JEANNIE LYNN DANHOF V ROBERT BRUCE DANHOF
Annotate this Case
Download PDF
STATE OF MICHIGAN
COURT OF APPEALS
JEANNIE LYNN DANHOF,
UNPUBLISHED
June 6, 2000
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v
No. 219233
Muskegon Circuit Court
LC No. 98-000634-DO
ROBERT BRUCE DANHOF,
Defendant-Appellant.
Before: Hoekstra, P.J., and Holbrook, Jr. and Zahra, JJ.
MEMORANDUM.
Defendant appeals as of right the judgment of divorce entered by the trial court. We affirm.
The parties were married for two separate periods. They first married in 1977, and were
divorced in 1985. They continued to live together without any significant changes, and remarried in
January 1993. The second complaint for divorce was filed on March 6, 1998.
On appeal, defendant argues that the court erred in including pension benefits and deferred
compensation earned between the marriages as part of the marital estate.
Pension benefits accrued before a marriage may be the subject of a division of property in
divorce. Booth v Booth, 194 Mich App 284, 290-291; 486 NW2d 116 (1992). The trial court may
include these benefits if it finds that such treatment is just and reasonable, considering the ability of either
party to pay, the character and situation of the parties, and all other circumstances. Id at 291.
In order to ensure that equity is done, the trial court’s discretion cannot be unduly restricted with
regard to the distribution of assets, including premarriage and postdivorce pension contributions.
Boonstra v Boonstra, 209 Mich App 558, 563; 531 NW2d 777 (1995). Where parties have been
married more than once, it is within the court’s discretion to divide assets based on the total
accumulation of benefits. McMichael v McMichael, 217 Mich App 723, 728-732; 552 NW2d 688
(1996).
-1
Defendant has failed to establish that the trial court erred in finding it just and equitable to
include the entirety of defendant’s pension and deferred compensation benefits as part of the marital
estate. The parties functioned as a single economic unit continually since 1977. Considering the
circumstances of the case, where defendant’s earnings were significantly higher than plaintiff’s, he had a
pension, and his deferred compensation account had significantly greater value than hers, there is no
showing that the court erred in finding that inclusion was just and reasonable.
Affirmed.
/s/ Joel P. Hoekstra
/s/ Donald E. Holbrook, Jr.
/s/ Brian K. Zahra
-2
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
