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DANIEL LYNCH v. LAURIE LYNCH(AC 35413)

Lavine, Bear and Borden, Js.*

Argued March 18—officially released September 30, 2014

(Appeal from Superior Court, judicial district ofFairfield, Hon. Howard T. Owens, Jr., judge trial referee

[dissolution judgment]; Adelman, J. [orders as toalimony payment, award of appellate counsel fees,

motions for modification, contempt, reargument, orderreducing amount of alimony overpayment, motions tostay alimony, support obligations, for order to offset

alimony payments].)

Daniel M. Lynch, self-represented, the appellant(plaintiff).

Christopher T. Goulden, for the appellee (defendant).

Opinion

BEAR, J. The present matter previously was beforethis court in Lynch v. Lynch, 135 Conn. App. 40, 43A.3d 667 (2012) (Lynch I). This court reversed in partthe dissolution judgment of the trial court, Hon. How-ard T. Owens, Jr., judge trial referee, ‘‘as to the financialorders only, except with respect to the portion of thecourt’s order granting the defendant’s February 4, 2009pendente lite motion for modification that applies retro-actively from February 4, 2009, until the date of judg-ment,’’ and accordingly remanded the matter. Id., 58.The trial court, Adelman, J., subsequently entered newfinancial orders pursuant to Lynch I from which theplaintiff, Daniel Lynch, now appeals. The plaintiff alsoappeals from the court’s orders with respect to severalmotions filed after Lynch I and both before and afterthe court’s December 13, 2012 memorandum of decisionin this appeal.

The plaintiff specifically claims that the court improp-erly (1) awarded alimony to the defendant, LaurieLynch, and not to him; (2) denied his request for equita-ble financial relief in his motion for modification, eventhough he had met his burden of establishing a substan-tial change in circumstances; (3) granted the defen-dant’s October 11, 2012 motion for contempt; (4)granted the defendant’s May 1, 2013 postjudgmentmotion for contempt; (5) calculated the reimbursementfor stipulated shared household expenses owed to himby the defendant; (6) failed to calculate a pendente litearrearage owed to him by the defendant; (7) awarded$7500 in appellate attorney’s fees to the defendant; (8)entered financial orders that were inequitable to himand that demonstrated the court’s bias against him; and(9) failed to hear certain of his motions and deniedothers without consideration of his due process rights.We disagree with all nine of the plaintiff’s claims andaffirm the judgment of the trial court.

I

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

A

Previous Appeal

As this court noted in Lynch I, ‘‘[t]he parties weremarried in 1992, and two children were born of themarriage.1 On September 14, 2009,2 the court renderedjudgment dissolving the marriage on the ground of irre-trievable breakdown.’’ (Footnotes altered.) Id., 42. Partof the dissolution judgment involved the court’s deci-sion to grant the defendant’s February 4, 2009 pendentelite motion to modify the parties’ December 11, 2008stipulation that they would equally divide the paymentof the household expenses.3 Id., 43. The defendant’smotion alleged that the plaintiff’s income had increasedand, therefore, asked the court to increase, in turn, the

plaintiff’s payment obligation. Id. The court accordingly‘‘ordered the plaintiff to pay 60 percent and the defen-dant to pay 40 percent of the obligations set forth inthe stipulation’’; id.; from February 4, 2009, to the dateof the sale and transfer of the marital home.4 Also amongthe financial orders entered by the court were an ali-mony award of $200 per week and a child support awardof $135 per week, both to be paid by the plaintiff tothe defendant. Id.

The plaintiff appealed from these orders and filedfour subsequent amended appeals to challenge certainof the court’s postjudgment rulings as well, one of whichawarded $7500 in appellate attorney’s fees to the defen-dant. Id., 44. We reversed that part of the dissolutionjudgment that ordered the plaintiff to pay to the defen-dant 30 percent of the value of his unsold books onthe ground that the court impermissibly considered theplaintiff’s intellectual property twice for alimony andproperty distribution purposes. Id., 52–53. We thenreversed almost all of the remaining financial orders5

in accordance with the principle that ‘‘[t]he [financial]orders [in a domestic relations matter] are interwovenand constitute a carefully crafted mosaic [and] [w]henwe disrupt a single tile in this mosaic, we place in doubtthe propriety of other financial orders that the trialcourt may have deemed equitable in relation to theentire distribution scheme.’’ (Internal quotation marksomitted.) Id., 54. We affirmed the court’s decision togrant the defendant’s motion for modification, but itdid so only with respect to the period of time betweenFebruary 4 and September 14, 2009. Id., 46–48.

Also relevant to this appeal is our conclusion in LynchI that the ‘‘court improperly failed to address [the plain-tiff’s] January 29, 2009 pendente lite motion for con-tempt,’’ in which he alleged that the defendant had failedto reimburse him for household expenses that he hadpaid in full, even though they were subject to the 2008stipulation. Id., 49. ‘‘At trial, the defendant testified thatshe believed she owed the plaintiff some money, butthat she did not know how much because she had nodocumentation to show exactly what he had paidtoward the expenses at issue in the stipulation.’’ Id.The court nonetheless failed to address this concededarrearage, even though it granted the defendant’smotion for modification. Id. We concluded that thecourt’s omission constituted an impermissible retroac-tive modification of the stipulation under General Stat-utes § 46b-86 and a violation of the plaintiff’s vestedproperty right in the arrearage. Id., 50. Therefore, inremanding the matter for reconsideration of the finan-cial orders, we also ordered that the court determine‘‘the amount of the pendente lite arrearage to beincluded in the judgment, along with an appropriateorder for its payment.’’ Id., 51.

The rescript in Lynch I provided: ‘‘The judgment is

reversed as to the financial orders only, except withrespect to the portion of the court’s order granting thedefendant’s February 4, 2009 pendente lite motion formodification that applies retroactively from February4, 2009, until the date of judgment, which is affirmed,and the case is remanded for further proceedings inaccordance with this opinion.’’ Id., 58.

B

Present Appeal

1

Trial Court’s Memorandum of Decision on Remand

The court heard the present matter on remand overfive days between October 2 and October 19, 2012, andit filed its memorandum of decision on December 13,2012. It found in relevant part: ‘‘The plaintiff’s employ-ment has been, and continues to be, in computerresearch relating to genealogical study. He had workedfor various companies over the years, but has been self-employed since March, 2003, when he started MattatuckConsulting, LLC. It was his testimony that his last jobprior to that date was severely hampered by his inabilityto be able to relocate to Utah to please his employer.Additional job opportunities required him to relocateas well. Those were not pursued. That was because,according to the plaintiff, the defendant refused to moveout of Connecticut. She [did] not dispute the fact thatshe was not willing to relocate.

‘‘His consulting business has been fairly successful,and his income has been a combination of consulting,writing and speaking engagements. In 2008, he authoreda book titled ‘Google Your Family Tree.’ That publica-tion enjoyed some success and boosted his income inthat year and the next. He testified that the book isnow four years old and in the technology field that isancient. He claim[ed] almost no income from the bookat [the time of the remand hearings] although he didadmit in cross-examination that the book was . . .used as a text in [a] course at Boston University, whichresulted in some extra book sales, but that he receivedno direct or other compensation from the college forthe use of the text. He also testified that MattatuckConsulting, LLC, has no intrinsic value and, other thansome computer equipment, it has virtually no assets.Over the years, his self-employment income has rangedfrom gross earnings of $73,500 with gross income of$37,800 in 2011, to gross earnings of $108,800 with grossincome of $64,700 in 2010, and to gross earnings of$150,700 with gross income of $67,600 in 2009. For[2012], he claim[ed] a gross income of almost $45,000through the end of September with gross earnings ofalmost $67,600.

‘‘The defendant was unemployed at the time of thetrial, having been laid off in January of [2012], but shehad been employed for most of the marriage. Her

employment has been for a variety of employers, all inthe areas of business to business sales. The defendant’searnings ranged from $74,560 in 2009 to $57,800 in 2010,to $71,500 in 2011, and to unemployment [in 2012] inthe amount of $525 per week.’’

