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STUBBLEBINE v. STUBBLEBINE. When setting spousal support, a divorce court may impute income to a retired man at the salary he could earn if he were employed. Va. Ct. App., VLW 096-7-121.
Abstract is below:
Virginia Family Law Case Notes:
NOTES ON VIRGINIA APPELLATE CASES
By Richard E. Crouch; earlier notes by Prof. Peter N. Swisher and others
LIMONY - IMPUTATION - RETIREMENT.
No one should infer any generalities from the Kaplan case. The Court of Appeals is not about to abandon its love affair with imputation theory, and carries it to dazzling new heights in Stubblebine v. Stubblebine, 21 Va. App. 635, 466 S.E. 2d 764, 10 VLW 980 (2/13/96), which upholds imputation of very high income, for alimony purposes, to a twice-retired, 64-year old military man. It does so even though the testimony is unchallenged that he could never find employment at his age, and that he has already retired in due course from the Army and from his post-retirement job. The reason? He has been active in his retirement, doing a tremendous amount of unpaid volunteer work. He also appears to have been imprudent enough to have been doing some of this work for a girl friend. Accordingly, as dissenting Judge Benton points out, clients who have retired should be warned against doing anything after retirement. The income that is imputed to the general is the $40,000 he was earning at the last job, and the alimony is $1,000 a month. The majority declares that it is not establishing a bright-line rule that no man, however old, can ever retire. Rather, it says, it would like to continue to decide each case on an ad hoc basis. THIS JUST IN: En banc reconsideration was granted March 22.