{
  "id": 6135976,
  "name": "Patricia SPEIGHT v. Benjamin SPEIGHT/Hakim Beyah",
  "name_abbreviation": "Speight v. Speight",
  "decision_date": "1989-12-13",
  "docket_number": "CA 89-159",
  "first_page": "1",
  "last_page": "4",
  "citations": [
    {
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      "cite": "30 Ark. App. 1"
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    {
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      "cite": "781 S.W.2d 39"
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  "court": {
    "name_abbreviation": "Ark. Ct. App.",
    "id": 13370,
    "name": "Arkansas Court of Appeals"
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    "id": 34,
    "name_long": "Arkansas",
    "name": "Ark."
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      "reporter": "S.W.2d",
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      "year": 1980,
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      "year": 1980,
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    {
      "cite": "Ark. Code Ann. \u00a7 9-14-202",
      "category": "laws:leg_statute",
      "reporter": "Ark. Code Ann.",
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  "last_updated": "2023-07-14T17:22:12.310921+00:00",
  "provenance": {
    "date_added": "2019-08-29",
    "source": "Harvard",
    "batch": "2018"
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  "casebody": {
    "judges": [
      "Cooper and Rogers, JJ., agree."
    ],
    "parties": [
      "Patricia SPEIGHT v. Benjamin SPEIGHT/Hakim Beyah"
    ],
    "opinions": [
      {
        "text": "Donald L. Corbin, Chief Judge.\nThis appeal comes to us from Pulaski County Chancery Court. Appellant, Patricia Speight, appeals the dismissal of her motion asking that appellee, Benjamin Speight/Hakim Beyah, be cited for contempt for his failure to comply with the October 4,1983, agreed order by which he was to pay child support in the amount of $200.00 per month. We reverse and remand.\nThe parties here were divorced in Pulaski County Chancery Court, Second Division, on September 29, 1972. Appellant was awarded custody of the couple\u2019s two minor children and appellee was ordered to pay child support at the rate of $40.00 per week.\nFollowing appellant\u2019s first petition to show cause, appellee on March 12,1975, was held in contempt for his failure to comply with the prior order of the court concerning child support payments. At that hearing appellee was ordered to make the $40.00 per week payments through the Master in Chancery. It was further ordered that appellant have judgment against appel-lee in the amount of $720.00 for arrearages in child support.\nIn 1979, appellant, then a resident of Michigan, through that state filed an incoming Uniform Reciprocal Enforcement of Support Act action asking the court to order appellee to properly support his minor children. A hearing on the petition was held November 27,1979, at which time child support was set at $60.00 per week and a wage assignment was granted.\nAppellant again in 1981 filed a motion and show cause order. A December 7,1981, hearing resulted in judgment for appellant in the sum of $11,315.00 for past due child support and a wage assignment for $75.00 per week. Of this amount, $60.00 was to be current support and $15^00 was to be applied to arrearages.\nOn October 4, 1983, another contempt motion filed by appellant was resolved. By way of an agreed order entered into by the parties appellant was given judgment for an additional $3,760.00 in arrearages and child support was revised to $160.00 per month for current support and $40.00 per month to be applied to arrearages.\nAppellant, on October 25, 1988, filed an amended motion alleging new arrearages of $5,955.00 for the period March 1, 1984, through August 31, 1988. At the November 8, 1988, hearing on the motion in Pulaski County Chancery Court, appellee\u2019s counsel moved that appellants\u2019 motion be dismissed based on the common law theory of election of remedies. Appellee asserted that the 1983 wage assignment barred any subsequent action for contempt because the two were opposite remedies. From the chancellor\u2019s granting this oral motion to dismiss with prejudice comes this appeal.\nAppellant raises the following three points for reversal: 1) The chancellor erred in granting appellee\u2019s oral motion to dismiss because it was not properly pled or proven; 2) the chancellor erred in granting appellee\u2019s oral motion to dismiss based on an election of remedies theory because the \u201cremedies\u201d sought herein do not fit the requirements for an election of remedies theory; 3) the chancellor erred in granting appellee\u2019s oral motion to dismiss based on an election of remedies theory because Ark. Code Ann. \u00a7 9-14-202 proscribes such a ruling. However, because we find merit in appellant\u2019s second point we will not address the first or last points.\nAppellant in her second point argues that a wage assignment for the payment of chid support and a motion and show cause order requesting that the court exercise its contempt power are not the types of totally separate remedies to which the election of remedies doctrine applies.\nFor the election of remedies doctrine to apply there must be concurrent, inconsistent remedies. Toney v. Haskins, 111 Ark. 190, 608 S.W.2d 28 (Ark. App. 1980). Furthermore, the election of remedies rule is not favored by the courts. Id. at 198, 608 S.W.2d at 32.\nThe first consideration is whether there actually are two remedies involved. In making this determination we look at both the nature of a wage assignment and that of the contempt order. In support of her argument appellant asserts that a show cause proceeding in which the defendant is accused of willful contempt of court for failing to pay child support will be adjudicated on the merits by the court. After either a judgment is granted for the arrearages or the defendant purges himself of the contempt or otherwise satisfies the court\u2019s requirement in this regard, the proceeding is finalized and the plaintiff cannot in the future raise the same issues concerning those arrearages. The issue regarding those particular arrearages is res judicata in any subsequent proceeding.\nShe also contends that in contrast, a wage assignment is merely a procedural administrative device made available to the court by statute to facilitate the regular payment of child support. The court, at any time upon proper motion, can modify the wage assignment as to the amount paid and the time of payments, as well as the party to whom it is directed.\nAppellant continues by stating that a contempt proceeding instituted by the obligee in a child support case is clearly a legal remedy which is pursued to enforce the obligation, whereas, the implementation of an income withholding order is not a legal remedy in the sense required to make the election of remedies doctrine applicable.\nWe agree with appellant\u2019s assertion that the actions of requesting a wage assignment for payment of a child support obligation and a subsequent show cause proceeding are not two remedies between which the movant is required to choose under the election of remedies theory. Therefore, it was error for the chancellor, based on an election of remedies theory, to dismiss appellant\u2019s motion for contempt. For this reason we reverse and remand.\nReversed and remanded.\nCooper and Rogers, JJ., agree.",
        "type": "majority",
        "author": "Donald L. Corbin, Chief Judge."
      }
    ],
    "attorneys": [
      "Jewel E. Holloway, Child Support Enforcement Unit of Pulaski County, for appellant."
    ],
    "corrections": "",
    "head_matter": "Patricia SPEIGHT v. Benjamin SPEIGHT/Hakim Beyah\nCA 89-159\n781 S.W.2d 39\nCourt of Appeals of Arkansas Division II\nOpinion delivered December 13, 1989\nJewel E. Holloway, Child Support Enforcement Unit of Pulaski County, for appellant."
  },
  "file_name": "0001-01",
  "first_page_order": 25,
  "last_page_order": 28
}