The court refashioned the financial orders on remandin two stages. First, it crafted the orders in accordancewith our directions in Lynch I and the facts as theywere at the time of the dissolution. It then modifiedthose orders in accordance with the motions for modifi-cation that it asked both parties to file during theremand hearings, in order to account for the changesin circumstances that had occurred since the time ofthe dissolution proceedings. The court undertook thisapproach pursuant to Sunbury v. Sunbury, 216 Conn.673, 676–77, 583 A.2d 636 (1990), in which our SupremeCourt held that a trial court must craft property distribu-tion orders on remand in accordance with the facts asthey existed at the time of the dissolution judgment,not at the time of the remand.

a

Financial Orders on Remand

i

Plaintiff’s January 29, 2009 Motion for Contempt,Regarding Reimbursement for Shared

Household Expenses

The court first addressed the plaintiff’s January 29,2009 motion for contempt, which the dissolution courthad failed to do. The plaintiff withdrew the motion onOctober 1, 2012, because he believed that the remandhearings would subsume the arguments and evidencerelevant thereto, but he also stated on the face of hiswithdrawal that he ‘‘[did] not in any way concede thecontents of the motion.’’ The court concluded on thebasis of the evidence that it was difficult to determineif the defendant owed anything to the plaintiff for theperiod of time covered by the motion for contempt,and to the extent that certain evidence indicated thatthere was an arrearage, such arrearage was ‘‘de mini-mis,’’ which prompted the court to state that it‘‘decline[d] to rule further on the issue.’’

ii

Defendant’s February 4, 2009 Motion for Modification,Regarding Division of Shared Household Expenses

The court then considered the defendant’s February4, 2009 motion for modification and found that it hadnot been remanded, and therefore, the order remainedin full force and effect, retroactive to February 4, 2009.The plaintiff has not directly challenged this finding inany of his nine claims on appeal.6

iii

Alimony and Attorney’s Fees Awards to Defendant

and Factual Findings Relevant Thereto

The court next found in relevant part with respectto the time of the dissolution judgment that ‘‘[n]eitherparty bore a greater degree of fault for [the marital]breakdown than the other . . . .’’ (Citation omitted.)‘‘In September, 2009, the plaintiff was self-employedand had a gross weekly income of approximately $1300.The defendant was employed with a gross weeklyincome at that time of a little over $1400.7 The partiesare the joint owners of a single-family home located[in Trumbull]. The home had a value as listed on thedefendant’s financial affidavit of $560,000 with a totaloutstanding mortgage of $210,533 for an estimatedequity of $349,467. At the time of the dissolution, theplaintiff had retirement accounts of approximately$114,000, the majority of which was accumulated duringthe time of the marriage. The defendant had deferredincome assets valued at $13,600, which [are] also amarital asset. Both parties have had medical issues inthe past. Currently, as well as in 2009, neither has issuesthat would prevent them from being employed to theirfullest capacity.’’ (Footnotes altered.) The court subse-quently ordered the plaintiff to pay to the defendant,inter alia, (1) periodic alimony of $100 per week until thedeath of either party or September 14, 2019, whicheveroccurred first, and (2) appellate attorney’s fees of $7500.

b

Parties’ Motions for Modification

The court then addressed both parties’ motions formodification: ‘‘The defendant filed her motion . . . onOctober 11, 2012. In said motion, she alleged thatalthough both parties were residing together with thechildren at the time of the dissolution, that changedwhen she obtained exclusive possession of the homein 2010. Furthermore, one of the minor children hasattained majority and now attends college. Additionally,the defendant is currently unemployed and is payingfor her medical insurance and that of her childrenthrough COBRA.8

‘‘The plaintiff filed his motion . . . also on October11, 2012. He claims significant changes as well, includ-ing his loss of medical insurance coverage once thedissolution was finalized. He points to the fact that hewas forced to vacate the marital home on May 18, 2010,incurring housing costs of his own as well as beingobligated to contribute to the living expenses of thechildren and the defendant. He also claims that therecent legislation passed in Connecticut that obligatesout-of-state Internet retailers to collect Connecticutsales tax in instances where they pay commissions totheir independent contractors or other representativeswho reside and do business in the state has had a directand negative impact on his income. Although there mayhave been some immediate reduction, his reported

income does not support this claim in the long term.’’(Citation omitted; footnotes altered.) Among the ordersthat the plaintiff requested in his motion for modifica-tion were (1) that the defendant pay alimony to him,retroactive to September 14, 2009; (2) that the defendantreimburse him for all alimony and child support pay-ments, retroactive to September 14, 2009; and (3) thatthe parties equally share the mortgage and utility pay-ments from September 14, 2009, to May 18, 2010, andequally share the mortgage payments and his rent pay-ments thereafter.

The court concluded: ‘‘In the present case, both par-ties have easily met their respective burdens of showinga substantial change in circumstances.’’ It thus enteredseveral modified financial orders, three of which arerelevant to this appeal.

i

Alimony Arrearage Owed to Plaintiff by Defendant

The first modified order that is a subject of this appealis the court’s determination that the plaintiff had over-paid his alimony obligation because he had paid $26,215in accordance with the original order of $200 per week,even though the order on remand of $100 per weekprovided that he owed a total of $17,000 through Decem-ber 15, 2012. The court did not finalize the amount ofthe overpayment at the time that it filed the decision,however, and instead ordered the parties to have a taxprofessional determine the amount in light of the taxconsequences of the alimony payments to both partiesand to file the tax professional’s report with the court.After the parties complied with this order, the courtfiled a supplemental memorandum of decision on Feb-ruary 7, 2013, in which it stated: ‘‘The alimony overpay-ment of $9215 found by the court . . . is reduced to$7832 in consideration of the tax consequences toboth parties.’’

ii

Reimbursement for Shared Household ExpensesOwed to Plaintiff by Defendant

The second modified order that is a subject of thisappeal is the court’s determination that the defendantowed a reimbursement to the plaintiff for paymentsmade pursuant to the 2008 stipulation during the periodof time between September 14, 2009, and the beginningof the remand hearings. It noted that it was not per-suaded by the plaintiff’s position that his housing costsand medical insurance costs were joint householdexpenses covered by the stipulation. It added, however,that it was persuaded that the plaintiff had paid$54,524.26 in mortgage and utility payments for thebenefit of the defendant and for which he was entitledto reimbursement.9 The court offset this amount by theamount owed to the defendant by the plaintiff, whichthe court fashioned by adding the amount conceded by

the plaintiff—$59,144—and the amount claimed by thedefendant—$65,000—and then dividing the sum in half.The ‘‘compromise figure’’ found by the court equaled$31,306, and when the court subtracted it from theamount owed by the defendant to the plaintiff for mort-gage and utility payments, it calculated a difference of$23,488.26, which it ordered as the amount that thedefendant owed to the plaintiff for ‘‘overpayment ofshared expenses prior to the start of the current trial. . . .’’ (Citation omitted.)

iii

Defendant’s October 11, 2012 Motion for Contempt,Regarding Plaintiff’s Failure to Pay Alimony

and Child Support ObligationsUnder Original Orders

The third modified order that is a subject of thisappeal is the court’s consideration of a motion for con-tempt filed by the defendant on October 11, 2012, inwhich she alleged that the plaintiff had stopped payinghis alimony obligation of $200 per week and his childsupport obligation of $135 per week, even though theappeal of the orders did not stay them, per PracticeBook § 61-11 (b). In his objection to the motion, theplaintiff argued that this court’s reversal of the alimonyand child support orders terminated his obligation topay them. The court found that the plaintiff ‘‘admit[ted]that he stopped making the payments and offered noreal reason for that decision. Ironically, he paid theobligation for almost all of the time his appeal waspending, as is required by § 61-11 (b) of the PracticeBook and only stopped some thirteen weeks before theorder was vacated and remanded for a new hearing.’’The court therefore granted the motion and orderedthat the plaintiff pay $4355 to the defendant, represent-ing $2600 ($200 x 13 weeks) in unpaid alimony and$1755 ($135 x 13 weeks) in unpaid child support.

c

Plaintiff’s Appeal of Trial Court’s Judgment RenderedAfter Filing of Memorandum of Decision

The plaintiff on December 31, 2012, filed a motionfor clarification of the memorandum of decision and amotion for reargument and reconsideration on January2, 2013. The court entered an order on January 3, 2013,that addressed the plaintiff’s requests for clarification,and denied his motion for reargument and reconsidera-tion on the ground that ‘‘within the mosaic of its ordersit reviewed and considered all claims and evidence pre-sented. The decision reflects the court’s determinationof what comprised an equitable division of the assetsand liabilities of the parties.’’ The plaintiff subsequentlyfiled his appeal on February 14, 2013, from the judgmentrendered in the December 13, 2012 memorandum ofdecision and filed an amended appeal on February 28,2013, after the court issued a supplemental memoran-

dum of decision on February 7, 2013.

2

Relevant Motions Filed Before and After Trial Court’sDecember 13, 2012 Memorandum of Decision

The following motions filed before and after thecourt’s December 13, 2012 memorandum of decisionare also subjects of this appeal. On April 27, 2012, theplaintiff filed a motion for exclusive possession of themarital home. The court, Wolven, J., entered an orderon June 28, 2012, and ruled with respect to this motion:‘‘No action will be taken on this motion. This motionwas previously argued on [January 13, 2011] and denied.The decision was appealed by the plaintiff anduntouched by the Appellate Court. Moreover, the issueof the marital property will be fully relitigated in Middle-town on the retrial of the financial matters in this casescheduled for October 1-5, 2012. Therefore the hearingscheduled for July 5, 2012 will not go forward.’’ Theplaintiff filed a motion to reargue and reconsider thisorder on July 6, 2012, and the court denied it on July30, 2012. The plaintiff then filed a notice of intent toappeal on August 14, 2012.

On March 26, 2013, the plaintiff filed an emergencypostjudgment motion for order in which he requestedthat the court order the defendant to transfer certainfunds and assume certain mortgage payment obliga-tions in response to the issuance of a default and fore-closure notice regarding the marital home. The docketindicates that the court, Adelman, J., denied the motionon April 1, 2013, and the transcript for the hearing heldon that date indicates that the ground for the court’sruling was that the motion was moot.

