Thomas L. Hayes

This case involves the division of a marital estate in a Vermont divorce between Jo-Ellen Golden and Peter Cooper-Ellis, along with related orders for spousal maintenance and child support. The family court included the husband's unvested stock options from his employment as marital property, valued them and other assets, divided the estate equally, and set support obligations based on his income including option exercises; it later denied his motions to modify the awards. The Vermont Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the options were attributable to the husband's work during the marriage and thus properly classified as marital property under state law, that the valuations and findings were supported by the evidence, and that there were no changed circumstances warranting modification of support. The court also dismissed the wife's contingent cross-appeal upon affirming the divorce judgment.

family law

In State v. Ovitt, the defendant was convicted by a jury of lewd and lascivious conduct under Vermont law after a witness reported seeing him masturbating near her home. On appeal, he challenged the trial court's jury instruction that a false or fabricated alibi could be considered evidence of guilt, as well as several claims of prosecutorial misconduct during trial and closing arguments. The Vermont Supreme Court affirmed the conviction, holding that the alibi instruction was proper because it addressed a deliberately false alibi rather than a mere failure to prove one, and that any improper statements by the prosecutor were either harmless, cured by the court's instructions, or not preserved for appeal. The court emphasized that the state retained the burden of proof throughout and that direct evidence of a fabricated alibi supports an inference of guilt.

criminal lawprocedure