A Georgia court can construe an ambiguous divorce decree, but it cannot hold you in contempt for violating a term that was unclear until then.
The Rule
“A party may not be held in contempt for violation of a court order unless such order ‘inform[s] him in definite terms as to the duties thereby imposed upon him.’” Morgan v. Morgan, 288 Ga. 417 (2011). You cannot willfully violate a duty the decree did not clearly impose.
That holds even when the court agrees with the other spouse. In Sutherlin v. Sutherlin, 301 Ga. 581 (2017), the husband had to hold the wife harmless from the family businesses’ “corporate income tax liability,” and the IRS later garnished her refund for one business’s unpaid payroll taxes. The Georgia Supreme Court agreed the phrase covered payroll taxes. But because that reading “stems from an explicit finding of ambiguity,” the term was not “so clear and definite” that the husband’s failure was willful, and the contempt finding was reversed. He was, however, “now on notice of his obligations.”
More Examples
In Chatel v. Carroll, 366 Ga. App. 643 (2023), a wife received half of her husband’s stock options and was “responsible for the taxes” of exercising them, but nothing said how to calculate them. The trial court held the husband in contempt for withholding more than the employer did. The Court of Appeals reversed: the provision “is susceptible to two reasonable interpretations.”
And in Hughes v. Browne, 217 Ga. App. 567 (1995), a requirement that each parent “exert every reasonable effort” to foster the child’s affection for the other was too indefinite to support contempt at all; it “does not proscribe any certain conduct.”
What This Does Not Mean
The obligation does not disappear; the court can still construe the term and punish disobedience afterward. Ambiguity is a defense to contempt for the past, not a way out of the decree.
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This post is a quick overview of the law and is not intended as legal advice. Please feel free to contact our office for a consultation if you have questions about this or any other legal aspects regarding your case!