{"id":1911,"date":"2021-08-06T09:32:56","date_gmt":"2021-08-06T09:32:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bresky-merger.local.com\/posts\/bresky-law-obtains-reversal-of-final-judgment-denying-fee-award-without-findings-of-need-and-ability-to-pay\/"},"modified":"2021-08-06T09:32:56","modified_gmt":"2021-08-06T09:32:56","slug":"bresky-law-obtains-reversal-of-final-judgment-denying-fee-award-without-findings-of-need-and-ability-to-pay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/bresky-law-obtains-reversal-of-final-judgment-denying-fee-award-without-findings-of-need-and-ability-to-pay\/","title":{"rendered":"Bresky Law Obtains Reversal of Final Judgment Denying Fee Award Without Findings of Need and Ability to Pay"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>May 19, 2021<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Bresky Law recently obtained reversal of a Final Judgment of Dissolution of Marriage that denied our client\u2019s request for attorney\u2019s fees.<\/p>\n<p>The parties were married for sixteen years before the wife filed for a divorce. The husband earned a significant income while the wife stayed at home with the parties\u2019 children. The case proceeded to a trial on disputed issues including timesharing, alimony, equitable distribution, and attorney\u2019s fees. The wife (our client) requested attorney\u2019s fees based on her need and the husband\u2019s ability to pay. The trial court rendered a Final Judgment following trial in which the court denied the wife\u2019s request for attorney\u2019s fees and ordered that each party be responsible for its own attorney\u2019s fees.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>We represented the wife on appeal in the Fourth District Court of Appeal (\u201cFourth DCA\u201d). We argued that the trial court erred in denying our client\u2019s request for attorney\u2019s fees. Specifically, we argued that the trial court erred by denying the wife\u2019s request without making findings regarding her need for an award of fees and the husband\u2019s ability to pay, pursuant to Chapter 61.16, Florida Statutes. We argued that our client clearly was entitled to an award of attorney\u2019s fees based on the fact that she was a homemaker and not employed, whereas the husband had the ability to pay an award of attorney\u2019s fees based on his income. &nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The Fourth DCA agreed with Bresky Law\u2019s arguments on behalf of our client as to the lack of findings. The Fourth DCA held that \u201ca \u2018trial court cannot deny a request for attorney\u2019s fees under section 61.16 without making findings as to one party\u2019s ability to pay an award of fees and the other party\u2019s need for the payment of fees.\u2019\u201d (quoting <em>Gudur v. Gudur<\/em>, 277 So. 3d 687, 693\u201394 (Fla. 2d DCA 2019). The Fourth DCA reversed the Final Judgment and remanded with instructions for the trial court to reconsider our client\u2019s request for attorney\u2019s fees and make the required findings. This favorable result for our client allows her to seek her attorney\u2019s fees from the trial court.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>May 19, 2021 Bresky Law recently obtained reversal of a Final Judgment of Dissolution of Marriage that denied our client\u2019s request for attorney\u2019s fees. The parties were married for sixteen years before the wife filed for a divorce. The husband earned a significant income while the wife stayed at home with the parties\u2019 children. The&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1812],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1911","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-attorneys-fees"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1911","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1911"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1911\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1911"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1911"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1911"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}