Cheryl Bridges and Eric Wooten divorced in May 1995, and Eric was ordered to pay child support in the amount of $400 per month. Bridges filed the instant lawsuit alleging that: 1 Eric was in arrears and his actions constituted felony abandonment, a tort; and 2 Eric’s parents, David Lee Wooten and Margaret E. Wooten, were liable for aiding and abetting Eric in committing the tort of felony abandonment. All three defendants failed to file an answer to the complaint, and the trial court entered a default judgment against them as to liability only and set a damages hearing. At the conclusion of the hearing, the trial court verbally announced that it was going to enter a default judgment against all of the defendants in the amount of $40,111.74, plus $3,975 in attorney’s fees. Thereafter, the trial court entered a written order granting a default judgment against Eric Wooten in the amount of $48,086 and concluding that Bridges was not entitled to judgment against David or Margaret Wooten because there was “no legal basis upon which to hold either them jointly or severally liable for money damages under the legal theories presented by the plaintiff.” Bridges appeals the trial court’s order with regard to David and Margaret, and we affirm, for reasons that follow.1 1. Bridges argues that the trial court erred by determining that there was no legal basis to hold David and Margaret liable for Bridges’s judgment against their son, Eric. Because the complaint itself demonstrated that Bridges had no valid claim against David or Margaret, this enumeration is without merit.
Pursuant to OCGA § 9-11-55 a, default by a defendant results in verdict and judgment to the plaintiff “as if every item and paragraph of the complaint or other original pleading were supported by proper evidence. . . .” However, the default operates to admit only the well-pled factual allegations of the complaint and the fair inferences and conclusions of fact to be drawn from those allegations. . . . It is axiomatic that a default does not result in the admission of allegations that are not well-pled or that are the result of forced inferences. The failure to answer or to appear at trial serves as an admission of the facts alleged in the complaint, but not of the conclusions of law contained therein. So while a default operates as an admission of the well-pled factual allegations in a complaint, it does not admit the legal conclusions contained therein. A default simply does not require blind acceptance of a plaintiff’s erroneous conclusions of law. Nor does a default preclude a defendant from showing that under the facts as deemed admitted, no claim existed which would allow the plaintiff to recover.2 Here, the complaint alleged that Eric committed felony abandonment in violation of OCGA § 19-10-1, a criminal statute, and that Bridges was entitled to damages under OCGA § 51-1-6. Bridges further alleged that David and Margaret “conspired to commit the unlawful acts and omissions of Eric by aiding and abetting Eric in his commission of the multiple counts of the crime of felony abandonment of a minor children” by 1 paying “just enough money to allow Eric to be released from custody” on multiple occasions when Bridges filed contempt actions against him; 2 allowing Eric to move in with them in Alabama “and thereby escape the jurisdiction of the trial court and not have to pay any amount for the support and maintenance of the children at issue”; and 3 supporting Eric “with the concerted knowledge that he was not properly paying his child support.”
