Steven L. Henderson v. Angela C. Henderson

Summary

The Supreme Court of Rhode Island reviewed an interlocutory Family Court order concerning jurisdiction over a divorce from bed and board and custody of the parties' children. The court held that Rhode Island had jurisdiction because the petitioner was domiciled there and the children were living there, and that personal jurisdiction over the defendant was not required for these status and custody determinations. The court also held that reconciliation was not a prerequisite to a bed-and-board divorce and that the pending Rhode Island proceeding did not bar the defendant from pursuing an absolute divorce in Missouri.

Holdings

1. A direct appeal does not lie from the interlocutory Family Court order because Rhode Island generally permits direct appeals only from final judgments, decrees, orders, decisions, or verdicts. The court therefore denied and dismissed the appeal and proceeded only by certiorari.
2. Rhode Island has jurisdiction over a petition for divorce from bed and board when the petitioner is domiciled in Rhode Island and has resided there for a period the court, in its discretion, finds sufficient to warrant exercising the statutory power.
3. Rhode Island may exercise jurisdiction over the defendant in a proceeding concerning the plaintiff's marital and parental status even though the defendant lacks minimum contacts with Rhode Island.
4. The possibility or intent of reconciliation is not a prerequisite to obtaining a divorce from bed and board.
5. The pendency of a Rhode Island divorce petition does not prevent either spouse from commencing a separate divorce action in a foreign state, including Missouri.
6. Rhode Island may determine custody of the children when Rhode Island was their home state at the commencement of the proceeding, even without personal jurisdiction over the defendant.

Questions Presented

1. Whether Rhode Island had statutory jurisdiction over Steven Henderson's complaint for divorce from bed and board when he was domiciled and had resided in Rhode Island for nearly a year.
2. Whether Rhode Island's exercise of jurisdiction over the divorce from bed and board violated the defendant's due process rights because she lacked minimum contacts with Rhode Island.
3. Whether the possibility of reconciliation is a prerequisite to obtaining a divorce from bed and board.
4. Whether a pending Rhode Island divorce-from-bed-and-board proceeding prevented the defendant from filing for an absolute divorce in Missouri.
5. Whether Rhode Island had jurisdiction to determine custody and placement of the children under the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction Act without personal jurisdiction over the defendant.
6. Whether the defendant could obtain direct appellate review of the interlocutory Family Court order.

Disposition

quashed