Edwin R. Jonas, III v. Linda B. Jonas, etc., and Nancy Gold, etc. , 2015 Fla. App. LEXIS 1836 ( 2015 )


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  •        DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF FLORIDA
    FOURTH DISTRICT
    EDWIN R. JONAS, III,
    Appellant,
    v.
    LINDA B. JONAS, individually and as Trustee of a constructive trust;
    and NANCY GOLD, individually,
    Appellees.
    No. 4D13-1438
    [February 11, 2015]
    Appeal from the Circuit Court for the Fifteenth Judicial Circuit, Palm
    Beach County; Lucy Chernow Brown, Judge; L.T. Case No.
    502002CA005708AH.
    Roderick V. Hannah of Roderick V. Hannah, P.A., Hollywood, for
    appellant.
    Eric C. Christu of Shutts & Bowen, LLP, West Palm Beach, for appellee
    Linda B. Jonas.
    ON MOTION FOR REHEARING
    WARNER, J.
    We deny appellant’s motion for rehearing but vacate the prior opinion
    and issue the following corrected opinion.
    Appellant challenges the trial court’s dismissal, on grounds of comity
    and the principle of priority, of his action collaterally attacking a
    domesticated foreign judgment.       The court determined that these
    proceedings arose out of a New Jersey divorce, and taking jurisdiction
    would interfere with New Jersey’s exercise of jurisdiction. We affirm.
    In 1997 and 1999, the appellee/former wife instituted proceedings to
    domesticate judgments in Florida which arose from the parties’ New Jersey
    divorce. Those decrees awarded the former wife judgments for unpaid
    alimony and child support. The New Jersey court also directed the
    establishment of a constructive trust to be funded with properties owned
    by the appellant/former husband, which it instructed the former wife to
    sell. In its order, the court provided that the former wife may pay the
    judgments from these funds if the former husband otherwise defaulted on
    his obligations. In the later order, the court also declined to consider the
    former husband’s claims to an accounting of the constructive trust on the
    grounds that the husband had left New Jersey and refused to appear in
    court. The court held that it would adjudicate those claims if the former
    husband would return to New Jersey to contest them.1
    In 2002, the former husband filed suit in Florida collaterally attacking
    the foreign judgment, for breach of trust, breach of fiduciary duty and
    negligence. He demanded an accounting of the New Jersey constructive
    trust, as he contended that the former wife had mismanaged the assets of
    the trust, and the judgments should have been paid from the constructive
    trust proceeds. Thus, he claimed that the judgments should be satisfied.
    In July 2003, the Florida court domesticated the New Jersey judgments,
    after earlier refusing to allow discovery involving credits to the judgment,
    due to the rulings of the New Jersey courts requiring the former husband
    to return to litigate those issues there.
    Subsequently, the husband filed a second amended complaint in his
    collateral attack. The proceedings became complicated, and several orders
    of the Florida courts required the former husband to return to New Jersey
    to litigate the trust issues. He had filed proceedings to litigate the issue in
    New Jersey, but the New Jersey court denied his requests for accounting
    without prejudice, because he had absconded from the jurisdiction. The
    court ruled that if he would return to the state, those claims would be
    considered.2
    1 Order in Jonas v. Jonas, Docket No. FM-00259-89, Superior Court of New
    Jersey, Chancery Division, Camden County, dated May 19, 1999 (“Defendant’s
    request that the Court order Plaintiff to give an accounting of funds held in
    constructive trust is denied without prejudice. In the event Defendant returns to
    the jurisdiction of New Jersey, appears before this Court, and is bound by the
    Order of this Court, the Court may order an accounting by Plaintiff of trust
    monies.”).
    2 Also delaying further proceedings in Florida was the former husband’s
    bankruptcy in which he filed an Adversary Complaint against his former wife
    making essentially the same allegations that he made in the Florida complaint.
    His bankruptcy petition was later dismissed. In various orders entered in that
    proceeding, the bankruptcy judge refused the former husband’s requests for an
    accounting as to the trust assets because of the New Jersey proceedings.
    2
    In the meantime, the former husband moved to Montana, and the
    former wife also domesticated the judgments in Montana. The former
    husband litigated the same claims in Montana as he had filed in Florida.
