Divorce; Valuation & division of the marital estate; Parenting time; Custody; MCL 722.26a(7)(b); Judgment of divorce (JOD)

The JOD was affirmed in part, vacated in part, and remanded. The parties challenged the trial court’s determinations as to “child custody, parenting time, and the valuation and division of the marital estate.” Defendant-ex-husband contended “that the trial court erred by including in the marital estate one bitcoin, which he asserts was his premarital asset.” He also argued “that the trial court erred by using different valuation dates for the cryptocurrency in comparison to other financial assets.” On cross-appeal, plaintiff-ex-wife argued “that the trial court erred by awarding defendant any amount of cryptocurrency as a separate asset because of defendant’s conflicting and disingenuous testimony on the subject of cryptocurrency.” Plaintiff requested that the court “reverse the trial court’s ruling awarding defendant the parties’ jointly held cryptocurrency.” The court vacated “the property distribution regarding the cryptocurrency and [remanded] for the trial court to redetermine the value of the cryptocurrency as of the time of trial and to modify the property distribution and equalization payment, if necessary.” Defendant next challenged “the trial court’s decision to allow plaintiff to look after the children during his summer parenting time while he is at work.” The court found that a “review of the record, including the trial court’s consideration of the best-interest factors, shows that the [trial] court determined allowing plaintiff to care for the children during defendant’s summer parenting time when he is at work is in the children’s best interests.” It noted that “the trial court’s ruling allowed the children to participate in extracurricular activities and allowed plaintiff to take them to their counseling sessions.” The court was “not persuaded that the record did not support the court’s factual findings, or that the court committed an abuse of discretion or a clear legal error on a key issue.” Finally, plaintiff argued “that the trial court abused its discretion by awarding the parties joint legal custody because the record establishes that they are unable to communicate and cooperate with each other.” On this close question, the court concluded “that the trial court did not abuse its discretion.” It found that “while the record demonstrated that the parties have difficulty cooperating, the trial court clearly saw that an effective coparenting relationship was possible. To this end, [it] ordered the parties to use AppClose to communicate with each other regarding the children.”