## Facts

- Harvey Dee Spiars and Phyllis Carol Watson divorced on February 18, 1981; the decree awarded Watson a share of Spiars’s San Antonio Police Department (SAPD) retirement benefits.
- The decree granted Watson “that portion” of Spiars’s future monthly pension payments determined by a fraction: the numerator was one-half of Spiars’s months of plan service as of the divorce date; the denominator was his total months of plan service at retirement.
- Spiars continued working for SAPD after the divorce and retired on March 1, 1991, then began receiving pension benefits.
- In 2004, Watson sought enforcement of the property division and an order to effectuate payment of her pension share.
- In 2005, the trial court entered a retirement-benefits division/enforcement order calculating Watson’s share as 33.5% and awarding a money judgment for unpaid benefits plus prejudgment interest, with post-judgment interest.
- Spiars appealed, arguing the trial court improperly valued the pension at retirement rather than fixing Watson’s interest as of the divorce date.

## Issues

1. Whether the post-divorce retirement-benefits order impermissibly amended or changed the divorce decree’s property division, in violation of Texas Family Code § 9.007, by calculating Watson’s share from the pension as paid at retirement rather than limiting her to a divorce-date value.

## Decision

- The court of appeals affirmed the trial court’s order.
- The court held the order did not alter the divorce decree’s substantive property division.
- The court concluded the trial court permissibly applied the decree’s stated fractional formula to the pension payments actually received after retirement and enforced Watson’s resulting share, including arrearages and interest.

## Legal Principles

- A post-decree court may issue orders to enforce or clarify a property division, but it may not amend, modify, alter, or change the division of property made in the divorce decree.  
- When a divorce decree divides retirement benefits using a time-rule fraction tied to total service at retirement and applied to future monthly payments, implementing that formula at retirement effectuates (rather than changes) the original division.
- An enforcement or clarifying order may quantify the parties’ interests (e.g., compute a percentage from the decree’s formula) and award arrearages and interest to enforce the decree, so long as ownership rights are not reallocated.

## Conclusion

The court upheld the retirement-benefits order because it implemented the divorce decree’s express time-rule formula by calculating Watson’s percentage from Spiars’s total service at retirement and enforcing payment of her share, which did not constitute an impermissible re-division of property under Texas Family Code § 9.007.


Spiars v. Watson, No. 04-06-00200-CV, 2007 WL 2428041 (Tex. App.—San Antonio Aug. 29, 2007)