Community Property - California Contemporary Decisions

This casebook contains 203 State of California appellate decisions that interpret and apply the community property provisions of the Family Code. The selection of decisions spans from 2001 through the date of publication. The decisions are organized by year of issuance and are listed in the order of frequency of citation.

We highlight holdings from two recent decisions:

Before the enactment of Family Code section 2556, courts allowed a former spouse "to bring a separate partition action to divide assets omitted from a dissolution judgment . . . ." (Berry v. Berry, 216 Cal.App.3d at p. 1159; see also Henn v. Henn (1980) 26 Cal.3d 323, 330.) Currently, "the court has continuing jurisdiction to award community estate assets or community estate liabilities to the parties that have not been previously adjudicated by a judgment in the proceeding." (Fam. Code, § 2556.)

In Re Marriage Of Thorne, (Court of Appeal, 6th Appellate Dist. 2012)

The CalSTRS statutes explicitly provide for the division of a community property interest in a CalSTRS member's "retirement allowance or retirement benefit." (Ed. Code, § 22655.) There are no parallel provisions providing for division of a member's "disability allowance." Instead, the only role that a disability allowance plays with respect to a nonmember spouse's community property interest in a member's CalSTRS benefits is where the disability allowance commenced prior to the couple's separation. (Ed. Code, § 22664, subd. (e) [limit on nonmember spouse's right to retire where member spouse was receiving a disability allowance on the date of separation; nonmember spouse cannot retire until disability allowance terminates.].)

In Re Marriage Of Elena M., (Court of Appeal, 6th Appellate Dist. 2012)