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Decided on June 14, 2004
Family Court, New York County

P-03876/82C
Helen C. Sturm, J.
The parties are the parents of Semone Christina Grossman (hereinafter "Christina"), a young woman who reached and exceeded the age of twenty-one during the pendency of these proceedings. In November 1996, pursuant to a stipulation entered by the parties, the Court entered a modified order of support which required, inter alia, that respondent pay $48,000 support per year until the subject child started her college education and $53,000 per year during the period that she attended college. This agreement was made subject to a number of conditions. The interpretation of the conditions of the 1996 order, and whether or not they were self-[*2]executing, are the gravamen of the instant violation petition filed by petitioner on March 21, 2002 and decided by Support Magistrate Schiraldi Stein on January 22, 2004 after extensive proceedings.
Procedural History
It is uncontested that the subject child withdrew from her studies at Roger Williams
University in the spring semester of her freshman year ostensibly because she had found a bald patch on her scalp. When respondent became aware of the child's absence from school, he had his counsel notify petitioner that he felt the support agreement was no longer in effect. Respondent continued to make payments at the $48,000 per year level until the child reached age twenty-one on September 11, 2002 whereupon he terminated payments.
Petitioner filed a violation petition on or about March 21, 2002 and argued that respondent's unilateral invocation of one of the conditions of the 1996 order was inappropriate self-help and contrary to the entire scheme of the Family Court Act's support section. Petitioner sought a finding that respondent's failure to pay support at the higher rate and his eventual termination of payment were willful violations of the order. Petitioner alleged that respondent cynically used the child's unfortunate medical condition as a pretext to evade his obligations. Respondent countered that the child's withdrawal from school was actually motivated by her poor academic performance and alleged that Christina's true goal was to have her father pay support indefinitely. He urged that the child's medical condition could only be characterized as minor and cosmetic and was an insufficient basis for leaving school. Because the agreement was automatically voided by the child's failure to matriculate in college, respondent argued, he had no financial obligation to his daughter but continued to support her anyway until she reached twenty-one; therefore, he maintained, he did not owe any arrears and had no further obligation to pay under the agreement. The trial commenced on September 30, 2002. Over the course of seven additional [*3]dates, the support magistrate heard testimony from the parties, the subject child, four doctors who had examined Christina for alopecia areata, respondent's accountant, and petitioner's forensic accountant. The parties, by their counsel, submitted written summations.
Findings of Fact and Order of the Support Magistrate Support Magistrate Schiraldi Stein found that respondent's support obligation could only terminate upon the happening of the latest of two events - the child's graduation from college or her twenty-first birthday. Since neither of these events had occurred as of the spring of 2001, the support magistrate concluded that respondent had no right under the 1996 order to adjust or terminate the payments. Although the support magistrate found that the child's partial hair loss did not excuse her from her obligation to attend school, she found that the reason for her withdrawal from her course of study was of no legal consequence under the order. Because the stipulation did not anticipate a circumstance wherein the child did not complete her education in four years, and because the child in fact continued her education subsequent to the Spring 2001 semester, respondent's support obligation never ceased. Relying on Black's Law Dictionary, the support magistrate found that Christina was in fact "matriculating" in college during the pendency of this action as contemplated by the 1996 order because she had resumed her schooling at another college. Based on the language and intent of Family Court Act

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