On April 12, 2013, the plaintiff filed a request in whichhe asked the court (1) to consider on the papers twomotions that he filed on February 14, 2013, and (2) toissue a discretionary stay of the December 13, 2012financial orders in the event that it decided to hold ahearing before it decided the two motions. The firstFebruary 14, 2013 motion was a request for a stay ofthe plaintiff’s alimony and support obligations duringthe pendency of this appeal. The second February 14,2013 motion was a postjudgment motion for orderrequesting, inter alia, that the court offset the plaintiff’sweekly $100 alimony obligation by an equal weeklyamount corresponding to the overpayments and reim-bursements found by the court. The plaintiff acknowl-edged that the court had rescheduled the hearing forthe two motions several times in order to accommodateboth parties. The court entered an order on May 1, 2013,in which it denied both February 14, 2013 motions anddeclined to take action on the April 12, 2013 motion,which it deemed moot. The plaintiff on May 20, 2013,filed an amended appeal challenging the May 1, 2013order.

Finally, on May 1, 2013, the defendant filed a motionfor contempt alleging that the plaintiff had not compliedwith his obligation under the December 13, 2012 memo-randum of decision to pay $100 per week in periodicalimony. The plaintiff on May 20, 2013, then filed amotion for modification and a motion to stay the execu-tion of the judgment on the motion for contempt. Onthat date,10 the court entered an order in which it (1)found the plaintiff in contempt, (2) suspended his ali-mony obligation from the week of May 26, 2013, tothe week of June 24, 2013; (3) determined that thesuspended alimony payments would accrue and beadded to the alimony arrearage of $2100 after June 24,2013, for a total alimony arrearage of $2500; and (4)transferred the matter from the regional family trialdocket in Middletown back to the judicial district ofFairfield for resolution of the plaintiff’s motion for mod-ification11 and all future motions. The plaintiff on June7, 2013, filed an amended appeal challenging the May20, 2013 order and the court’s failure to decide hismotion for modification at the same time as the defen-dant’s motion for contempt. Additional facts and proce-dural history will be set forth as necessary.

II

LEGAL STANDARDS

A

Standard of Review

‘‘In fashioning its financial orders [in a domestic rela-tions matter], the court has broad discretion, and [j]udi-cial review of a trial court’s exercise of [this] broaddiscretion . . . is limited to the questions of whetherthe . . . court correctly applied the law and could rea-sonably have concluded as it did. . . . In making thosedeterminations, we allow every reasonable presump-tion . . . in favor of the correctness of [the trialcourt’s] action. . . . That standard of review reflectsthe sound policy that the trial court has the uniqueopportunity to view the parties and their testimony, andis therefore in the best position to assess all of thecircumstances surrounding a dissolution action, includ-ing such factors as the demeanor and the attitude ofthe parties. . . . We likewise note that [a]ppellatereview of a trial court’s findings of fact is governedby the clearly erroneous standard of review. The trialcourt’s findings are binding on this court unless theyare clearly erroneous in light of the evidence and thepleadings in the record as a whole. . . . A finding offact is clearly erroneous when there is no evidence inthe record to support it . . . or when although thereis evidence in the record to support it, the reviewingcourt on the entire evidence is left with the definite andfirm conviction that a mistake has been committed.’’(Citation omitted; internal quotation marks omitted.)Schoenborn v. Schoenborn, 144 Conn. App. 846, 856–57,

74 A.3d 482 (2013).

B

Self-Represented Litigants

Although the plaintiff was represented by an attorneyduring the remand hearings, he was self-representedduring several of the other trial court proceedings atissue, including the motions discussed in part I B 2 ofthis opinion, and currently is self-represented in thisappeal. ‘‘[I]t is the established policy of the Connecticutcourts to be solicitous of [self-represented] litigants andwhen it does not interfere with the rights of other partiesto construe the rules of practice liberally in favor ofthe [self-represented] party. . . . Nonetheless,[a]lthough we allow [self-represented] litigants somelatitude, the right of self-representation provides noattendant license not to comply with relevant rules ofprocedural and substantive law.’’ (Citation omitted;internal quotation marks omitted.) New Haven v.Bonner, 272 Conn. 489, 497–98, 863 A.2d 680 (2005).

III

PLAINTIFF’S CLAIMS

Again, we note that the plaintiff claims that the courtimproperly (1) awarded alimony to the defendant andnot to him; (2) denied his request for equitable financialrelief in his motion for modification, even though hehad met his burden of establishing a substantial changein circumstances; (3) granted the defendant’s October11, 2012 motion for contempt; (4) granted the defen-dant’s May 1, 2013 postjudgment motion for contempt;(5) calculated the reimbursement for stipulated sharedhousehold expenses owed to him by the defendant; (6)failed to calculate a pendente lite arrearage owed tohim by the defendant; (7) awarded $7500 in appellateattorney’s fees to the defendant; (8) entered financialorders that were inequitable to him and that demon-strated the court’s bias against him; and (9) failed tohear certain of his motions and denied others withoutconsideration of his due process rights. We now addresseach of the plaintiff’s claims in turn.

A

Claim One: Award of Alimony fromPlaintiff to Defendant

The plaintiff first claims that the court abused itsdiscretion in ordering him to pay alimony to the defen-dant and in not ordering the defendant to pay alimonyto him because the evidence demonstrated that she hada higher level of income, a lower level of debt, andbetter employment prospects at all times relevant tothe present matter. We are not persuaded. We addressonly the alimony orders pertaining to the time of thedissolution judgment in resolving this claim becausewe address the alimony orders pertaining to the timeafter the dissolution judgment in resolving the plaintiff’s

claim regarding his motion for modification, whichoverlaps with this claim. See part III B of this opinion.

‘‘We begin our analysis by noting that . . . the pur-pose of alimony [is] the obligation of support thatspouses assume toward each other by virtue of themarriage. . . . This court has stated that [a]limony isalways represented by money and is damages to com-pensate for loss of marital support and maintenance.. . . In other words, alimony represents the court’sfinding, measured in dollars, of the financial needs ofthe receiving spouse at the time of the dissolution. . . .

‘‘[General Statutes §] 46b-8212 governs awards of ali-mony. That section requires the trial court to considerthe length of the marriage, the causes for the . . . dis-solution of the marriage . . . the age, health, station,occupation, amount and sources of income, vocationalskills, employability, estate and needs of each of theparties. . . . In awarding alimony, [t]he court mustconsider all of these criteria. . . . It need not, however,make explicit reference to the statutory criteria thatit considered in making its decision or make expressfindings as to each statutory factor.’’ (Citation omitted;footnote added; internal quotation marks omitted.) Wie-gand v. Wiegand, 129 Conn. App. 526, 535–36, 21 A.3d489 (2011).

The present matter is similar to Gamble-Perugini v.Perugini, 112 Conn. App. 231, 237, 962 A.2d 192, cert.denied, 291 Conn. 915, 970 A.2d 727 (2009), in whichthis court affirmed a periodic alimony award to theplaintiff wife of $100 per week for ten years, even thoughthe defendant husband argued that she would earn sig-nificant income from her work as a real estate agentand from the rental properties that she received in thedistribution of the marital assets. The trial court found:‘‘The plaintiff earned $37,594 in 2006 and $14,700 in 2005in real estate commissions. Although the defendant hadnot . . . filed his 2006 tax return [at the time of trial],he reported an income of $67,025 for 2005.’’ Id., 233. Italso found that the share of the rental properties allo-cated to the plaintiff had a fair market value of$2,057,061. Id., 236. This court concluded: ‘‘Althoughthere is evidentiary support for the defendant’s claimthat the plaintiff received properties from which shewill earn rental income and that she also works asa real estate agent, testimony regarding the parties’marriage also revealed that, for most of the years theparties were together, the plaintiff was the primary care-taker for the children and that her earnings fromemployment were modest.’’ Id., 237.

In the present matter, even though the court foundthat ‘‘[b]oth parties had an average [weekly] grossincome in the $1300 to $1400 range’’ at the time of thedissolution judgment, it also found that ‘‘[t]he plaintiff,having been employed for a longer period of time duringthe marriage while the defendant was a fulltime mother,

had a much larger amount of deferred income assetsas of the original trial.’’ (Citation omitted.) The evidenceestablished that the defendant did not have fulltimepaid employment from 1993 to 2004. It also establishedthat, at the time of the dissolution judgment, the plaintiffhad $114,000 in his retirement accounts while the defen-dant had $13,600 in deferred income assets. The courtlabeled both as marital assets but did not subject theseassets to division or redistribution in fashioning thefinancial orders on remand in express accordance with,inter alia, § 46b-81, which governs property distributionawards in dissolution actions, and § 46b-82. As thiscourt concluded in Gamble-Perugini, ‘‘[u]nder all thecircumstances presented to’’ us in this matter, we con-clude that the trial court’s ‘‘order for the payment ofdurational alimony was not an abuse of discretion.’’Gamble-Perugini v. Perugini, supra, 112 Conn. App.237.

