Laccetti v. Laccetti

Oppenheimer, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. In this divorce case, the court below, while finding that the wife had proved her husband’s adultery, held that there was sufficient evidence to prove that the wife also had committed adultery and that therefore she was barred from the relief she prayed. We disagree. The wife, Katherine May Laccetti, the appellant, filed suit against her husband, Alfonso Laccetti, the appellee, in the Circuit Court for Montgomery County, praying for a divorce a vinculo.

In her bill the wife alleged that she and her husband had both been residents of Montgomery County for more than one year preceding the filing of the bill. She alleged that her husband deserted her in 1962 and since that time has been living in adultery with another woman. The husband in his answer denied the wife’s allegations as to his desertion and adultery and alleged that it was the wife who deserted him and that she has been living in adultery with another man. Testimony was taken before an examiner.

The wife testified that she met the husband in Washington, in the District of Columbia, in 1949, and lived with him in the District in a common-law relationship. The couple held themselves out as man and wife and from 1950 the appellant used the appellee’s name. They have two daughters, born respectively in 1950 and 1951. In 1953 they purchased a house in Rockville, Maryland and lived there together as man and wife until September, 1962, when the ¹⁰⁰ appellee left the home.

The appellant testified that her husband, since his desertion, has been living with another woman and gave detailed testimony as to that cohabitation. On cross-examination the wife testified that, until a few weeks before the hearing, she and her two daughters had been living in the same house as a Mr. Thurston and his two children. She testified that she did not occupy the same bedroom as Thurston and denied that she had ever had intercourse with him. The wife’s testimony as to her common-law marriage with the husband and as to the husband’s subsequent adultery was corroborated by another daughter, Regina Thompson, 22 years of age, born to her during a prior marriage which resulted in divorce.

On cross-examination, Regina testified that she had been to the house in which her mother had been living and which was also occupied by Thurston and his two sons. There were three bedrooms in the house; Regina did not know where her mother slept. The husband, in his testimony, admitted that he and the appellant lived in a common-law relationship of husband and wife in the District of Columbia and had so lived in Maryland. He admitted living in adultery with another woman.

He knew that the wife was living in the same house as Thurston but could not say that they were living together as man and wife. After reading the testimony taken before the examiner, Judge Pugh felt that the situation required that further inquiry be made into the relationship between the wife and Thurston and summoned Thurston to testify in open court. At this hearing, Thurston testified that he had been separated from his wife for about five years; he has three boys, aged 22, 16 and 14. The two younger children live with him in a three-bedroom house in Rockville which he rents; the appellant lives in the same house with her two daughters.

Thurston testified that he and his two boys occupy one bedroom, the appellant’s daughters have a bedroom and she has a bedroom. Before moving into the house in Rockville, Thurston, the appellant, and their respective children, occupied another larger house in Rockville; that house had four bedrooms. Thurston said he and the appellant had an agreement under which she did the ironing and the cooking and took care of the children and that he paid the bills. ¹⁰¹ In response to questions by the court, Thurston repeatedly denied that he had ever had sexual intercourse with the appellant. He said: “I go my way and she goes hers.” Thurston then asked the court if he could explain something and, with the court’s permission, testified that his boys had been in trouble several times.

He said that he had been told by the Juvenile Court Judge that he could not have custody of his children unless he had someone to take care of them, to cook their meals and look after them. “The whole thing of it is,” he said, “I kept my kids if I got somebody to take care of the kids, and that is just the way it worked out.” In his opinion delivered after the taking of this testimony, Judge Pugh referred to the conceded fact that the husband and wife had entered into a common-law marriage in the District of Columbia. Common-law marriages are recognized in the District of Columbia. Lee v. Lee, 201 A. 2d 873 (D. C. App. 1964). “We have adopted the generally accepted rule that where a valid common-law marriage has been entered into in a jurisdiction which recognizes the validity of such a marriage, it will be recognized as valid in another jurisdiction, regardless of the rule which prevails in the later jurisdiction in respect to the validity of common-law marriages.” Henderson v. Henderson, 199 Md. 449, 459 , 87 A. 2d 403 (1952). As the appellant’s marital status is recognized in