The parties got divorced. The Trial Court awarded the 80-acre family farm to the wife. Husband was to sign a Quit Claim deed to wife. Wife was obligated to either obtain a loan or to sell the farm. Then, to make a payment of $200,000 to husband from the loan or the sale, to settle the marital estate.
The Trial Court entered post judgment orders. These orders were related to the sale of the farm.
Wife could not or would not perform. The reasons why she did not perform were heard by the Court over several months and multiple hearings.
The circuit court found “[t]he house and farm are worth $569,200 pursuant to an appraisal done” for wife by Skinner Appraisal. The circuit court recognized wife “hotly contested this appraisal and was given almost a year to get a different appraisal and refused.”
It is one month shy of four years since the Court authored the Opinion letter. The letter required the sale. Wife is asking the Court to simply go back to 2015 and ignore or vacate the postjudgment orders. The Trial Court denied wife’s motion. She appealed.
The Appellate Court agreed with the Trial Court. It stated that the Trial Court had properly denied her motion to enforce the judgment and vacate postjudgment orders. The circuit court has indefinite jurisdiction to enforce prior judgments. The Trial Court did not engraft any additional obligations onto the parties with its postjudgment orders. Despite the fact that wife would have preferred to control the sale of the farm to the purchasers, the Newells, that she secured and approved.
The higher offer for the entire farm was received by husband from the Howards before wife forwarded the final contract with the Newells to husband. This was nearly two years after the entry of the original judgment and the date that husband was due to receive his equitable distribution from the marital estate.
The Trial Court was enforcing, but not modifying, the original judgment by compelling the parties to appear for closing on the sale of the entire farm to the purchasers with the highest offer.
In re Marriage of Warner, 2020 IL App (3d) 190198 (April 22, 2020) Knox Co.
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