Case Summaries
| Jurisdiction | Utah,United States |
| Citation | Vol. 6 No. 1 Pg. 28 |
| Pages | 28 |
| Publication year | 1993 |
CHILD SUPPORT
A divorce decree providing that future child support would be automatically adjusted by the parties to reflect changes in the father's income, whether up or down, directly contravenes Utah Code Ann. § 78-45-7(1) (1992). A child support order should only be modified based upon a showing of material change in circumstances. Such a provision disregards other dispositive factors, including the parties' living expenses. The decree provision was in error.
Judge Orme, concurring in the result, opines that this case is different than a stipulated arrangement whereby support might increase in accordance with a fixed percentage, the consumer price index, or a proportion of the adjusted gross income. In his view, such arrangements ought to be permitted. He concurs in the result in this case because the language and stipulation also permitted a decrease as well as an increase.
Grover v. Grover, 198 Utah Adv. Rep. ___(Appeals Ct. October 15, 1992). (Judge Russon, with Judge Garff concurring, Judge Orme concurring in the result.)
STANDARD OF REVIEW, ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEEDINGS, STATUTORY INTERPRETATION
A Court of Appeals panel, Judges Billings, Greenwood and Bench, more clearly focuses upon a growing disagreement in the Court of Appeals regarding standards of review in various types of cases. In the instant case, the majority opinion applies Morton International, Inc. v. Auditing Div., 814 P.2d 581 (Utah 1991) to review the administrative law judge's interpretation of Utah Code Ann. § 35-2-14 regarding exposure to injurious amounts of asbestos. The court did not find an implicit grant of discretion to the administrative agency in the statute and therefore did not allow deference to the agency's decision and reviewed the interpretation of the statute under a correction of error standard. The court then reviewed the statute and discussed at length various relevant principles to statutory interpretation and determination of legislative intent. The court held that the statute is ambiguous in some aspects, but its plain language did not allow for the "quantitative or temporal requirements" added in the ALJ's definition. Determining that the ALJ had erred in interpreting the requirements of the asbestos injury statutes, the panel remanded to the commission for reconsideration of the facts in light of the panel's interpretation of the statutes established in the opinion.
The dissent, by Judge Bench, criticized the majority's expansive articulation of the standard of review and statutory interpretation in resolving ambiguity. Judge Bench would find that the statute is not ambiguous. The dissenting opinion claims that while attempting to set forth the standard of review in the Morton case the majority does not follow the dictates of Morton in applying the standard. According to the dissent, the commission found that the decedent's exposure to asbestos while employed by the respondent was not a contributing cause of the disease. The petitioner had failed to show any likelihood of a different result on remand and any erroneous interpretation of the statute was harmless error. Therefore, if there was any erroneous interpretation of the statute by the ALJ, the petitioner was not prejudiced thereby. In essence, the dissent contends that the majority opinion fails to defer to the ALJ's factual determinations or...
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