We also conclude that the court did not abuse itsdiscretion in declining to award alimony to the plaintiffat the time of the dissolution judgment.13 The circum-stances presented to the court do not rise to the levelof those that have prompted this court to label a failureto award alimony as an abuse of discretion. For exam-ple, in Kovalsick v. Kovalsick, 125 Conn. App. 265, 270–75, 7 A.3d 924 (2010), this court held that the trial courtabused its discretion in failing to award time limitedalimony to the plaintiff wife where (1) her historicalincome never exceeded $25,000, while the defendanthusband’s historical income was approximately$125,000 per year; (2) there was no evidence that shecould increase her earning capacity without additionaleducation; and (3) ‘‘there was evidence that the plaintiffwas not able to meet her obligations’’; id., 274; war-ranting the conclusion that ‘‘[i]t [was] reasonably fore-seeable that, if the court’s financial orders [were]allowed to stand and the plaintiff continue[d] to beresponsible for the entire debt but [was] unable eitherto increase her earning capacity or receive alimony ora portion of the marital property, she could well be indire financial straits.’’ Id., 274–75.

This court likewise held in Wiegand v. Wiegand,supra, 129 Conn. App. 539, that the trial court abusedits discretion in failing to award some form of alimonyto the plaintiff husband where, ‘‘[o]n the date of thedissolution hearing, the plaintiff had little or no income,while the defendant had a net income of approximately$889 weekly. The plaintiff was ordered to assume andto pay a substantial portion of the marital debt, despitehaving little or no income to pay that debt, and thecourt did not make any findings regarding his prospectsfor employment or his earning capacity. Because theparties did not have substantial personal assets, it rea-sonably is foreseeable that if the plaintiff complied withthe court’s orders, he quickly would become destitute,to the extent that he was not already destitute.’’

The court in the present matter found that the plain-tiff’s ‘‘consulting business has been fairly successful’’and that his book, published in 2008, ‘‘enjoyed somesuccess and boosted his income in that year and thenext.’’ It did not find that there was any significantdisparity between the plaintiff’s income and the defen-dant’s income at the time of the dissolution judgment.It awarded no child support, and it ordered the partiesto share the minor children’s expenses equally and thehousehold expenses in the 60/40 percent ratio providedby the modified stipulation. It further ordered that theparties retain both their respective assets and liabilities,with the exception of the balances on the defendant’sAmerican Express and Chase credit cards. The courtordered that the parties jointly pay these balances withtheir respective net proceeds from the sale of the mari-tal home. Given the court’s findings regarding the plain-tiff’s career and income, and its orders regarding childsupport and the division of assets and liabilities, weare unable to conclude that the present matter is analo-gous to Kovalsick and Wiegand, and that the courtabused its discretion in awarding alimony to the defen-dant at the time of the dissolution judgment and notawarding the same to the plaintiff. We therefore rejectthe plaintiff’s claim.

B

Claim Two: Plaintiff’s October 11, 2012Motion for Modification

The plaintiff next claims that the court abused itsdiscretion because it failed to grant him equitable finan-cial relief in accordance with his requests in his October11, 2012 motion for modification, even though it deter-mined that ‘‘both parties have easily met their respectiveburdens of showing a substantial change in circum-stances.’’ We are not persuaded.

‘‘[General Statutes §] 46b-86 governs the modificationor termination of an alimony or support order after thedate of a dissolution judgment. When, as in this case,the disputed issue is alimony [or child support], theapplicable provision of the statute is § 46b-86 (a),14

which provides that a final order for alimony may bemodified by the trial court upon a showing of a substan-tial change in the circumstances of either party. . . .Under that statutory provision, the party seeking themodification bears the burden of demonstrating thatsuch a change has occurred. . . .

‘‘Once a trial court determines that there has been asubstantial change in the financial circumstances ofone of the parties, the same criteria that determine aninitial award of alimony and support are relevant to thequestion of modification. . . . The power of the trialcourt to modify the existing order does not, however,include the power to retry issues already decided . . .or to allow the parties to use a motion to modify as an

appeal. . . . Rather, the trial court’s discretionincludes only the power to adapt the order to somedistinct and definite change in the circumstances orconditions of the parties.’’ (Citations omitted; footnotealtered; internal quotation marks omitted.) Olson v.Mohammadu, 310 Conn. 665, 671–72, 81 A.3d 215(2013).

Regarding the motions for modification filed by bothparties, the court found the following substantialchanges in circumstances that are relevant to this claim.After ‘‘the original trial, [the defendant’s] income . . .fluctuated from a low of less than $58,000 in 2010 to ahigh of over $82,000 in 2011, not including her . . .unemployment [in 2012].’’ The plaintiff’s ‘‘income . . .decreased somewhat over the years with the aging ofhis book and the resulting lower sales.’’ Specifically,‘‘[t]he evidence presented [was] that his gross incomefor 2011 was under $38,000 and that his income [asof October, 2012, was] projected to be approximately$60,000 . . . .’’ The court was not persuaded by theplaintiff’s argument that the 2011 amendment to Gen-eral Statutes § 12-407,15 which ‘‘obligates out-of-stateInternet retailers to collect Connecticut sales tax ininstances where they pay commissions to their indepen-dent contractors or other representatives who resideand do business in the state . . . had a direct and nega-tive impact on his income.’’ It found: ‘‘Although theremay have been some immediate reduction, his reportedincome does not support this claim in the long term.’’

Furthermore, the plaintiff was ordered to vacate themarital home in December, 2009, but did not do so untilMay, 2010. The elder daughter did not participate in theshared custody arrangements after May, 2010, althoughthe younger daughter did. In response to this changein circumstances, the court ordered the plaintiff to paychild support of $148 per week for the elder daughter,to account for the period of time between May, 2010,and when she reached the age of majority. See footnote1 of this opinion.

The court additionally found that the plaintiff hadoverpaid (1) his alimony obligation, as described in partI B 1 b i of this opinion; (2) his obligation under the2008 stipulation, as described in part I B 1 b ii of thisopinion; and (3) his child support obligation in theamount of $11,967, given the reversal of the originalorder and the child support order on remand.

As previously noted in part I B 1 b of this opinion,the plaintiff requested in relevant part that the courtmodify the orders entered at the time of the dissolutionjudgment by ordering the defendant to (1) reimburseall of his alimony and child support payments, retroac-tive to September 14, 2009;16 (2) pay him alimony, alsoretroactive to September 14, 2009; and (3) equally sharethe mortgage and utility payments for the marital homefrom September 14, 2009, to May 18, 2010, and the

mortgage payments and his rent payments thereafter.We begin our resolution of the claim by noting that themodified financial orders include reimbursements fromthe defendant to the plaintiff for his overpayment ofchild support, alimony, and stipulated shared householdexpenses, as well as for one half of a property insurancereimbursement check received by the defendant. Theseorders are contrary to the plaintiff’s position that hereceived ‘‘no equitable financial relief . . . .’’

We also are not persuaded by the plaintiff’s positionthat we should analogize this matter to those mattersin which our Supreme Court and this court have heldalimony awards to be inequitable and therefore anabuse of discretion. See, e.g., Greco v. Greco, 275 Conn.348, 361, 880 A.2d 872 (2005) (reversing, inter alia, ali-mony award of $710 per week where ‘‘[t]he defendant’sannual salary of $73,840, reduced by $36,920 per year foralimony payments, $12,480 per year for life insurancepremiums, $5972.16 per year for health insurance premi-ums, and $20,000 per year in attorney’s fees, result[ed]in an annual gross income deficit of $1532.16 per year’’and also observing that ‘‘[i]f the defendant’s net income,which he reported to be $53,872 per year, is correct,the payment of alimony and insurance premiums aloneleave the defendant with an annual net income deficitof $1500.16’’); Pellow v. Pellow, 113 Conn. App. 122,124, 128–30, 964 A.2d 1252 (2009) (periodic alimonyaward of $4500 per month, which totaled more than$70,000 per year, was abuse of discretion where it wouldconsume more than 90 percent of obligor’s grossincome, which trial court found to be $78,796); Clearyv. Cleary, 103 Conn. App. 798, 803–807, 930 A.2d 811(2007) (reversing alimony award of $1000 per weekwhere evidence provided that defendant’s income con-sisted of $109 per week in disability; $38,098 listed onjoint income tax return as ‘‘other income’’ attributedto gambling winnings, subject to $28,100 attributed toreceipted gambling losses; pension benefits of $173,000and retirement benefits of $1700 per week, half of whichcourt awarded to plaintiff; other assets deemed ‘‘rela-tively insignificant’’ by court; and potential consultingwork, specifics of which, numerical or otherwise, werenot established with evidence).

