Dissolution of Marriage -Maintenance case law updates

Civil - Dissolution Of Marriage/ Property Division / Maintenance 1st Dist.
In re Marriage of Heroy, No. 1-07-0308 (September 17, 2008) 3rd div. (Greiman) Affirmed as modified, remanded.

Trial court was not required to make specific findings with regards to each of the relevant factors it considered when awarding wife in 26 year marriage $35,000 per month in permanent maintenance; and award is not against the manifest weight of the evidence. Although wife has law and library degrees, publishes newsletter, and formerly worked as law librarian, she has not worked as law librarian for twenty years, and could never earn enough to maintain the standard of living enjoyed during the marriage. Further, although trial court made minor errors in calculation of marital estate, they are harmless in light of size of multi-million dollar marital estate; and court was not required to itemize its finding on each statutory factor. In addition, merely using marital accounts as conduit to transfer funds between sale of non marital asset and purchase of new asset does not make purchased property marital. However, trial court did fail to give husband proper credit for adv ances he made from marital estate to cover wife's expenses and attorney's fees during pendency of case.