Advance Release Opinions – March 9

The Connecticut Supreme Court advance released an opinion about redistributing an asset of the marital estate after a divorce judgment, which I review below.

Divorce

Reinke v. Sing – CGS § 46b-86(a) precludes a trial court from modifying an estate distribution unless one of the exceptions in CGS § 52-212a, or some other exception, applies. Here, the parties both consented to modifying the judgment to redistribute the husband’s pension entirely to the husband. Since that is one of the § 52-212a exceptions, the trial court had the authority to open and modify. In reaching this conclusion, the Supreme Court confirmed that § 46b-86(a) is not subject matter jurisdictional, but rather a restriction on the court’s authority to act. Since it is not subject matter jurisdictional, the fact that § 46b-86(a) does not authorize the court to redistribute the estate does not prevent the court from doing if some other statute authorizes it.