Pishal v. Pishal

Citations

• 212 Conn. App. 607

Syllabus

The defendant, whose marriage to the plaintiff previously had been dis- solved, appealed to this court from the judgment of the trial court denying his motion to modify his alimony obligation. In his motion, the defendant alleged that his alimony obligation should be terminated on the basis of the plaintiff's cohabitation with a third party, or that his alimony obligation should be modified on the basis of a substantial change in his financial circumstances, as his current income was less than his income at the time of the dissolution as a result of his recent loss of employment. The court denied the defendant's motion in an oral ruling at the conclusion of a hearing on that motion. Held: 1. The defendant could not prevail on his claim that the trial court improperly relied on a certain rule of practice (§ 15-8), which applied to civil actions and not to family matters, in denying his motion to modify his alimony obligation: the defendant failed to demonstrate that the trial court, in fact, relied on Practice Book § 15-8, as the plaintiff did not make a motion for judgment of dismissal under § 15-8 and the court did not dismiss the defendant's motion or refer to § 15-8 in its decision; more- over, the court's statement that the defendant had not proven a prima facie case of either cohabitation or a substantial change in circumstances reasonably could be interpreted to mean that, in its role as fact finder, the court had evaluated the totality of the evidence and did not find the relevant factual issues in the defendant's favor. 2. This court declined to review the defendant's remaining claims, namely, that the trial court improperly weighed the evidence and abused its discretion in declining to terminate or to modify the defendant's alimony obligation, the defendant having failed to provide an adequate record for review as required pursuant to the applicable rule of practice (§ 61- 10): the record did not contain a proper statement of the court's decision, as the co