We note the plaintiff’s allegations of financial hard-ship in his arguments and briefs to this court.17 Nonethe-less, our review of the court’s modified financial orders‘‘is limited to determining (1) whether the . . . courtcorrectly applied the law and (2) whether the . . .court could reasonably have concluded as it did. . . .This court may not substitute its own opinion for thefactual findings of the trial court.’’ (Internal quotationmarks omitted.) Panganiban v. Panganiban, 54 Conn.App. 634, 642, 736 A.2d 190, cert. denied, 251 Conn. 920,742 A.2d 359 (1999). We further note the principle that‘‘ ‘inability to pay’ does not automatically entitle a partyto a decrease of an alimony order. It must be excusable

and not brought about by the [obligor’s] own fault.’’Sanchione v. Sanchione, 173 Conn. 397, 407, 378 A.2d522 (1977); see also Gleason v. Gleason, 16 Conn. App.134, 137, 546 A.2d 966 (1988); cf. Berry v. Berry, 88Conn. App. 674, 685, 870 A.2d 1161 (2005) (‘‘loss ofemployment does not warrant alimony modificationunless the moving party also proves that her earningcapacity has changed substantially’’). We do not notethis principle for the purpose of addressing the issueof fault, which is not before us. Instead, we note it forthe purpose of demonstrating that a trial court taskedwith modifying a financial order in a domestic relationsmatter must consider any allegation of financial hard-ship in the context of the facts before it and the criteriaset forth in § 46b-82. See, e.g., O’Donnell v. Bozzuti,148 Conn. App. 80, 87–88, 84 A.3d 479 (2014).

The court in the present matter modified the financialorders in response to not only the substantial changein the plaintiff’s circumstances but also the substantialchange in the defendant’s circumstances, most promi-nent of which was her loss of employment at the begin-ning of 2012. Furthermore, during the three yearsbetween the dissolution judgment and the remand hear-ings, the court found that the plaintiff had earned moreincome in 2010 and 2012, while the defendant hadearned more income in 2009 and 2011. See part I B 1of this opinion. These findings prompted the court tomake the additional finding that ‘‘the earning capacitiesof the parties are remarkably close.’’ Given these find-ings, along with the court’s findings pertaining to bothparties’ overall living situations between 2009 and 2012,its orders that the defendant reimburse the plaintiff foroverpayments, and our careful review of the record,we are unable to conclude that the court abused itsdiscretion by failing to modify the alimony orders inthe manner requested by the plaintiff. We also deter-mine, for the reasons more fully stated in part III D ofthis opinion, that the court did not abuse its discretionin modifying the financial orders with respect to theparties’ obligations for shared household expensesunder the 2008 stipulation. We accordingly reject theplaintiff’s claim.

C

Claim Three: Defendant’s October 11, 2012Motion for Contempt

Claim Four: Defendant’s May 1, 2013Motion for Contempt

We next address the plaintiff’s two claims regardingmotions for contempt filed by the defendant andgranted by the court because they are governed by thesame legal principles. The plaintiff claims that the courtimproperly granted the defendant’s October 11, 2012motion for contempt regarding his nonpayment of ali-mony and child support under the original financialorders because this court vacated those orders in LynchI on April 24, 2012, and the trial court could not havefound simultaneously that he owed alimony and childsupport payments to the defendant and that the defen-dant owed reimbursements to him for alimony and child

support overpayments. The plaintiff also claims thatthe court improperly granted the defendant’s May 1,2013 motion for contempt regarding his nonpayment ofalimony under the financial orders fashioned on remandbecause General Statutes § 46b-8 required the court tohear his concurrently filed motion for modification atthe same time, the court abused its discretion by findinghim in wilful contempt, and again, the court could nothave found that he owed alimony to the defendantwhere it previously had found that the defendant oweda reimbursement to him for alimony overpayments.18

We are not persuaded by either claim.

‘‘A finding of contempt is a question of fact, and ourstandard of review is to determine whether the courtabused its discretion in [finding] that the actions orinactions of the [alleged contemnor] were in contemptof a court order. . . . [T]he credibility of witnesses,the findings of fact and the drawing of inferences areall within the province of the trier of fact. . . . Wereview the findings to determine whether they couldlegally and reasonably be found, thereby establishingthat the trial court could reasonably have concluded asit did.’’ (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Tow v. Tow,142 Conn. App. 45, 48, 64 A.3d 128 (2013).

We begin our analysis by rejecting the plaintiff’s argu-ment that the court could not reasonably have foundhim in contempt of his support obligations under theoriginal financial orders on October 11, 2012, and themodified financial orders on May 1, 2013, because it alsohad found that the defendant owed a reimbursementto him for support overpayments. The essence of theplaintiff’s argument is that he was entitled to offset hisaccrued obligations under both series of court orders byhis overpayments. This court has rejected that position,however, in McRae v. McRae, 139 Conn. App. 75, 86, 54A.3d 1049 (2012): ‘‘Retroactive modifications of supportorders are ordinarily impermissible. . . . With theexception of the period following service of a motionfor modification, [n]o order for periodic payment ofpermanent alimony or support may be subject to retro-active modification . . . . The power of the trial courtto modify orders of support and alimony is . . . a crea-ture of statute. General Statutes § 46b-86. Nothing inour statute regarding modification of alimony and sup-port can be construed as authorizing retroactive modifi-cation. Such a construction has been expresslydisavowed by our Supreme Court. . . . Simply stated,alimony already accrued may not be modified.’’ (Cita-tions omitted; emphasis added; internal quotationmarks omitted.) If the court had denied the motionsfor contempt on the ground that the plaintiff couldoffset the past due amounts that he owed by theamounts that he overpaid, it would have subjected theoperative court orders to retroactive modification inviolation of § 46b-86 (a) and McRae.19

1

October 11, 2012 Motion for Contempt

We now address each of the claims in turn. Withrespect to the October 11, 2012 motion for contempt—see part I B 1 b iii of this opinion—the plaintiff doesnot challenge the finding that he failed to make alimony

and child support payments under the original financialorders from the week of January 23, 2012, to the weekof April 16, 2012. His own alimony and child supportpayment detail submitted during the remand hearingsdocuments that he made only three alimony and childsupport payments under the original financial ordersin 2012, during the first three weeks of January. Further-more, his challenge to the finding of wilful contemptis limited to his argument that he could offset his unpaidsupport obligations by his overpayments of past supportobligations, which we reject for the aforementionedreasons. The plaintiff instead argues that the courtimproperly granted the motion because the motionpostdated Lynch I by approximately six months andtherefore sought to enforce vacated orders.

We reject the plaintiff’s position that he had no obliga-tion from the week of January 23 to the week of April16, 2012, to pay alimony and child support under courtorders that this court vacated on April 24, 2012, simplybecause the defendant sought to hold him in contemptof those orders after that date. The date when the defen-dant filed her motion for contempt had no bearing onhis obligations under the original financial orders, for‘‘ ‘the rule [is] that [a]n order of the court must beobeyed until it has been modified or successfully chal-lenged.’ . . . Sablosky v. Sablosky, 258 Conn. 713, 719,784 A.2d 890 (2001). Indeed, this court and our SupremeCourt previously have determined that a party’s deci-sion to use self-help instead of judicial resources tomodify an obligation under a judgment in a family mat-ter could be a basis for granting a motion for contemptagainst that party . . . . Id., 720 . . . accord Eldridgev. Eldridge, 244 Conn. 523, 529–32, 710 A.2d 757 (1998)(plaintiff stopped paying alimony and child supportafter he learned defendant had not told him that shehad been earning more than $25,000 per year for sevenyears, because plaintiff believed he had overpaid underagreement provision with formula by which plaintiffcould reduce such payments when defendant earnedat least $25,000 per year); Behrns v. Behrns, 80 Conn.App. 286, 288–92, 835 A.2d 68 (2003) (defendant stoppedpaying alimony and child support under belief that hislack of employment allowed him to do so, pursuant tomathematical formula in agreement that provided foradjustments of such payments in accordance withchanges in cost of living as measured by consumer priceindex or his salary and wages), cert. denied, 267 Conn.914, 840 A.2d 1173 (2004).’’ (Citation omitted.) McKeonv. Lennon, 147 Conn. App. 366, 377–78, 83 A.3d 639(2013).

2

May 1, 2013 Motion for Contempt

We likewise are not persuaded by the plaintiff’s claimwith respect to the May 1, 2013 motion for contempt.See part I B 2 of this opinion. Again, the plaintiff has notchallenged the finding that he failed to make alimonypayments under the modified financial orders fromDecember 13, 2012, to May 1, 2013. He has challengedthe court’s finding of wilful contempt during the May20, 2013 hearing held on the motion, which was basedupon the court’s observation that, despite his testimonyregarding his lack of financial resources to pay $100

per week in periodic alimony, he had ‘‘the ability to pay$97 a week towards this appeal . . . .’’ The plaintiffhas not cited any authority, however, for his positionthat the court abused its discretion by disregarding hisclaimed right to pursue this appeal in making its wilfulcontempt finding. In contrast, this court has upheld awilful contempt finding despite the alimony obligor’sposition that ‘‘his dearth of financial resources’’ ren-dered him ‘‘simply unable to comply with the orders ofthe court’’; Brody v. Brody, 145 Conn. App. 654, 663,77 A.3d 156 (2013); where ‘‘the evidence conclusivelydemonstrated that [the obligor] . . . paid many nones-sential personal expenses ahead of his court-orderedobligations . . . .’’ (Internal quotation marks omitted.)Id., 663–64. The evidence in the present matter similarlyestablishes that the plaintiff paid litigation expenses ina weekly amount equal to his unpaid court-orderedalimony obligations. The plaintiff did not demonstratethat the court abused its discretion by finding him inwilful contempt for his failure or refusal to comply withthe alimony order.

