In Perry v. Perry,[1] the supreme court held that a court must presume that debt incurred during marriage is martial when equitably dividing marital assets upon divorce, and that a court may not rely solely on W-2s to determine income for child support purposes without considering other contrary and more recent evidence before it. Adam and Kyoko Perry married in November 2005 and have two children. Kyoko continued her education while married, incurring roughly $84,000 in debt to obtain her bachelor’s and master’s degrees. In 2017, Adam filed for divorce and moved for interim child support. During the property division proceedings, the superior court determined that not all of Kyoko’s student loans were marital after judging the credibility of the parties. Additionally, in calculating child support, the court stated that it would rely solely on the parties’ W-2s. Vacating the superior court’s property distribution order, the supreme court held that the lower court reversed the presumption that all debt is marital by concluding that because Adam had expressly agreed only to incur debt toward Kyoko’s bachelor’s degree, they had not intended to make the master’s degree debt marital. The court also vacated the lower court’s child support determination, holding that a court must examine all available evidence to make the best possible calculation and take all evidence necessary to accurately reflect the parties’ economic reality. It was thus error for the superior court to rely on the parties’ W-2s to the exclusion of other and more recent evidence. Reversing the lower court, the supreme court reiterated the presumption that all debt incurred during marriage is marital and that, in determining child support, a court should consider all relevant evidence before it to make the best calculation.
[1] 449 P.3d 700 (Alaska 2019).
