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171 F.2d 1021

Docket No. 9761.

Nelson v. Nelson

District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals

Argued Nov. 9, 1948.

Decided Dec. 2, 1948.

District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals · decided 1948-12-02

2 counsel of record

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Opinion by (per_curiam) · Decided 1948-12-02

How this case has been cited

Cited by 5 later decisions — most recently November 1993

2 federal appellate · 3 state decisions

20194819501960197019801990decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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¶1Mr. Otho D. Branson, of Washington, D. C., with whom Mr. Emerson W. Browne, of Washington, D. C., was on the brief, for appellant.

¶2Mr. Joseph A. McMenamin, of Washington, D. C., with whom Mr. Robert I. Miller, of Washington, D. C., was on the brief, for appellee.

¶3Before EDGERTON, CLARK, and WILBUR K. MILLER, Circuit Judges.

¶4PER CURIAM.

¶5Appellee John Nelson sued appellant Dorothy Nelson for divorce. She denied his charges, and also counterclaimed for annulment by reason of her own preexisting marriage. She asked the court to award her an interest in a house belonging to the parties, claiming she had contributed to its purchase.

¶6The District of Columbia Code provides: “Upon the entry of a final decree of annulment or divorce a vinculo all property rights of. the parties in joint tenancy or tenancy by the entirety shall stand dissolved and the court, in the same proceeding in which such decree is entered, shall have power and jurisdiction to award such property to the one lawfully entitled thereto or to apportion the same in such manner as shall seem equitable, just, and reasonable.” D. C. Code 1940, § 16 — 409.

¶7The court decreed annulment, found that appellant had not contributed to the purchase of the hou'se, and awarded her no interest in it. She contends the court erroneously excluded eviderice of her contributions. The record shows that her counsel, without having proffered such evidence, expressly rested, “except for the identification of the parties” to the prior marriage. But the record is not inconsistent with counsel’s present contention that he meant to rest only with respect to an oral motion then pending, not the whole case. He failed to make this clear at the trial. There was therefore no error or abuse of discretion in the court’s subsequent ruling that it was too late for counsel to make a proffer of testimony. Yet we are inclined to think counsel did not intentionally give up his right to prove contributions. If the'District Court should see fit to entertain a motion filed within ten days from the issuance of the mandate herein, to reopen the case for the purpose of hearing further testimony, we see no objection to its doing so. Otherwise the judgment is to stand affirmed. The quoted statute is in our opinion fully applicable.

¶8Affirmed.

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