Udell & Pomerantz, Ltd. v. Ryan, 369 Ill. App. 3d 821, 824 (2006). We review de novo a grant of summary judgment. People ex rel. Department of Public Health v. Wiley, 218 Ill. 2d 207, 220 (2006). Whether a debt is dischargeable is a matter of federal law governed by the terms of the Bankruptcy Code (11 U.S.C.

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