## Facts

- Judith N. Reid (wife) and Dr. Robert A. Reid (husband) married in 1965 and had four children.
- Over the marriage, Robert worked long hours in medical training, military service, academia, and private practice; Judith was primarily a homemaker and later worked in Robert’s medical corporation and started a travel agency.
- Judith became dissatisfied with infrequent sexual relations (including recurring impotence), Robert’s work-focused lifestyle, his limited involvement in child-rearing, and an emotionally distant relationship.
- The couple attempted marital counseling without resolution.
- In April 1984, without mutual agreement to separate, Judith moved out of the marital home into an apartment.
- Judith filed for divorce alleging Robert’s constructive desertion; Robert filed a cross-bill alleging Judith’s actual desertion.
- A commissioner recommended a no-fault divorce based on one year’s separation and recommended spousal support and a monetary award to Judith; the circuit court entered a no-fault divorce decree and adopted those recommendations.
- Robert appealed the denial of a fault-based divorce in his favor and challenged the spousal support, equitable distribution monetary award, and attorney’s fees.

## Issues

1. Whether Judith’s departure constituted desertion or was legally justified as a response to Robert’s alleged constructive desertion.
2. Whether a spouse found guilty of desertion without legal justification may receive spousal support.
3. Whether the trial court improperly considered future earning capacity and post-divorce housing need in setting a monetary award in equitable distribution.
4. Whether the award of attorney’s fees to Judith was proper.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeals of Virginia reversed and remanded.
- It held Judith committed desertion because she broke off cohabitation without legal justification; the evidence showed marital dissatisfaction and longstanding conditions, not legally sufficient fault making cohabitation unsafe or intolerable.
- It directed entry of a divorce in Robert’s favor on the ground of desertion.
- It held Judith’s unjustified desertion barred her from receiving spousal support and required reversal of the support award.
- It held the monetary award in equitable distribution was infected by improper reliance on Robert’s superior earning capacity and Judith’s housing need and ordered recalculation without those considerations.

## Legal Principles

- Desertion requires (1) an actual breaking off of matrimonial cohabitation and (2) intent to desert; intent may be inferred from an unjustified unilateral departure.
- A spouse who leaves is not a deserter only if the other spouse’s misconduct provides legal justification by making continued cohabitation unsafe or intolerable under governing fault standards.
- Marital unhappiness, gradual relational breakdown, longstanding sexual difficulties, and work/parenting complaints, without proof of legally sufficient misconduct, do not justify leaving so as to avoid a finding of desertion.
- A spouse guilty of desertion without legal justification forfeits eligibility for spousal support under the fault-based limitations applied by the court.
- Equitable distribution addresses division of marital property and must not be based on support-oriented considerations such as one spouse’s future earning capacity or the other spouse’s post-divorce housing needs.

## Conclusion

The court reclassified the separation as wife’s unjustified desertion, ordered a fault-based divorce for the husband, barred spousal support to the deserting spouse, and required equitable distribution to be recalculated without importing support-related factors into the property division analysis.


Reid v. Reid, 7 Va. App. 553, 375 S.E.2d 533 (Va. Ct. App. 1989)