Martinez v. Carretero

539 P.3d 565

Marianita R. MARTINEZ, Petitioner-Appellant,

v. Victorio CARRETERO, Respondent,andCarretonero Transportation, LLC; Carretonero Logistics, LLC; and Carretonero Transportation Services, Inc., Respondents.

Docket No. 49859

Supreme Court of Idaho, Boise, June 2023 Term.

Opinion Filed: November 29, 2023

Barton, Atkinson & Murdoch, P.C., Rexburg, for Appellant Marianita R. Martinez. Steven A. Atkinson submitted argument on the briefs.

Blaser Oleson & Lloyd, Chartered, Blackfoot, for Respondent Victorio Carretero. Jeromy W. Pharis submitted argument on the briefs.

BRODY, Justice.

By statute, Idaho recognizes common law marriages only if they were entered into by the parties before January 1, 1996. In the proceedings below, Marianita Martinez alleged that after she and Victorio Carretero divorced in April 1995, they subsequently entered into a common law marriage between their divorce in April 1995 and their move to California in November 1995. After the filing of cross-motions for summary judgment on the common law marriage issue, the magistrate court proceeded to hold an evidentiary hearing without ruling on the motions and without objection from either party. At the evidentiary hearing, the magistrate court excluded all evidence of the parties’ conduct on or after January 1, 1996, as being irrelevant to whether the parties had entered into a common law marriage prior to that date. This ruling resulted in the exclusion of, among other things, evidence of a life insurance application in which Carretero identified Martinez as his "wife" on January 10, 1996—two months after the parties left Idaho in November 1995. At the close of the hearing, the magistrate court concluded there was not sufficient evidence to show that the parties had consented to marry within the seven-month period prior to January 1, 1996. The magistrate court then dismissed Martinez's claim of a common law marriage, and on appellate review, the district court affirmed. We affirm in part, reverse in part, and remand.

I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

A. Factual Background

Martinez and Carretero were originally married in California in November 1989, and had their first child in 1992. Two years after that, in 1994, a family dispute arose, during which Martinez and Carretero separated, and Martinez filed a petition for divorce on September 14, 1994, in Power County, Idaho. After that filing, Martinez worked the potato harvest in Idaho, after which the parties reconciled, and began living together again in a home in American Falls, Idaho. At the evidentiary hearing following the parties’ cross-motions for summary judgment, Martinez testified that Carretero had asked her to "get back together" as "husband and wife" and to live together as a family. In contrast, Carretero never testified to why the parties reconciled, but did testify that after the reconciliation, he intended to get divorced.

There is no dispute that, after the reconciliation, the parties continued with divorce proceedings and on March 10, 1995, signed a Stipulation for Divorce in Idaho. The decree of divorce was entered a month later, on April 18, 1995. During this time, it is undisputed that the parties were living together at the home in American Falls. It is also undisputed that roughly seven months after the decree was entered, in November 1995, the parties moved together, with their child, to California.

During the seven-month period in Idaho before the move, Martinez did not enforce Carretero's child support payment obligation required under the Stipulation for Divorce. Also, during this seven-month period, Martinez alleged—through declarations and testimony from herself and witnesses at the later evidentiary hearing—that she and Carretero continuously lived together as husband and wife with their minor child, shared control over financial and legal matters, publicly held themselves out as husband and wife to family members, and that Carretero provided for their family while Martinez stayed home to raise their minor child. For example, Martinez's adult niece testified at the evidentiary hearing that Carretero called Martinez his "wife" during the time before the parties moved from American Falls to California. Her sister-in-law testified to the same. After the parties moved from Idaho to California in November 1995, two years later, in 1997, they moved to Arizona for Carretero's employment. The parties eventually returned to Idaho sometime in 2005 or 2006.

B. Procedural Background

Twenty-five years after the parties’ decree of divorce was entered, on May 4, 2020, Martinez filed a verified pleading titled Petition for Decree of Divorce with Minor Children/Complaint in the district court of Bannock County, Idaho. In it, Martinez pleaded two alternative claims: (1) that the parties entered into a common law marriage during the seven-month period they lived together in Idaho following their April 1995 divorce; or (2) if there was no common law marriage, Martinez alleged there was "general partnership" between herself and Carretero regarding a trucking business that the parties allegedly formed together—and Martinez sought its dissolution, compensatory damages, restitution, and other damages under a related wage claim.

