APPELLATE COURT OPINIONS

This is an appeal from the trial court’s grant of the father’s petition to be named the minor child’s primary residential parent. Finding that the father met his burden to show a material change in circumstances sufficient to warrant the requested modification and that the change was in the child’s best interest, we affirm.

This appeal involves a doctor’s challenge to disciplinary charges brought against him by the Department of Health, Division of Health Related Boards. After the trial court denied the doctor’s request for a temporary injunction prohibiting the defendant from proceeding with a hearing on the disciplinary charges, the doctor filed a notice of appeal to this court. Because the order appealed does not resolve all the claims raised by the doctor, we dismiss the appeal for lack of a final judgment.

Petitioner filed to establish his parentage of the child born to defendant, Lori Jane Martin. He asked to have his parentage established, that he share parenting time, and expressed the desire to provide child support, as well as pay half the medical expenses for the mother and child. He also asked that the child then bear his last name. In a series of motions, the mother moved to relocate to Hawaii, which the trial court denied. She then moved the Court to allow her to move to North Carolina to allow her to pursue a graduate degree. The trial court then allowed this move, and entered a series of orders relating to visitation, travel, etc. The mother appealed to this Court and we remand to the trial court because the remaining issues that the petitioner raised in his Petition have not been ruled upon by the trial court. The appeal was premature.  Case remanded.

After Husband and Wife filed cross petitions for orders of protection, they entered Consent Injunctions restricting communications between them. Subsequently, the parties filed competing petitions for contempt, alleging violations of the Consent Injunctions. On appeal, Husband argues that the Consent Injunctions were improperly entered, and therefore, that the trial court’s criminal contempt conviction, which was based upon violations of such injunctions, cannot stand. We affirm the decision of the chancery court, and finding the appeal frivolous, we remand for a determination of damages.

After eighteen years of marriage, Jennie F. Ingraham (“Wife”) sued Patrick Garrett Ingraham (“Husband”) for divorce. After a trial, the Trial Court entered its Final Judgment on December 7, 2009, inter alia, granting Wife a divorce and dividing the marital property. Husband appeals to this Court raising issues regarding the valuation and distribution of the marital property. Wife raises additional issues concerning the property distribution and attorney fees. We affirm as to the Trial Court’s valuation of items of marital property, the determination that the Exxon stock is Husband’s separate property, and the denial of an award to Wife of attorney’s fees. We, however, remand this case for proof on the issue of whether Husband’s combined SEP and IRA fall under the definition contained in Tenn. Code Ann. § 36-4-121(b)(1)(B) pursuant to our Supreme Court’s Opinion in Snodgrass v. Snodgrass, 295 S.W.3d 240 (Tenn. 2009).

Leta V. Myers (“Mother”) and Robert A. Myers (“Father”) were divorced in 1999. Approximately ten years later, Father filed a petition seeking to have his child support payment reduced after the oldest of the parties’ four children became emancipated. Mother responded to the petition. Mother also filed a counter-petition seeking a modification of the parenting plan as well as to have Father found in contempt of court for willfully violating numerous provisions of the final decree. When Father failed to respond timely to the counter-petition, Mother filed a motion for default judgment. The trial court granted the motion for default. Approximately three hours after the order granting the default judgment was entered, Father filed a response to the counter-petition. The trial court eventually found Father in contempt of court for numerous violations of the final decree. After Father’s motion to set aside the default judgment was denied, Father appealed challenging only the initial entry of the default judgment. We affirm.

The plaintiffs were injured in a car accident in which their car collided with a stolen car. They sued the City of Murfreesboro and its police department, arguing that the stolen car was being pursued by the police immediately prior to the accident. The plaintiffs also sued the person who was using the car with its owner’s permission prior to the theft, arguing that he had acted negligently in leaving the keys in the car. The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of all of the defendants. With respect to the city and its police department, we affirm. With respect to the user of the offending car prior to its theft, we reverse and remand.

Plaintiff filed a cause of action asserting breach of contract and violation of the Tennessee Human Rights Acts. The trial court awarded summary judgment to Defendant Memphis Light Gas & Water Division based on the applicable statute of limitations. We affirm.

This is an employee discharge case. Plaintiff was an at-will employee who alleged that his termination violated the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing in his employment contract. The Tennessee Claims Commission dismissed his complaint for failure to state a claim. We affirm.

This appeal involves the question of whether the trial court properly dismissed Plaintiff’s action when another related lawsuit, filed prior to this Hamblen County Chancery Court action, was pending in Knox County Chancery Court. We hold that the trial court properly dismissed Plaintiff’s action under the prior suit pending doctrine. Accordingly, we affirm.