    The Montana courts declined jurisdiction, requiring the former husband
    to return to New Jersey, as demanded by the New Jersey courts, to litigate
    the matter.
    Not to be deterred, the former husband continued to pursue the second
    amended complaint in Florida, again raising the same claims. Finally, in
    2013, upon motion by the former wife, the trial court dismissed the claims
    based upon priority and comity.
    On appeal, the former husband claims that Florida has jurisdiction to
    adjudicate a collateral attack on a domesticated judgment, citing to Nichols
    v. Nichols, 
    613 So. 2d 137
    , 139 (Fla. 4th DCA 1993), which holds that a
    foreign judgment, domesticated in Florida, can be collaterally attacked
    based upon extrinsic fraud. Nichols is inapplicable. The former husband
    is not challenging the validity of the New Jersey judgment; he is claiming
    that the Florida domesticated judgment should have been satisfied
    through application of the funds in the constructive trust. All of his claims
    revolve around the management of the constructive trust by the former
    wife and the application of its proceeds to satisfying his obligations to her.
    Nichols does not control this case.
    Instead, principles of comity and priority required the court to decline
    jurisdiction, as the trial court properly found. Proceedings involving this
    family began in New Jersey in the 1990s. The courts of that state assumed
    jurisdiction, adjudicated the alimony obligations and child support, and
    directed the establishment of the constructive trust which is the source of
    much of the litigation here. Although first ordered to appear in New Jersey
    in 1999, the former husband refused and left the state. When the former
    husband, through counsel, sought an accounting of the constructive trust,
    complaining that the former wife was mismanaging the funds and not
    using them to satisfy his obligations, the New Jersey courts determined
    that those claims could be considered when the former husband returned
    to New Jersey. These orders were appealed and affirmed by the New Jersey
    courts. Thus, the former husband can obtain in New Jersey the relief he
    seeks.
    Comity requires the courts of this state to refrain from exercising
    jurisdiction in this case. The New Jersey courts have prior jurisdiction
    and have demanded that, in order to obtain relief, the former husband
    return to their jurisdiction, from which he absconded.
    3
    When a court is confronted with an action that would
    involve it in a serious interference with or usurpation of this
    continuing power, ‘considerations of comity and orderly
    administration of justice demand that the nonrendering court
    should decline jurisdiction * * * and remand the parties for
    their relief to the rendering court, so long as it is apparent that
    a remedy is available there.’
    Mann Mfg., Inc. v. Hortex, Inc., 
    439 F.2d 403
    , 408 (5th Cir. 1971) (footnote
    omitted); see also Cermesoni v. Maneiro, 
    144 So. 3d 627
    , 630 (Fla. 3d DCA
    2014) (quoting Mann). The Montana court also followed that principle
    when the former husband sought the same relief there. Consistent with
    the Montana court, we too require the former husband to return to New
    Jersey to pursue his relief.
    While the principle of priority also applies, as New Jersey was the first
    court to assert jurisdiction, see Siegel v. Siegel, 
    575 So. 2d 1267
    , 1272
    (Fla. 1991), the usual remedy in such cases is to stay the subsequent
    proceeding in favor of the prior proceeding. Under the circumstances of
    this case, however, the court did not err in dismissing the case rather than
    issuing a stay. This litigation has been pending in the Florida courts for
    twelve years. Prior orders of the Florida trial courts have determined that
    New Jersey is the appropriate forum, yet the former husband has failed to
    litigate in that forum. The interests of judicial economy and finality require
    that this action in Florida come to an end. If the former husband is
    successful in having the judgments in New Jersey satisfied, he can file
    those satisfactions in Florida and the domesticated judgments will also be
    satisfied.
    Having been told by two states that he must pursue his claims in New
    Jersey, the former husband should do so. We affirm the ruling of the trial
    court.
    TAYLOR and KLINGENSMITH, JJ., concur.
    *         *          *
    4
    

Document Info

Docket Number: 4D13-1438

Citation Numbers: 155 So. 3d 1289, 2015 Fla. App. LEXIS 1836

Judges: Warner, Taylor, Klingensmith

Filed Date: 2/11/2015

Precedential Status: Precedential

Modified Date: 10/19/2024