Villao v. Paz

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Villao v. Paz

JONATHAN I. VILLAO v. GRISELL V. PAZ
(AC 48574)
Alvord, Moll and Wilson, Js.

Syllabus

The defendant, whose marriage to the plaintiff had previously been dis-
solved, appealed, challenging the financial orders in the trial court’s judg-
ment of dissolution. While the appeal was pending, the trial court denied
the plaintiff’s postjudgment motion for contempt, in which the plaintiff
claimed, inter alia, that the defendant had failed to pay attorney’s fees that
had been awarded to him in the dissolution judgment, but ordered the
defendant to pay those fees. The defendant filed a motion for review of the
trial court’s order determining that the automatic appellate stay pursuant
to the rule of practice (§ 61-11 (a)) did not apply to the award of attorney’s
fees. Held:

This court granted the motion for review and granted the relief requested,
vacating the trial court’s order, as the award of attorney’s fees was automati-
cally stayed under Practice Book § 61-11 (a) because the award did not fall
within the orders exempted from the automatic appellate stay in § 61-11 (c),
namely, periodic alimony, support, custody or visitation in family matters.

Considered July 23—officially released September 30, 2025

Procedural History

Action for the dissolution of a marriage, and for other
relief, brought to the Superior Court in the judicial dis-
trict of Stamford-Norwalk and tried to the court, Cirello,
J.; judgment dissolving the marriage and granting cer-
tain other relief, from which the defendant appealed to
this court; thereafter, the court, D’Agostino, J., denied
the plaintiff’s motion for contempt and issued an order
that the award of attorney’s fees to the plaintiff was
exempt from the appellate stay, and the defendant filed
a motion for review of that order with this court. Motion
for review granted; relief granted.
Anthony L. Cenatiempo, in support of the motion.
Jonathan I. Villao, self-represented, in opposition to
the motion.
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Villao v. Paz

Opinion

ALVORD, J. In this marital dissolution action, the
defendant, Grisell V. Paz, appeals following the judg-
ment dissolving her marriage to the plaintiff, Jonathan
I. Villao. On May 30, 2025, the defendant filed a motion
for review of the order of the trial court determining
that its attorney’s fees award was in the nature of sup-
port and thus exempted from the automatic appellate
stay pursuant to Practice Book § 61-11 (c). On July
23, 2025, this court granted the motion for review and
granted the relief requested, vacating the trial court’s
order. This court also indicated that an opinion would
follow. This opinion sets forth the reasoning for our
decision.
The following procedural history is relevant to our
review. On March 3, 2025, the court, Cirello, J., dis-
solved the marriage between the parties. The court
awarded the parties joint legal and physical custody of
their two minor children and set forth a parenting plan.
The court found that the plaintiff recently had been
terminated from his employment of twenty years at an
auto parts store due to theft and was working as an
Uber driver, that the defendant recently had stopped
working in her chiropractic and weight loss clinic due to
a cancer diagnosis, and that both parties had exhibited
a lack of candor and transparency with respect to their
finances. The court ordered the defendant to pay the
plaintiff $119 weekly in child support. The court also
ordered the defendant to pay the plaintiff $750 monthly
in alimony while she is receiving disability benefits, and
a different amount when disability payments cease. The
court also made orders distributing the parties’ assets.
Finally, the court found that ‘‘the defendant’s actions,
including the slow trickle of disclosure or nondisclosure
of relevant information, caused the plaintiff’s counsel
to hire private investigators, file motions for contempt
and motions to compel, and spend more time litigating
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Villao v. Paz

the case than necessary.’’ The court ordered the defen-
dant to pay $25,000 of the plaintiff’s attorney’s fees. On
March 20, 2025, the defendant filed an appeal challeng-
ing the financial orders in the dissolution judgment.
On March 31, 2025, the plaintiff filed a motion for
contempt, in which he alleged that the defendant had
failed to make child support payments in accordance
with the dissolution judgment. On April 4, 2025, the
plaintiff amended his motion for contempt to allege
that the defendant also had not made alimony payments
or paid the attorney’s fees ordered. In his motion, the
plaintiff argued that, pursuant to Practice Book § 61-11
(c), attorney’s fees orders are not automatically stayed
during the pendency of an appeal. On May 1, 2025,
the court, D’Agostino, J., issued an order in which it
declined to find the defendant in contempt because the
dissolution judgment did not contain a precise date on
which alimony and child support should be paid but
ordered that alimony payments be made monthly and
child support weekly on dates certain and that the child
support arrearage of $223 was to be paid by May 2,
2025. The court allowed the parties to file supplemental
memoranda on the issue of whether the attorney’s fees
award was stayed and, therefore, whether the defendant
was in contempt. Both parties filed memoranda.
On May 21, 2025, the court issued a memorandum of
decision on the motion for contempt with respect to
the award of attorney’s fees. It determined that there
was no appellate stay of the award of attorney’s fees
entered in the dissolution judgment and required the
defendant to pay that award on or before May 28, 2025.
On May 23, 2025, the defendant filed a motion seeking
an emergency stay from this court. See Practice Book
§ 61-14 (b). This court stayed the defendant’s obligation
to pay the attorney’s fees pending the resolution of her
motion for review, which she filed on May 30, 2025. On
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Villao v. Paz