This appeal involves a boundary line dispute based on competing surveys. The plaintiffs, Doyle and Gloria Sweeney (“the Sweeneys”), and the defendants, Charles and Valerie Koehler (“the Koehlers”), own adjoining real properties. The Sweeneys brought a declaratory judgment action against the Koehlers, seeking to have the boundary line declared between the parties. The Koehlers counterclaimed. The trial court found that the statutory bar codified in Tenn. Code Ann. § 28-2-110 did not apply to the Koehlers and that the Sweeneys were not entitled to a rebuttable presumption of ownership to the disputed land under § 28-2-109 based upon the payment of property taxes on the tract for over 20 years. The trial court determined the common boundary line as contended by the Koehlers. The Sweeneys appealed. We affirm the decision of the trial court.

The father of a minor child appeals his conviction of eighteen counts of criminal contempt for willful failure to pay child support. He contends the evidence was insufficient to sustain the convictions because the State failed to present evidence he had the ability to pay or that his failure to pay was willful. We agree and reverse the holding of the trial court.

Property developer applied to the Town of Smyrna for a rezoning request for a planned development. The request was initially approved by the Planning Commission, but the Town Council later voted to deny the request. The developer appealed by writ of certiorari to the Rutherford County Chancery Court, which affirmed the decision. On appeal, the developer asserts that the Town Council’s action was arbitrary and capricious. We affirm.

Lindsi Allison Connors ("Mother") and Jeremy Phillip Lawson ("Father") are the parents of a daughter (the "Child") who currently is eight years old. Several parenting plans have been entered over the years. Mother eventually moved with the Child to Florida, and thereafter, Father filed a petition claiming there had been a material change in circumstances such that it was in the Child's best interest for him to be designated the primary residential parent. Father also sought to have Mother held in contempt of court. Following a hearing, the trial court found Mother in contempt but refused to mete out any punishment for the contemptuous conduct. The trial court made no mention in its final judgment as to the petition for a change in custody. The trial court then abdicated jurisdiction and instructed the parties to take up any future matters with the Florida courts. We vacate the trial court's judgment and remand for further proceedings consistent with this Opinion.

This is an action to enforce a promissory note. The plaintiff/appellee, a realty company, entered into an exclusive listing agreement with John Sporup for the sale of real property. The listing agreement provided for an eight percent commission in cash on the sale of the property. The realty company secured a buyer, the sale closed, and it received a portion of the commission owed. As an accommodation to the client, however, the realty company agreed to defer the unpaid portion of the commission. Mr. Sporup and his wife, co-owners of the corporation selling the property, signed a promissory note in their individual capacities providing for payment of the deferred commission in monthly installments with a balloon payment due at the end of three years. After the buyer defaulted, the Sporups declined to honor the terms of the promissory note, maintaining that payment of the remaining commission was conditioned on their receipt of the buyer's payments. The realty company filed this action to recover the unpaid commission, pre-judgment interest, and attorney's fees under the terms of the promissory note. The Sporups counterclaimed. The trial court awarded the realty company a judgment in the amount of $85,327.82 after a bench trial. Because the Sporups have not established a breach of fiduciary duty entitling them to an offsetting award of damages, we affirm.

The son of a woman who died at the age of ninety-four filed a petition for probate in solemn form of his mother's lost will. After examining a photocopy of the alleged will and hearing proof from six witnesses, the trial court granted the petition. One of the granddaughters of the decedent appealed, and she has presented a number of arguments to suggest that the trial court erred. We have considered her arguments on appeal, but in the absence of a trial transcript or a statement of the evidence, we must assume that the trial court's decision is fully supported by the record. We accordingly affirm.

The trial court reduced a divorced husband's alimony obligation because of a decline in his income from existing and expected future reductions in his overtime hours at the Post Office. The wife argues on appeal that her medical condition continues to prevent her from working, so her need remains the same as it was before, and that a reduction in alimony is therefore unjustified, even if the husband's ability to pay declines. She also argues that the trial court erred in taking future reductions in husband's overtime hours into consideration, which she characterizes as speculative. We find that under the circumstances of this case the reduction in alimony ordered by the trial court did not constitute an abuse of its discretion, and we therefore affirm its judgment.

