Berlinger v. Casselberry

Pursuant to the divorce agreement between Bruce Berlinger (plaintiff) and Roberta Casselberry (defendant), Berlinger was to pay Casselberry $16,000 per month in lifetime alimony. The Berlinger Discretionary Trusts (the trusts) paid all Berlinger’s living and personal expenses but were subject to a spendthrift provision protecting the trust corpus from Berlinger and his creditors. Most of Berlinger’s expenses were paid directly by the trusts, and Berlinger had a credit card, fully paid by the trusts, for all other expenses. Berlinger did not work and did not have any other source of income. Several years after the divorce, Berlinger stopped paying Casselberry alimony. Shortly thereafter, Berlinger transferred his real property interests, previously held in his own name, into a new irrevocable trust without disclosing it to Casselberry. Casselberry sued for enforcement of the alimony order, and the trial court issued a writ of garnishment against the trusts for alimony arrears. Several months later, Casselberry then moved for a continuing writ of garnishment to be attached to Berlinger’s present and future distributions from any trust to satisfy her ongoing monthly alimony payments. Berlinger, along with Richard Inglis, the corporate trustee for the trusts, challenged, arguing that distributions from discretionary trusts were not subject to garnishment by any creditor, even a former spouse. The trial court issued a continuing writ of garnishment directing that all future disbursements to Berlinger be payable to Casselberry unless there were no outstanding alimony payments owed at the time of the distribution. Berlinger appealed.