The plaintiff largely bases his claim on what he per-ceives as the court’s noncompliance with General Stat-utes § 46b-8,20 which provided that ‘‘[w]henever amotion for modification of an order for support andalimony is made to the superior court by a moving partyagainst whom a motion for contempt for noncompli-ance with such order is pending, the court shall acceptsuch motion and hear both motions concurrently.’’ Theplaintiff argues that the court abused its discretionbecause it did not hear the defendant’s May 1, 2013motion for contempt and his May 20, 2013 motion formodification at the same time, even though § 46b-8required it to do so. The plaintiff’s statutory interpreta-tion ignores our Supreme Court’s determination in Bry-ant v. Bryant, 228 Conn. 630, 637 A.2d 1111 (1994), thatthe statute ‘‘merely [sets] forth a procedure whereby thetrial court [could] consider a motion for modificationjointly with a motion for contempt when doing so would[have been] in the interests of the orderly and efficientresolution of the two motions’’; id., 639; and that it was‘‘not persuaded that the legislature intended to requirea joint hearing.’’ Id., 640. We accordingly reject theplaintiff’s claim, which is governed and resolved by thisstatutory interpretation.

D

Claim Five: Calculation of ReimbursementOwed to Plaintiff by Defendant

Claim Six: Calculation of Pendente Lite ArrearageOwed to Plaintiff by Defendant

We consider these claims together because they bothchallenge the court’s factual findings. First, the plaintiffclaims that the court clearly erred in calculating theamount of the reimbursement owed to him by the defen-dant, which he argues was too low due to how thecourt credited her for her payments of certain types ofexpenses without also crediting him for his paymentsof these types of expenses. The plaintiff further claimsthat the court clearly erred in finding that there wasno pendente lite arrearage owed under the 2008 stipula-tion for the period of time covered by his January 29,

2009 motion for contempt because the defendant hadconceded the arrearage, and this court in Lynch I hadordered its calculation and incorporation into the finan-cial orders on remand. We are not persuaded byeither claim.

We again note that ‘‘[i]t is within the province of thetrial court to find facts and draw proper inferences fromthe evidence presented. . . . [W]here the factual basisof the court’s decision is challenged, we must determinewhether the facts set out in the memorandum of deci-sion are supported by the evidence or whether, in lightof the evidence and the pleadings in the whole record,these facts are clearly erroneous.’’ (Internal quotationmarks omitted.) Guarascio v. Guarascio, 105 Conn.App. 418, 421, 937 A.2d 1267 (2008).

1

Calculation of Reimbursement for Paymentsof Shared Stipulated Household Expenses

We first resolve the plaintiff’s claim regarding thecalculation of the reimbursement owed to him for hispayment of stipulated shared household expenses. Seepart I B 1 b ii of this opinion. The plaintiff does notclaim that the calculation lacked evidentiary supportor that the court misunderstood the evidence on whichit relied in making the calculation. The plaintiff furtherdoes not challenge the ‘‘compromise figure’’ that thecourt found to represent the defendant’s payment ofshared expenses, which it subtracted from the amountthat it found to represent his payment of sharedexpenses in order to arrive at the reimbursement thatit ordered her to pay to him. As the court noted in itsmemorandum of decision, the plaintiff conceded in hisproposed findings of fact and orders that the defendant‘‘incurred at least $59,144 in what should be sharedexpenses . . . .’’ The plaintiff’s claim instead is thatthe conceded amount representing the defendant’s pay-ment of shared stipulated household expenses includedpayments for auto insurance premiums, the children’sexpenses, and the children’s unreimbursed medicalexpenses, but the amount representing his payment ofstipulated shared household expenses improperly failedto include his payments for these categories ofexpenses, which led to an erroneously low calculationof the reimbursement owed to him. We are not per-suaded. The plaintiff’s claim asks us to reexamine andreweigh the evidence, which this court is prohibitedfrom doing, for ‘‘[t]he trier of facts [is] free to acceptor reject any portion of the evidence of either party.’’Kinney v. Kinney, 5 Conn. App. 484, 486, 500 A.2d 569(1985), cert. denied, 199 Conn. 804, 506 A.2d 146, cert.denied, 479 U.S. 818, 107 S. Ct. 78, 93 L. Ed. 2d 33 (1986).There is nothing in the plaintiff’s claim or the record thatwould warrant a deviation from this well establishedprinciple in this matter.

Furthermore, in making this claim, the plaintiffdirects our attention to his January 2, 2013 motion toreargue and reconsider, which contains a detailed alter-native calculation that was based on evidence that wasbefore the court during the remand hearings. The courtdenied the motion, which the plaintiff now argues wasan abuse of discretion. We disagree. ‘‘The standard of

review for a court’s denial of a motion to reargue isabuse of discretion. . . . [T]he purpose of a reargu-ment is . . . to demonstrate to the court that there issome decision or some principle of law which wouldhave a controlling effect, and which has been over-looked, or that there has been a misapprehension offacts. . . . It also may be used to address . . . claimsof law that the [movant] claimed were not addressedby the court. . . . [A] motion to reargue [however] isnot to be used as an opportunity to have a second biteof the apple . . . .’’ (Citations omitted; internal quota-tion marks omitted.) Liberti v. Liberti, 132 Conn. App.869, 874, 37 A.3d 166 (2012). The plaintiff’s motion didnot ask the court to consider an overlooked legalauthority or claim or to reconsider a misapprehendedfact. It instead asked the court to reevaluate the factsthat had been before it during the remand hearings inorder to recalculate the reimbursement owed to theplaintiff in a higher amount. This is a clear example ofan attempt to have the proverbial ‘‘ ‘second bite of theapple’ ’’; id.; and we reject it, as we reject this claim.

2

Calculation of Pendente Lite Arrearage

We similarly are not persuaded by the plaintiff’s claimthat the court clearly erred in failing to find a pendentelite arrearage owed to him by the defendant for hispayments of stipulated shared household expensesfrom December 11, 2008, to September 14, 2009. Seepart I B 1 a i of this opinion. This court’s order in LynchI regarding the pendente lite arrearage was premisedon the plaintiff’s entitlement to the arrearage, whichthis court treated as an undisputed fact due to thedefendant’s concession during the dissolution proceed-ings. Lynch v. Lynch, supra, 135 Conn. App. 49–51.During the remand hearings, the parties presented thecourt with evidence in which they documented theirrespective payments of stipulated shared householdexpenses from December 11, 2008, to September 14,2009. Of particular note are the plaintiff’s multipagesummary of the claimed pendente lite arrearage, theplaintiff’s schedule of the defendant’s partial reimburse-ment payments during the pendente lite period, and thedefendant’s list of payments made for stipulated sharedhousehold expenses during the pendente lite period.

We have reviewed this evidence and the parties’ testi-mony during the remand hearings, and we concludethat the court did not clearly err in finding that ‘‘[t]heevidence was not convincing that money was owed ineither direction.’’ We note, as did the plaintiff, thecourt’s inconsistent disposition of the issue—first‘‘declin[ing] to rule further on’’ it and then denying theunderlying motion for contempt—and its reference toa ‘‘de minimis amount’’ that could be owed to the plain-tiff if the evidence were construed in a certain way, andwe agree with the plaintiff that they are problematic,insofar that they were perhaps inartful. Nonetheless,

they do not necessitate a conclusion on our part thatthe court clearly erred and violated this court’s orderin Lynch I. Accordingly, we reject the plaintiff’s claim.

E

Claim Seven: Award of Attorney’s Feesfrom Plaintiff to Defendant

The plaintiff claims that the court erred because itawarded $7500 in appellate attorney’s fees to the defen-dant when refashioning the financial orders on remand,even though the record does not support the conclusionthat she lacked sufficient liquid assets to pay the feesor that a failure to award such fees would underminethe other financial orders. We are not persuaded.

‘‘When making an order for the payment of attorney’sfees, the court must consider factors that are essentiallythe same as those that must be considered when award-ing alimony. . . . [General Statutes §] 46b-62 governsthe award of attorney’s fees in dissolution proceedingsand provides that the court may order either spouse. . . to pay the reasonable attorney’s fees of the otherin accordance with their respective financial abilitiesand the criteria set forth in [§] 46b-82.’’ (Citation omit-ted; internal quotation marks omitted.) Pacchiana v.McAree, 94 Conn. App. 61, 70, 891 A.2d 86, cert. denied,278 Conn. 922, 901 A.2d 1221 (2006). ‘‘This reasonable-ness requirement balances the needs of the obligeespouse with the obligor spouse’s right to be protectedfrom excessive fee awards.’’ (Internal quotation marksomitted.) Panganiban v. Panganiban, supra, 54 Conn.App. 644.

