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Lamb v. Lamb3/8/2002
ifferent conclusion had we been asked to decide the matter in place of the trial court, our function upon review is merely to measure the lower court's adherence to the standards of fairness, not substitute our judgment for that of the trier of fact. Kaechele at 94.
In the third and final assignment of error, appellant claims that the trial court erred when it treated the Summit Federal Credit Union account as an asset and ordered the sum of $940 to be divided equally between the parties. According to appellant, he borrowed funds from a credit union to purchase an air compressor, and that this was a debt, not an asset.
It is undisputed that appellant is a member of the Summit Federal Credit Union. At the hearing, appellee submitted a March 2000 statement from the credit union. A close review of this statement reveals that appellant has two accounts with this credit union.
The first is a regular share account (account # 081077). A "share account," also termed a "share-draft account," is " n account that a member maintains at a credit union and that can be drawn on through the use of share drafts payable to third parties. A share-draft account operates much like a checking account operates at a bank." Black's Law Dictionary (7 Ed. 2000), 15. The March 2000 statement indicates that the share account had an ending balance of $111.14. As such, this portion of the Summit Federal Credit Union account is an asset.
However, according to the March 2000 statement, the second account (account # 081077-61) maintained at Summit Federal Credit Union is a "loan account." According to appellant, he borrowed funds from the credit union in order to purchase a $900 air compressor. The statement indicates that there were regular payroll deductions of $16 each week, which were applied towards the payment of this loan. As of the March 2000 statement, the remaining unpaid balance was $877.29. Given that appellant was issued a loan, the second account is a debt.
While the divorce decree provides for the disposition of the Summit Federal Credit Union account, the court did not specify which account it was referring to. Rather, the court merely concluded that the Summit Federal Credit Union account contained $940 and ordered it to be divided equally. It is, however, unclear to this court how the trial court arrived at the $940 figure. As explained earlier, the March 2000 statement shows that appellant maintained two separate accounts at the credit union, to wit: a shared account with an ending balance of $111.14, and a loan account with a unpaid balance of $877.39.
Because the trial court abused its discretion in failing to properly dispose of the two Summit Federal Credit Union accounts, we remand this issue to enable the court to do so. Accordingly, appellant's third assignment of error is well-taken to the limited extent indicated.
Based on the foregoing analysis, appellant's first and third assignments of error are meritorious to the extent indicated while the second assignment of error is not well-taken. Accordingly, the judgment of the trial court is affirmed in part, reversed in part, and this matter is remanded for proceedings consistent with this opinion.
JUDGE JUDITH A. CHRISTLEY
FORD, P.J., GRENDELL, J., concur.
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