KAZIMIERZ GORECKI v. JACQUELINE GRANARA GORECKI (2026)

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER PURSUANT TO RULE 23.0

Jacqueline Granara-Gorecki (wife), the former spouse of Kazimierz Gorecki (husband), appeals from a judgment of divorce nisi of the Probate and Family Court. She argues that (1) the judge's findings failed to demonstrate requisite consideration of the statutory factors under G. L. c. 208, § 34; (2) the judge's division of the marital liabilities was not supported by the evidence; and (3) the judge “prejudged” the case, thereby denying the wife due process. We affirm.

Background. We summarize the record, drawing on the judge's findings in support of the judgment, and supplementing them with undisputed evidence in the record. See Pierce v. Pierce, 455 Mass. 286, 288 (2009). The parties’ marriage was long term, with the husband and the wife marrying on September 12, 1981, and last living together on August 26, 2019. The parties have one emancipated child. For twenty-eight years, the wife worked as a tax preparer for ten months of the year and received unemployment income for the remaining two months of the year. At the time of trial, the wife worked part-time and seasonally, earning $486.06 per week. Throughout the marriage, the husband received social security disability income (SSDI) and United States Department of Veterans Affairs disability benefits, totaling $1,236.56 per week as of the trial date. The parties’ child received a dependent benefit as a part of the husband's SSDI benefits. The parties’ marital estate consisted of a single-family home in Malden, the wife's interest in a revocable realty trust, two vehicles, retirement accounts in the wife's name, shares of stock, and bank accounts. The parties’ liabilities included a home equity line of credit and consumer debt in the husband's name.

The case was tried over two days in 2024. Three witnesses testified and twenty exhibits were admitted in evidence. On August 5, 2024, the judge issued findings of fact and rationale and a judgment of divorce nisi. The judge found that “both parties contributed to the marital estate throughout the marriage. Both parties worked and both parties contributed to the home and to the caretaking of the child.” The judge ordered the marital home to be sold and for the net proceeds to be divided equally after payment of the consumer debt standing in the husband's name and other adjustments to account for the disparate values of the parties’ vehicles and the wife's use of marital assets to pay her counsel fees. The judge ordered that the coverture portion of the retirement assets be divided equally, and that the wife retain her interest in the real estate and bank account held by the revocable trust. The judge declined to order either party to pay alimony to the other.

Discussion. The wife first argues that the judge failed to appropriately consider all of the statutory factors under G. L. c. 208, § 34, giving undue weight to the length of the marriage and “simply ignor[ing] contribution,” and erred in dividing the marital estate.¹ We disagree.

“Our review of a judgment pursuant to the equitable distribution statute, G. L. c. 208, § 34, proceeds under a two-step analysis. ‘First, we examine the judge's findings to determine whether all relevant factors in § 34 were considered.’ ” Adams v. Adams, 459 Mass. 361, 371 (2011), quoting Bowring v. Reid, 399 Mass. 265, 267 (1987).² “The second tier of our review requires us to determine whether the reasons for the judge's conclusions are ‘apparent in his findings and rulings.’ ” Adams, supra, quoting Redding v. Redding, 398 Mass. 102, 108 (1986). “A judge's determinations as to equitable distribution will not be reversed unless ‘plainly wrong and excessive.’ ” Adams, supra, quoting Redding, supra at 107.

Here, the judge considered the mandatory statutory factors under G. L. c. 208, § 34, and made extensive findings supported by the record about the parties’ health, station, occupation and income, estate, liabilities and needs, and opportunity to acquire future assets and income. Also, the judge considered the discretionary contribution factors and made findings about each of the parties’ financial and nonfinancial contributions to the marriage. The judge credited the husband's testimony regarding his contributions to the maintenance of the marital home including “routinely cook[ing] meals for the family and clean[ing] the home.” The judge did not credit the wife's testimony that the husband did not contribute financially to the marriage but credited the wife's contributions and her “care of the parties’ son.” The judge credited and discredited portions of each party's testimony regarding their income and work history; to wit, the “inconsistent testimony surrounding [w]ife's financial statements,” and “inconsistent testimony regarding [h]usband ․ working while he claimed he could not work and was designated as 100% disabled.” The judge did not rely exclusively on the length of the parties’ marriage in dividing the estate; rather, he concluded that the wife was not a super contributor and that “[n]either [w]ife's nor [h]usband's contributions greatly exceeded the other's [sic] to the marital partnership.” Where “[t]he weight to be accorded each of the § 34 factors ․ is committed to the judge,” Ross v. Ross, 385 Mass. 30, 37 (1982), quoting Langerman v. Langerman, 9 Mass. App. Ct. 869, 870 (1980), and “the ultimate goal of G. L. c. 208, § 34, is an equitable, rather than an equal, division of property” (quotations and citation omitted), Connor v. Benedict, 481 Mass. 567, 580 (2019), we discern no abuse of discretion in the judge's weighing of the § 34 factors. See Rice v. Rice, 372 Mass. 398, 401 (1977) (judge has broad discretion to equitably divide property pursuant to G. L. c. 208, § 34).

