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Collins v. Collins5/30/2002
s efforts to locate post-retirement employment. Moreover, no witnesses were called at the hearing on the exceptions, which concerned only the pendente lite child support, child custody, and alimony awards.
We have never required a trial court to make a specific finding of dissipation. See Welsh v. Welsh, 135 Md. App. 29, 52, 761 A.2d 949 (2000), cert. denied, 363 Md. 207, 768 A.2d 5 (2001) (inferring a finding of dissipation from the trial court's ruling). We infer a similar finding of dissipation in the trial court's ruling here.
Clearly, the trial court credited Dr. Collins' testimony that the diamonds were purchased during the marriage and that they were worth $6,500. Lt. Col. Collins argues that testimony that the diamonds had a value of $1,500 was "uncontroverted" and was "the only credible evidence of the value of the diamonds." Lt. Col. Collins never provided the court with an appraisal of the diamonds, a receipt for the diamonds' sale, or identified to whom he sold the diamonds. Acknowledging that the diamonds were unavailable, the trial court accepted Dr. Collins' valuation, which, according to her, was the value ascribed to them by Lt. Col. Collins. As stated above, we will not find clear error in a ruling based on a credibility determination. Rule 8-131(c); Caccamise, 130 Md. App. at 521.
At oral argument, Lt. Col. Collins contended that the court was required to determine the "present value" of the diamonds, which he contends to be $1,500. We decline to reduce the monetary award to $750 to reflect the price for which Lt. Col. Collins allegedly sold the diamonds. Even assuming that Lt. Col. Collins sold the diamonds for $1,500, absent some evidence of an arm's length sale, there is no proof that this was the actual value of the diamonds. The court's conclusion was not clearly erroneous.
4. Dr. Collins' TIAA-CREF Account
Lt. Col. Collins next contends that the court erred by failing to award him half of the value of Dr. Collins' TIAA-CREF account, or, alternatively, by not allowing him to take a credit against the monetary judgment. Again, Dr. Collins argues that the trial court's findings and ruling speak for themselves.
The trial court made the following finding with respect to this account:
Then with regard to the TIA -Cref account of the plaintiff's, I will accept the suggestion of the plaintiff that even though that is marital property, so was the stocks that Mr. Collins had possession of and has dissipated before the trial, they were marital property and dissipated so I will just treat that as a wash even though there is a slight difference in value, it's not enough to worry about. So she will be able to keep that Cref account intact because of the settlement.
The trial court clearly found that Lt. Col. Collins had dissipated certain "stocks" during the separation period. Consequently, we find no abuse of discretion in the court's decision not to award Lt. Col. Collins a portion of the TIAA-CREF account, but instead using his marital interest in it to offset the value of assets that he dissipated.
5. Monetary Award Based on Pension Payments
We shall discuss other aspects of Lt. Col. Collins' many complaints concerning the distribution of his pension in Section I.B of this opinion. We address here his complaint concerning the sum of $5,896 included in the monetary award to Dr. Collins, based on pension payments he received prior to the divorce. He argues that this sum arose "solely out of the retirement pay received by the Appellant prior to the divorce between the Parties[.]" (Emphasis in appellant's brief.) Because the pension payments were made prior to the time o
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