The former attorney for the plaintiff, who is seeking to recover a contingency fee pursuant to an attorney's lien she filed after her services were terminated, filed this appeal challenging the trial court's finding that the parties did not enter into a binding settlement agreement and the involuntary dismissal of the underlying personal injury action. The action was dismissed because the pro se plaintiff did not comply with orders of the court. The plaintiff's former attorney claims she has the independent right to enforce a settlement she negotiated, but which her client rejected, in order to recover a fee. The pro se plaintiff also seeks to set aside the involuntary dismissal of his case. Finding no merit to the arguments asserted on appeal, we affirm the trial court in all respects.

This is a divorce appeal involving subject matter jurisdiction. The parties, the parents of one minor child, resided in Tennessee when divorce proceedings were initiated in the Tennessee trial court. The trial court entered a pendente lite order designating the father as the child's primary residential parent and setting the mother's child support obligation. Before the trial, a special master made a recommendation on the mother's child support obligation. In May 2008, after a trial, the Tennessee trial court entered an order declaring the parties divorced and designating the father as primary residential parent, but did not rule on child support. By the time of the divorce order, both parties had moved to Kentucky. Almost immediately afterward, the mother filed an objection regarding the amount of her child support obligation, and the Tennessee trial court entered an order temporarily modifying her child support. In February 2009, the mother filed a petition to modify the designation of primary residential parent. The Tennessee trial court conducted a hearing on the mother's objection to the amount of child support and her petition to modify the designation of primary residential parent. It declined to change the designation of primary residential parent, and also held that the mother owed no back child support arrearage. Both parties appeal. We hold that, under the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act, the Tennessee trial court did not have subject matter jurisdiction to adjudicate the mother's petition to change the designation of primary residential parent. We also hold that, under the Uniform Interstate Family Support Act, the trial court did not have subject matter jurisdiction to adjudicate the mother's request for modification of child support. Therefore, we vacate the trial court's orders modifying the parenting plan and modifying child support.

The plaintiff home buyers filed suit against two home inspectors and a home inspection company after discovering defects in the home that were not mentioned in the inspection report. The court found that the defendants were negligent and granted the plaintiffs a judgment for damages against the home inspectors and the inspection company, individually, jointly and severally. The defendants argue on appeal that the judgment was not supported by the evidence and that in holding them individually liable, the court pierced the corporate veil without the proof of the extraordinary circumstances normally required for a court to do so. We affirm the finding of liability and the judgment for damages, but we vacate the judgment as to one of the individual defendants, because the evidence preponderated against the trial court's finding that he was in partnership with the other individual defendant.

Father appeals the trial court's decision to allow Mother to relocate to California with the parties' minor child. Mother and Father lived separately in California when their only child was born. Mother moved with the minor child to Tennessee in April 2008; Father also moved to Tennessee to be near the child. A year later, Father filed a Petition to Register a Foreign Decree and Modify and Enforce Visitation in the Williamson County Juvenile Court. In June 2009, Mother notified Father she intended to return to California with their child and sought court permission to do so. When the juvenile court referee denied the relocation, Mother sought a de novo hearing before the juvenile court judge. Following a full hearing, the juvenile court judge granted Mother's request to relocate finding that Father, who did not have substantially equal parenting time, failed to carry his burden under the parental relocation statute, Tenn. Code Ann. _ 36-6-108(d)(1). We affirm the trial court's findings that Father did not prove that Mother's move is not for a reasonable purpose, poses a specific or serious threat of harm to the child, or is vindictive. We also affirm the trial court's decision denying Mother's request for attorney's fees and deny her request for attorney's fees on appeal.

In this matter, the plaintiff appeals the decision of the Board of Review of the Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development that he is disqualified from receiving unemployment compensation benefits pursuant to Tenn. Code Ann. _ 50-7-301, as a result of his failure to establish that he had covered wages not provided by an unemployment workrelief program financed by a federal agency under Tenn. Code Ann. _ 50-7-207(c)(5)(G). The trial court upheld the decision of the Board of Review. We affirm.

The trial court found that a parcel designated as a recreational facility in a planned unit development was a "lot" under the terms of the governing declarations such that it could not be subdivided or subjected to a revised use. Under the original declaration, the recreational parcel was expressly excluded within the definition of lot but the later supplemented declaration omits the exclusion. Finding that according to its terms the Supplementary Declaration could not conflict with the original declaration, we find the parcel was not included within the definition of lot. Consequently, it is not subject to the restrictions placed on lots. As there is no prohibition to subdivision or conversion to residential use in the documents governing the parcel, then the parcel may be subdivided and converted to residential use. Accordingly, the trial court is reversed.