Similarly, we discern no error in the judge's consideration of the division of the parties’ liabilities. The wife argues that the judgment, in ordering equal responsibility for the home equity line of credit (HELOC) and the debts in the husband's name, was not supported by the evidence. However, it is implicit in the judge's findings that he appropriately considered the testimony of both parties relative to the HELOC in his conclusion that there “was insufficient evidence to prove that the HELOC was not marital debt.” See Prenaveau v. Prenaveau, 81 Mass. App. Ct. 479, 495-496 (2012) (“The judge's credibility finding is decisive”). Further, in determining that the credit cards were to be treated as joint liabilities and paid from the proceeds from the sale of the marital home, the judge properly exercised his discretion. He weighed the evidence that the husband had been obligated to pay, since October of 2019, the “HELOC payments, solar bill, real estate taxes, homeowner's insurance and the water bill associated with the former marital home, while [w]ife has been living in the home,” against the wife's contributions and properly concluded that it was “appropriate and reasonable” that the liabilities accumulated during that same time period be the joint responsibility of the parties, a division of the parties’ estate that did not fall “outside the range of reasonable alternatives,” L.L. v. Commonwealth, 470 Mass. 169, 185 n.27 (2014). See Hassey v. Hassey, 85 Mass. App. Ct. 518, 531 (2014) (G. L. c. 208, § 34, permits judge to “assign to either husband or wife all or any part of the estate of the other” [quotation and citation omitted]).

The wife also argues that the judge “prejudged the case” and denied her “fundamental due process rights.” We pause here to comment that in support of these claims the wife relies only on excerpted testimony from the trial and conclusory statements without legal analysis or citation to legal authority. Rule 16 (a) (9) (A), as appearing in 481 Mass. 1628 (2019), of the Massachusetts Rules of Appellate Procedure requires that arguments must set forth “the reasons therefor, with citations to the authorities and parts of the record on which the appellant relies.”³ Notwithstanding the deficiencies in the wife's briefing, we have reviewed the judge's statements during the trial and discern no error or denial of due process. See Commonwealth v. Colon, 33 Mass. App. Ct. 304, 308 (1992) (“it is presumed that the judge as trier of fact applies correct legal principles”). Early in the trial, the judge commented, in regard to the disposition of the marital home, that he would “likely order it sold and the property divided equitably as I determine the assets should be,” and shortly thereafter, regarding college expenses, the judge stated that, “after 43 years of marriage ․ I'm not compensating somebody for tuition now.” Both comments show the judge's awareness of the statutory factors and his intent to weigh the evidence, and as discussed above, the judge did so and made findings of fact based on the evidence.

As the trial progressed, the judge also discovered that the parties had not reached an agreement regarding division of their personal property. In response, he asked an attorney who was present in the court room whether she was amenable to accepting an appointment as a special master, not because the judge had conclusively determined the division of the assets, but “because [he'd] tried to get people to do this and they usually say no.” Contrary to the wife's assertions that the judge “stopped the trial and appointed [the attorney] to be the property master to divide, list[,] and sell the property of the marital estate,” and that “[t]he determination that the marital estate would be sold and divided equally had already been made and announced prior to the conclusion of evidence,” the judge merely asked the attorney if she “would be willing, if the court appointed you as a property master” to so serve. The judge and the attorney discussed the scope of the potential appointment, and, as the colloquy concluded, the judge stated, “So you can dispose of the property. That's likely what the judgment is going to say.” The totality of the record confirms that the judge intended that the discussed appointment was “likely” to be part of the judgment, not that the decision had been made or that an order of appointment had entered. To be sure, as conceded by the wife at oral argument, no contemporaneous order of appointment entered that day, and the appointment of the attorney as the master was included in the judgment of divorce nisi.

Finally, the wife argues that the judge erred by failing to consider in his weighing of the evidence a certain statement within the husband's pretrial memorandum that was filed on August 13, 2021, over two years prior to trial. The sentence, which the wife describes as an “admission,” and which the husband included within the section of a memorandum titled, “Contested Issues of Fact and Law,” stated, “the [h]usband has already elected to take responsibility for paying off the home equity line of credit fully, along with his own liabilities.” We cannot conclude that this statement was an admission to be treated with the conclusiveness and formality of a request for admission served pursuant to Mass. R. Dom. Rel. P. 36. Rather, we view the statement, when read in the context of the entire memorandum, and particularly due to its inclusion within a section describing contested issues, as a settlement position expressed at the time of the pretrial conference. The wife's reliance on J.D.H. v. P.A.H., 71 Mass. App. Ct. 285, 287-292 & nn.3, 9 (2008), misses the mark. There, although this court affirmed the judgment, it did so not because of an “invo[cation of] the concept of ‘admissions’ ” from statements in a pretrial memorandum, but because the facts in the statements were otherwise amply supported by the record. J.D.H., supra at 290. Here, there was no error.

Judgment affirmed.

FOOTNOTES

1.   The wife does not argue that any of the judge's findings of fact are error. To the extent that the wife contends that the judge's weighing of the evidence is error, “it is within the purview of the judge to weigh the evidence, ․ and, accordingly, make findings of fact [which] will remain undisturbed unless shown to be clearly erroneous,” Adoption of Querida, 94 Mass. App. Ct. 771, 777 (2019), circumstances not present here.

2.   The mandatory factors for the judge to consider are “the length of the marriage, the conduct of the parties during the marriage, the age, health, station, occupation, amount and sources of income, vocational skills, employability, estate, liabilities and needs of each of the parties, the opportunity of each for future acquisition of capital assets and income, and the amount and duration of alimony, if any, awarded under sections 48 to 55, inclusive.” G. L. c. 208, § 34. The judge “may also consider the contribution of each of the parties in the acquisition, preservation or appreciation in value of their respective estates and the contribution of each of the parties as a homemaker to the family unit.” Id.

3.   The wife did not include transcripts from any pretrial proceedings in the record; thus, they are not considered.