Roughly two months after Martinez filed her pleading, the district court entered a procedural order that explained the "alternative" nature of Martinez's pleading and sua sponte bifurcated the case after consulting with the administrative district judge. The district court "remanded" the common law marriage and divorce portion of the pleading to the magistrate court and outlined a contingent procedural disposition. If a common law marriage existed, the magistrate court would "proceed with addressing and resolving the divorce issues and the alternatively pled count will become moot." On the other hand, if a common law marriage did not exist, the matter would be "referred back to district court and the alternatively pled claims related to dissolution of business relationships and the wage claim [would] proceed in district court."

Days prior to entry of the procedural order, Carretero filed a motion to dismiss the portion of the pleading alleging the existence of a common law marriage and requesting a divorce. However, Carretero's motion did not rely solely on the pleadings—instead, it relied on matters outside the pleadings where Carretero attached his affidavit and testified that, among other things, he never entered into a second marriage with Martinez. Martinez initially objected to Carretero's motion to dismiss as procedurally improper, and after the procedural order was entered, filed a memorandum in support of her argument that dismissal was improper. Martinez concluded her memorandum by acknowledging that "the question of the marriage should be determined at trial as soon as possible following the completion of discovery."

However, four days later, Martinez filed a motion for a declaratory judgment under Idaho Rule of Family Law Procedure ("I.R.F.L.P.") 506, as it existed prior to July 1, 2021, contending that the undisputed evidence in the record established as a matter of law that the parties entered into a common law marriage. In support of her motion, Martinez relied on her verified pleading, and alleged various "undisputed" facts she claimed established that the parties had entered into a common law marriage in Idaho in 1995 after their divorce. Despite now arguing that she was entitled to judgment as matter of law based on undisputed material facts in the record, Martinez specifically requested a "speedy hearing where she may call witnesses and present evidence in support of this motion as provided for by I.R.F.L.P. 506 [now I.R.F.L.P. 508 ("The court may order a speedy hearing of an action for a declaratory judgment.")]."

Four days later, on August 11, 2020, Carretero filed a notice that he "intends to require strict compliance" with the Idaho Rules of Evidence in the pending family law proceeding before the magistrate court pursuant to Rule 102(B)(1) of the Idaho Rules of Family Law Procedure, in effect prior to July 1, 2021. The same day Carretero filed his notice for strict compliance, he filed a motion for change of venue from Bannock County, Idaho, to Power County, Idaho, on the common law marriage and divorce issue. The magistrate court in Bannock County granted the motion, and venue changed to the magistrate court in Power County.

After the change of venue, on October 29, 2020, Martinez filed a motion for summary judgment under Idaho Rule of Family Law Procedure 505 (now I.R.F.L.P. 507), and a motion for declaratory judgment under Rule 506 (now I.R.F.L.P. 508), as in effect prior to July 1, 2021. As with her prior motion for a declaratory judgment, this combined motion alleged that based on purportedly undisputed facts, a common law marriage between Martinez and Carretero formed as a matter of law in Idaho in 1995 after their divorce. However, unlike her prior motion for a declaratory judgment, Martinez attached declarations from herself and other family members, and various documents spanning 1996 to 2008, all supporting her claim that after the parties’ April 1995 divorce, the parties entered into a common law marriage during the seven-month period they continued to live together in Idaho.

Among other things, the documents attached in support included: the 1995 Stipulation for Divorce; a January 10, 1996, life insurance application signed by Carretero, which identified Martinez as Carretero's "wife"; a July 1996 claim for medical benefits signed by Carretero, which requested coverage for Martinez's medical treatment starting January 8, 1996, and identified Martinez as his "wife"; a 1998 joint vehicle purchase agreement with both parties’ signatures; two separate 1998 vehicle insurance applications, both listing the parties as "married"; a 2000 letter concerning delinquent property taxes, addressing the parties as husband and wife who jointly owned...