June 9, 2025, the plaintiff filed an opposition to the
defendant’s motion for review.
We begin our discussion with the standard of review
and relevant legal principles. ‘‘The interpretation and
application of provisions of the rules of practice
involves a question of law over which our review is
plenary.’’ Bouffard v. Lewis, 203 Conn. App. 116, 120,
247 A.3d 667 (2021); see also U.S. Bank Trust, N.A. v.
O’Brien, 231 Conn. App. 779, 785–86, 334 A.3d 558
(2025) (‘‘[a] trial court’s determination of whether an
appellate stay was in effect raises a question of law
over which we exercise plenary review’’).
Practice Book § 61-11 governs stays of execution in
noncriminal cases. Section 61-11 (a) provides in rele-
vant part: ‘‘Except where otherwise provided by statute
or other law, proceedings to enforce or carry out the
judgment or order shall be automatically stayed until
the time to file an appeal has expired. If an appeal is
filed . . . such proceedings shall be stayed until the
final determination of the cause. . . .’’ ‘‘In family mat-
ters, however, orders of periodic alimony and orders
of child support are specifically exempt from the auto-
matic stay provisions of . . . § 61-11.’’ Bouffard v.
Lewis, supra, 203 Conn. App. 120. Specifically, § 61-11
(c) provides in relevant part: ‘‘Unless otherwise
ordered, no automatic stay shall apply . . . to orders
of periodic alimony, support, custody or visitation in
family matters . . . .’’
Our appellate courts have explained the purpose of
exempting certain orders in family matters from the
automatic appellate stay. ‘‘Where the need for child
support is established and ordered by the court, it is
of the utmost importance for the welfare of the child
that such payments be made in a timely fashion. It is
also in the interest of society that the child be supported
by those obligated to support the child and that the
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Villao v. Paz

child not be required to seek public assistance to satisfy
those needs unless otherwise necessary.’’ (Internal quo-
tation marks omitted.) Wald v. Cortland-Wald, 226
Conn. App. 752, 772, 319 A.3d 769 (2024); see also Mul-
holland v. Mulholland, 229 Conn. 643, 652, 643 A.2d 246
(1994) (discussing policy preference against compelling
financially disadvantaged spouse to require public assis-
tance during appeal); Yontef v. Yontef, 185 Conn. 275,
291, 440 A.2d 899 (1981) (automatically staying custody
or visitation orders pending appeal ‘‘is not only
unseemly but is inconsistent with the concern, repeat-
edly enunciated in the statutes and the cases, for the
best interests of the children’’).

In Birkhold v. Birkhold, 343 Conn. 786, 276 A.3d 414
(2022), our Supreme Court was presented with the ques-
tion of whether the automatic appellate stay applied to
an order of attorney’s fees. In that case, the trial court
had determined that ‘‘the automatic appellate stay did
not apply to its order of attorney’s fees and that, even
if it did, the court would terminate the stay . . . .’’
Id., 794 n.4. On the plaintiff’s motion for review, our
Supreme Court granted review but denied the requested
relief, determining that it did not ‘‘have to decide
whether the automatic stay exception for orders of
support, prescribed by Practice Book § 61-11 (c),
applies to this particular order, as fashioned by the trial
court, because the trial court commendably found, in
the alternative, that the . . . factors [set forth in Grif-
fin Hospital v. Commission on Hospitals & Health
Care, 196 Conn. 451, 456, 493 A.2d 229 (1985)] weighed
in favor of terminating the appellate stay. . . . Even if
the automatic stay did apply under these circumstances,
we cannot conclude that the trial court abused its dis-
cretion in terminating any automatic stay pursuant to
Griffin Hospital.’’ (Citation omitted.) Birkhold v. Birk-
hold, supra, 794 n.4.
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Villao v. Paz

This court previously has construed the exception to
the automatic appellate stay contained within Practice
Book § 61-11 (c) narrowly. For example, in Lowe v.
Lowe, 58 Conn. App. 805, 816, 755 A.2d 338 (2000), this
court determined that a lump sum alimony order did
not fall within § 61-11 (c), which refers to orders of
‘‘periodic alimony,’’ and, therefore, lump sum alimony
orders automatically are stayed on appeal. ‘‘[T]rial
courts in this state continue to have the power to con-
duct proceedings and to act on motions filed during
the pendency of an appeal provided they take no action
to enforce or carry out a judgment while an appellate
stay is in effect. . . . [In other words] [t]he automatic
stay prohibits only those actions that would execute,
effectuate, or give legal effect to all or part of a judgment
challenged on appeal. . . . The automatic appellate
stay merely denies [the successful litigant] the immedi-
ate fruits of his or her victory . . . in order to protect
the full and unhampered exercise of the right to appel-
late review.’’ (Citation omitted; emphasis omitted; inter-
nal quotation marks omitted.) Lavy v. Lavy, 190 Conn.
App. 186, 212, 210 A.3d 98 (2019).

With these principles in mind, we conclude that the
$25,000 attorney’s fees award in the present case does
not fall within ‘‘periodic alimony, support, custody or
visitation’’ exempted from the automatic appellate stay
in Practice Book § 61-11 (c). The award was issued as
part of the overall financial mosaic in the dissolution
judgment. The trial court made findings that the defen-
dant’s litigation conduct had caused the plaintiff to
expend more attorney’s fees than was necessary. Like
a property distribution or similar ‘‘lump sum’’ award in
a dissolution matter, we conclude that the attorney’s
fees award is automatically stayed unless and until the
trial court terminates that stay.
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The motion for review is granted and the relief
requested is granted in accordance with this court’s
July 23, 2025 order.
In this opinion the other judges concurred.