## Facts

- Parents divorced in 1990; mother received custody of two minor children, and father received visitation.
- The trial court ordered father to pay $704.13 per month in child support and provide medical insurance.
- Mother repeatedly sought contempt findings for arrears and alleged misconduct during visitation exchanges.
- Father asserted irregular and declining income from an auto-salvage business and sought reductions in support.
- In 1991, the trial court found father in contempt for noncompliance and declined to consider modification, citing “unclean hands.”
- In 1993–1994, after further petitions, the trial court held father in criminal contempt for violating anti-harassment/abuse orders and in civil contempt for support nonpayment; it imposed incarceration and set purge conditions based on large arrearages.
- The trial court ordered that father’s visitation would be “summarily suspended” for untimely support payments and then suspended visitation on that basis.
- In 1994, the trial court denied father’s later petition to reduce support and maintained the visitation suspension.
- Father appealed the denial of modification and the suspension of visitation tied to nonpayment.

## Issues

1. Whether the evidence supported the trial court’s finding that no material change in circumstances justified modifying father’s child-support obligation.
2. Whether the trial court could summarily suspend visitation solely for nonpayment of support without determining ability to pay and willful refusal, and without findings that visitation endangered the children.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeals of Tennessee vacated the order dismissing/denying father’s petition to modify child support and remanded for further proceedings under the child-support guidelines.
- The court vacated the summary suspension of father’s visitation tied to nonpayment and remanded for reconsideration under the proper visitation standards.
- The court concluded the evidence preponderated against the trial court’s finding that father’s income circumstances had not changed.
- The court held the trial court erred by denying visitation based on nonpayment without determining father was financially able to pay and willfully refused, and without grounding any visitation restriction in the children’s welfare.

## Legal Principles

- Child-support awards must reflect the obligor’s actual ability to pay and the children’s reasonable needs; material changes in financial circumstances can warrant modification.
- A parent’s duty to pay child support and the right to visitation are distinct; visitation should not be denied solely because support has not been paid.
- Visitation may be restricted or denied only when necessary to protect the child’s physical or emotional welfare (endangerment-based justification).
- Coercive sanctions for nonpayment require a determination that the obligor has the present ability to comply and is willfully refusing; deprivation of visitation cannot substitute for proper support-enforcement findings.

## Conclusion

The appellate court vacated both the denial of the father’s child-support modification request and the visitation suspension that functioned as a payment enforcement device, requiring on remand a support determination consistent with the guidelines and any visitation limits to be based on the children’s welfare and supported by ability-to-pay findings when nonpayment is alleged.


Turner v. Turner, 919 S.W.2d 340 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1995)