Preview:

NOTICE: This opinion is subject to motions for rehearing under Rule 22 as well as formal revision before publication in the New Hampshire Reports. Readers are requested to notify the Reporter, Supreme Court of New Hampshire, One Charles Doe Drive, Concord, New Hampshire 03301, of any editorial errors in order that corrections may be made before the opinion goes to press. Errors may be reported by E-mail at the following address: reporter@courts.state.nh.us. Opinions are available on the Internet by 9:00 a.m. on the morning of their release. The direct address of the court's home page is: http://www.courts.state.nh.us/supreme. THE SUPREME COURT OF NEW HAMPSHIRE ___________________________ Hillsborough-northern judicial district No. 2009-520 IN THE MATTER OF ROBERTA L. (PIERCE) SCOTT AND JAMES P. PIERCE Argued: April 8, 2010 Opinion Issued: June 3, 2010 Wiggin & Nourie, P.A., of Manchester (Andrea Q. Labonte on the brief and orally), for the petitioner. Law Office of Joshua L. Gordon, of Concord (Joshua L. Gordon on the brief and orally), for the respondent. DALIANIS, J. The petitioner, Roberta L. (Pierce) Scott (Wife), appeals an order recommended by a Marital Master (Dalpra, M.) and approved by the Superior Court (Smukler, J.) denying her motion for certain payments from the respondent, James P. Pierce (Husband). We affirm in part, vacate in part and remand. I. Facts

The record reveals the following facts. The parties married in Massachusetts in 1982 and had two children, a son born in 1983 and a daughter born in 1986. In April 1989, they divorced pursuant to a Massachusetts decree, which expressly incorporated their separation

agreement. Under the decree, as modified in October 1989, Husband was to pay child support in the amount of $98 per week plus $15 per week for health insurance premiums until the children were "emancipated," as defined by the decree. In their original stipulation, the parties agreed that their children "should receive the best college education available to them" and that they would meet in the future to discuss "the financial responsibility each of them shall bear" for their children's college expenses. The parties agreed that Massachusetts law governed the interpretation of their agreement and their rights thereunder. In April 1997, the parties agreed to modify certain aspects of their divorce decree. They stipulated that Husband's total child support obligation would remain $113 per week, but that this amount would be allocated differently: $73 would be for child support, and $40 per week would be placed in an escrow account for Husband's use to visit the children, with whom the stipulation allowed Wife to relocate to California. Any amount not expended from the escrow account by March 30 each year would be deposited in a college education account for the children. Additionally, the parties agreed to modify the duration of Husband's child support obligation by redefining the circumstances under which the children were "emancipated." Under the original decree, each child was emancipated at age eighteen, unless the child attended college, in which case the child would be emancipated at age twenty-one. By contrast, pursuant to the 1997 stipulation, emancipation occurred when the child reached age twenty-one, unless the child entered college in the September after graduating from high school. In that case, emancipation occurred when the child graduated from college, no longer lived with Wife, or reached the age of twenty-three, whichever occurred first. See Mass. Gen. Laws Ann. ch. 208,

Download 2009-520, In the Matter of Roberta L. (Pierce) Scott and James P. Pierce.pdf

New Hampshire Law