‘‘Courts ordinarily award counsel fees in divorcecases so that a party . . . may not be deprived of [hisor] her rights because of lack of funds. . . . Where,because of other orders, both parties are financiallyable to pay their own counsel fees they should be per-mitted to do so. . . . An exception to the rule . . . isthat an award of attorney’s fees is justified even whereboth parties are financially able to pay their own feesif the failure to make an award would undermine itsprior financial orders . . . . Whether to allow counselfees [under §§ 46b-62 and 46b-82], and if so in whatamount, calls for the exercise of judicial discretion.. . . An abuse of discretion in granting counsel feeswill be found only if [an appellate court] determinesthat the trial court could not reasonably have concludedas it did.’’ (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Pacchi-ana v. McAree, supra, 94 Conn. App. 70–71.

The court’s order that the plaintiff pay appellate attor-ney’s fees to the defendant was one of the financialorders that the court refashioned on remand in accor-dance with the facts as they were at the time of thedissolution judgment. Our determination that the ali-mony award was not an abuse of discretion thereforeprompts us to reach the same conclusion regarding the

appellate attorney’s fees award. Furthermore, we alsoare not persuaded by the plaintiff’s argument that theaward was improper for the additional reason that thedefendant did not submit any evidence or proposedfinding of fact or order in support of the award. Amongthe defendant’s proposed orders was that the plaintiff‘‘be responsible for [her] legal fees . . . in the totalamount of $26,000 pursuant to the [a]ffidavit filed bycounsel,’’ which she also filed with the court. For theforegoing reasons, we deem the award of appellateattorney’s fees to the defendant to have been a properexercise of the court’s discretion and supported by theevidence, and we reject the plaintiff’s claim.

F

Claim Eight: Judicial Bias

The plaintiff labels this claim as one that ‘‘[t]he . . .court erred in its overall orders which are inequitable,unjust, discriminatory, and punitive toward’’ him, buta reasonable interpretation of his briefs leads to theconclusion that the plaintiff’s claim is one of judicialbias. Furthermore, both parties characterized this claimin this fashion during oral argument before this court.We note, as the defendant did during oral argumentbefore this court, that this appeal is the first time thatthe plaintiff has made this claim. The plaintiff has notchallenged this assertion, and our review of the recorddemonstrates that he did not ‘‘preserve his claim ofjudicial bias in accordance with Practice Book § 1-23’’by moving to disqualify Judge Adelman at any timeduring the trial court proceedings. Wiegand v. Wiegand,supra, 129 Conn. App. 533. ‘‘Nevertheless, becauseclaims of judicial bias strike at the very core of judicialintegrity and implicate the basic concepts of a fair trial,we will review the plaintiff’s claim.’’ Id.

‘‘No more elementary statement concerning the judi-ciary can be made than that the conduct of the trialjudge must be characterized by the highest degree ofimpartiality. If he departs from this standard, he castsserious reflection upon the system of which he is apart. . . . In whatever he does, however, the trial judgeshould be cautious and circumspect in his language andconduct. . . . A judge should be scrupulous to refrainfrom hearing matters which he feels he cannot approachin the utmost spirit of fairness and to avoid the appear-ance of prejudice as regards either the parties or theissues before him. . . . A judge, trying the cause with-out a jury, should be careful to refrain from any state-ment or attitude which would tend to deny [a party] afair trial. . . . It is his responsibility to have the trialconducted in a manner which approaches an atmo-sphere of perfect impartiality which is so much to bedesired in a judicial proceeding.’’ (Internal quotationmarks omitted.) Gleason v. Smolinski, 149 Conn. App.283, 296, 88 A.3d 589, cert. granted on other grounds,312 Conn. 920, 94 A.3d 1201 (2014).

The plaintiff makes the broad, sweeping argumentthat ‘‘the record demonstrates bias’’ and that ‘‘[w]hileunknown if [the] bias is tied to [his] gender (awardstraditionally paid by husband to wife), his previousgrievance filings, his history as a pro se litigant, hispending malpractice counterclaim against former trialcounsel, or some combination thereof, it is not reason-able to summarily dismiss these claims as mere coinci-dence.’’ He supports this assertion of Judge Adelman’sgender bias and bias against litigants for their past litiga-tion conduct and self-represented status with equallybroad, sweeping references to what he characterizesas the inequitable nature of the financial orders and tocertain rulings, specifically, credibility determinations,that were favorable to the defendant. We already haverejected the plaintiff’s characterization of the financialorders in parts III A and B of this opinion, in which weconcluded that the court did not abuse its discretionin declining to award alimony to the plaintiff and reducehis alimony obligations to the defendant.

With respect to the plaintiff’s reliance on credibilitydeterminations and other court rulings that were favor-able to the defendant, we note that ‘‘[a]dverse rulingsthemselves do not constitute evidence of bias. . . .Obviously, if a ruling against a party could be used asan indicia of bias, at least half of the time, every courtwould be guilty of being biased against one of twoparties. Moreover, the fact that a trial court rulesadversely to a litigant, even if some of these rulingswere determined on appeal to have been erroneous,[still] does not demonstrate personal bias.’’ (Internalquotation marks omitted.) Burns v. Quinnipiac Uni-versity, 120 Conn. App. 311, 317, 991 A.2d 666, cert.denied, 297 Conn. 906, 995 A.2d 634 (2010). As did thiscourt in Burns, we conclude that ‘‘[t]he fact that theplaintiff strongly disagrees with the substance of thecourt’s rulings does not make those rulings evidenceof bias. In the present case, the plaintiff’s argument ofbias is completely unsubstantiated by the trial record.’’21

Id. We thus reject the plaintiff’s claim.

‘‘Because the plaintiff’s judicial misconduct claimsare unsupported, we take the time to reiterate that [a]nyclaim of judicial bias is taken as an attack on the fairnessof the judicial process. . . . [We] remind [litigants]once again that claims of judicial bias are serious mat-ters that should not be raised for the mere purpose ofseeking a reversal of a judgment.’’ (Internal quotationmarks omitted.) Bennett v. Chenault, 147 Conn. App.198, 205, 81 A.3d 1184 (2013).

G

Claim Nine: Whether Court Erred in Failing to HearCertain of Plaintiff’s Motions and Denying

Others without Consideration ofPlaintiff’s Due Process Rights

Finally, the plaintiff claims that the court’s failure tohold hearings and issue decisions for each of themotions discussed in part I B 2 of this opinion requiresreversal. We are not persuaded.

We begin by noting that part of the plaintiff’s claimis that the court declined to hear and decide the motionsat issue without consideration of his due process rights.The plaintiff’s due process argument consists of a hand-ful of passing references to due process in his initialbrief only: the caption of the claim; references to thefifth and fourteenth amendments to the United Statesconstitution in the table of authorities cited; and a onesentence contention without analysis or supportingcitations that the court’s denial of his request to callthe defendant as a witness during a motion hearing was‘‘a violation of [his] procedural due process rights.’’‘‘[A]ssignments of error which are merely mentionedbut not briefed beyond a statement of the claim willbe deemed abandoned and will not be reviewed by thiscourt.’’ (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Wendt v.Wendt, 59 Conn. App. 656, 690, 757 A.2d 1225, cert.denied, 255 Conn. 918, 763 A.2d 1044 (2000). We accord-ingly will not address this part of the plaintiff’s claimbecause he has abandoned it through inadequatebriefing.

In making this claim, the plaintiff cites repeatedly toAhneman v. Ahneman, 243 Conn. 471, 482, 706 A.2d960 (1997), and Ramin v. Ramin, 281 Conn. 324, 330,915 A.2d 790 (2007), for the proposition that a trialcourt abuses its discretion when it refuses to considera party’s motions in a dissolution matter. Those cases,however, are distinguishable. In both of those cases,the refusal by the trial court to consider the motionsat issue was a wholesale refusal to address the motionsin any fashion. In Ahneman v. Ahneman, supra, 475–76,the court refused on the record to consider any motionsconcerning financial issues filed by the defendant afterher appeal of its decision to grant a motion for modifica-tion filed by the plaintiff. Similarly, in Ramin v. Ramin,supra, 332–36, the court held a hearing for a motion forcontempt filed by the plaintiff, but it marked the motionas ‘‘ ‘off’ ’’; id., 336; after expressing its frustration overthe duration of the matter, insisting that the matterproceed to trial as scheduled, and consequently refusingon the record to consider the motion further duringthe hearing.

Our recitation of the procedural history pertainingto the motions at issue in part I B 2 of this opiniondemonstrates that the court not only considered butalso decided all of these motions or the issues that theyraised. The plaintiff nonetheless appears to argue thatthe court refused to consider these motions in violationof Ahneman and Ramin because it did not hold discretehearings and issue discrete decisions for each of themin sufficiently expeditious fashion. We decline to adopt

the plaintiff’s position and label the court’s actions withrespect to the motions, each of which was heard anddecided fully, as an abuse of its broad discretion.

The judgment is affirmed.

In this opinion the other judges concurred.* The listing of judges reflects their seniority status on this court as of

the date of oral argument.1 The elder daughter became eighteen years old in October, 2011, and the

younger daughter became eighteen years old in July, 2014. We need notdiscuss the trial court orders pertaining to child support or custody becausethey have not been challenged on appeal in either Lynch I or the presentappeal, except to the limited extent described in parts III B and C of thisopinion.

