Renstrup v. Renstrup

Citations

• 217 Conn. App. 252

Syllabus

The defendant appealed from the trial court's financial orders issued in connection with the judgment dissolving his marriage to the plaintiff. During the parties' marriage, the defendant was the primary wage earner for the family while the plaintiff remained at home and raised their two minor children. At the time of dissolution, the defendant earned, inter alia, a base salary and was eligible for a cash bonus targeted at 30 percent of his base salary. The defendant's weekly net income exceeded $4000. The trial court attributed to the plaintiff an earning capacity of $40,000 per year, and, in light of the plaintiff's earning capacity, a devia- tion criterion under the Child Support and Arrearage Guidelines set forth in the applicable regulations (§ 46b-215a-1 et seq.), the court used that deviation in its calculation of the defendant's child support obliga- tion. The court added the plaintiff's earning capacity to the defendant's net weekly income to arrive at a new, combined weekly income and used the guidelines to determine a basic child support range. Rather than adjusting the defendant's basic child support obligation downward from the original range to account for the plaintiff's earning capacity, the court ordered the defendant, the noncustodial parent, to pay a weekly child support award of $1000 per week, which reflected a 5 percent deviation upward from the top of the basic child support range based on the parties' combined weekly income. The court also ordered the defendant to pay a supplemental child support payment equal to 17.71 percent of the after-tax amounts of any bonuses and other income he earned. The court awarded the plaintiff alimony and a supplemental alimony award in the amount of 17.71 percent of the after-tax amounts of any bonuses and other income earned by the defendant in any year in which he has an alimony obligation to the plaintiff. Held: 1. The trial court abused its discretion in calculating the defendant's initial child support ob