2 The docket lists the date for the judgment as September 15, 2009, butwe will use the date of September 14, 2009, instead, given the use of thatdate on the judgment itself, by this court previously, and by both parties inthe present appeal.

3 ‘‘The defendant’s motion referenced a paragraph of the stipulation . . .providing that the parties pay equally the following: ‘[M]ortgage includingreal estate taxes and homeowner’s insurance, all children’s expenses, allutilities, life, health and auto insurance premiums and groceries for thefamily. Each party shall pay their own auto expenses except for auto insur-ance. Parties must agree on children’s expenses. No liquor or wine is to beincluded in the groceries.’ ’’ Lynch v. Lynch, supra, 135 Conn. App. 43 n.3.

4 We were not provided with information concerning the current statusof the marital home, e.g., whether it is still owned by the parties or whetherit has been sold.

5 We concluded that we ‘‘need not review the plaintiff’s claims challengingthe other financial orders rendered in the dissolution judgment based onour partial reversal of that judgment and our remand to the trial court fornew financial orders.’’ (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Lynch v. Lynch,supra, 135 Conn. App. 54 n.12.

6 In outlining the facts and procedural history, the plaintiff states in afootnote: ‘‘The retroactive pendente lite modification should now be vacatedas it necessarily impacts the issue of an outstanding pendente lite arrearagewhich was specifically addressed on remand orders by the Appellate Courtin 2012.’’ We previously have held that an ‘‘assertion, raised in a footnotein [an] appellate brief without substantive discussion or citation of authori-ties,’’ is inadequately briefed for the purpose of appellate review. Fort Trum-bull Conservancy, LLC v. New London, 135 Conn. App. 167, 175, 43 A.3d679, cert. denied, 307 Conn. 905, 53 A.3d 220 (2012). The plaintiff’s passingreferences to the motion in other parts of his initial brief also are insufficientto raise the issue for the purpose of appellate review, given that they, too,are unaccompanied by analysis or citations to relevant authority.

7 Even though the court referred only to the parties’ respective grossincomes throughout its memorandum of decision, it clarified in its January3, 2013 order that it ‘‘used net income for all calculations as required.’’ Cf.Cleary v. Cleary, 103 Conn. App. 798, 801, 930 A.2d 811 (2007) (trial courtimproperly entered alimony orders on basis of gross income rather thannet income).

8 See the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985, 29U.S.C. §§ 1161 through 1168.

9 The court noted that these overpayments covered the entirety of thedefendant’s stipulated share of the mortgage and utility expenses at issue.

10 In his brief, the plaintiff refers to a May 20, 2013 hearing held on themotion for contempt and the motion to modify and cites to the transcriptthereof. See discussion in footnote 18 and part III C 2 of this opinion.

11 The parties established during oral argument to this court that thetrial court, Pinkus, J., decided the plaintiff’s motion for modification inJanuary, 2014.

12 General Statutes § 46b-82 (a) provides in relevant part: ‘‘At the time ofentering the decree, the Superior Court may order either of the parties topay alimony to the other, in addition to or in lieu of an award pursuant tosection 46b-81. In determining whether alimony shall be awarded, and theduration and amount of the award, the court shall hear the witnesses, ifany, of each party, except as provided in subsection (a) of section 46b-51,shall consider the length of the marriage, the causes for the annulment,dissolution of the marriage or legal separation, the age, health, station,

occupation, amount and sources of income, vocational skills, employability,estate and needs of each of the parties and the award, if any, which thecourt may make pursuant to section 46b-81 . . . .’’

13 ‘‘Our Supreme Court has held that if alimony is not awarded in a finaldissolution decree, it cannot be awarded in the future based on changedcircumstances. . . . Alimony is solely a creature of statute, and a court hasno authority to award it other than at the time of entering a dissolutiondecree.’’ (Citations omitted; emphasis in original; internal quotation marksomitted.) Fitzsimons v. Fitzsimons, 116 Conn. App. 449, 457, 975 A.2d729 (2009).

14 General Statutes § 46b-86 (a) provides in relevant part: ‘‘Unless and tothe extent that the decree precludes modification, any final order for theperiodic payment of permanent alimony or support . . . may, at any timethereafter, be continued, set aside, altered or modified by the court upona showing of a substantial change in the circumstances of either party . . . .If a court, after hearing, finds that a substantial change in circumstancesof either party has occurred, the court shall determine what modificationof alimony, if any, is appropriate, considering the criteria set forth in section46b-82.’’

15 See General Statutes § 12-407 (a) (12) (L) and (15) (A) (x).16 Even though the plaintiff also requested that the defendant reimburse

all of his child support payments, we do not discuss this part of the plaintiff’srequested relief in resolving this claim because the plaintiff does not addressit specifically in challenging the modified financial orders on appeal.

17 While we note the plaintiff’s allegations of expressed financial hardship,we are not persuaded by the plaintiff’s calculations of his weekly obligationsunder the modified financial orders as a means of demonstrating suchhardship under Greco and its progeny. The plaintiff asserts that ‘‘the refash-ioned orders are overwhelmingly burdensome and represent an abuse ofdiscretion; they are inequitable, unjust, discriminatory, and punitive againstthe [plaintiff]. Immediately obvious is [the plaintiff]’s obligation to pay hisrent ($453), half the mortgage ($594 / 2 = $297), and alimony of $100 weekly,to say nothing of his other very basic living expenses. This $850 weeklytotal represents 102 [percent] of [the plaintiff’s] net weekly income . . . .’’(Emphasis omitted.)

The plaintiff misinterprets the financial orders, however, because the onlyamounts from them that are relevant to his argument are the order of $100per week in alimony and $148 per week in child support, not relied on bythe plaintiff, however, to be paid for the elder daughter from when theplaintiff vacated the marital home in May, 2010, to when the elder daughterreached the age of majority in October, 2011. See footnote 1 of this opinion.

The order with respect to payment by each of the parties of one-half ofthe mortgage obligation relating to the marital premises was in effect onlyuntil the sale and transfer of the marital home, a matter at least in partunder the control of the parties. We already have noted that we have notreceived any information regarding the present status of the marital home.See footnote 4 of this opinion. Therefore, if we analyze the impact of onlythe alimony and child support orders—$248 per week—on the claimednet weekly income of the plaintiff—$833—the amount of those paymentsconsumed approximately 30 percent of the plaintiff’s net weekly income.For this reason, we conclude that this matter is readily distinguishable fromGreco and its progeny.

The modified financial orders, furthermore, appropriately do not addressthe plaintiff’s personal rent obligations, despite the plaintiff’s argument that‘‘since [the parties] were sharing expenses under the orders of the originaldecree pending the sale of the house, once he vacated the home his newrental and utilities costs should be shared along with the expenses of themarital home.’’ We conclude that the court did not abuse its discretion inomitting the plaintiff’s rent obligations from its calculation of the modifiedfinancial orders, especially given that the plaintiff has not cited any authorityfor his argument. In Greco and its progeny, this court and our SupremeCourt determined that financial orders were an abuse of discretion aftercomparing the payments required under them to the obligor’s net income.In none of these cases were the obligor’s claimed living expenses a factorin the court’s calculation.

18 The plaintiff also argues that the court improperly granted the defen-dant’s May 1, 2013 motion for contempt because of how it conducted theMay 20, 2013 hearing on the motion, specifically, its denial of his requeststo be represented by an attorney and to call the defendant as a witness.We reject both arguments. We reject the plaintiff’s argument regarding hisclaimed inability to call the defendant as a witness for the reasons more

fully stated in part III G of this opinion. We reject the plaintiff’s argumentregarding his claimed right to be represented by an attorney during thecontempt proceeding because he relies upon the well established principlethat ‘‘[t]he due process clause of the fourteenth amendment to the UnitedStates constitution guarantees the right to appointed counsel to any indigentcivil contemnor who might be incarcerated’’; (emphasis added) Emerick v.Emerick, 28 Conn. App. 794, 797, 613 A.2d 1351, cert. denied, 224 Conn.915, 617 A.2d 171 (1992); and the court here expressly stated that it was‘‘going to take the possibility of incarceration off the table because [it didnot] have an attorney to give [to the plaintiff].’’

19 For this reason, this matter is distinguishable from Tow v. Tow, supra,142 Conn. App. 47–48, on which the plaintiff relies in making his claim. Thiscourt held in Tow that the trial court properly denied the plaintiff wife’smotion for contempt alleging nonpayment of alimony and child supportwhere, during the period of time covered by the motion, the plaintiff hadaccess to a joint checking account into which the defendant husband depos-ited an amount that was ‘‘well in excess’’ of the defendant’s court-orderedsupport obligations. Id., 47. In the present matter, there is no temporaloverlap between the plaintiff’s overpayments and his noncompliance withhis court-ordered support obligations.

20 General Statutes § 46b-8 was repealed by No. 13-213, § 6, of the 2013Public Acts, effective October 1, 2013.

21 We observe that the record in fact contains multiple statements byJudge Adelman acknowledging the plaintiff’s credibility, his respectfulnessto the court, and the merit of the plaintiff’s claims.