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Butler v. Turner

The consent judgment that defendant signed in a prior Department of Human Resources suit for child support was not res judicata as to his representations of his income because plaintiff was not a privy of the DHR in that action.

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We granted certiorari to the Court of Appeals in Turner v. Butler, 245 Ga. App. 250 537 SE2d 703 2000, to consider: 1 whether the Court of Appeals erred in holding that a parent who assigns to the Department of Human Resources DHR the parent’s rights to seek child support as a condition of receiving benefits is in privity with the DHR in its action to establish a child support obligation under OCGA § 19-11-8; and 2 whether such parent may sue the other parent for fraud and deceit based on alleged misrepresentations made during the action to establish child support. For the reasons which follow, we answer in the affirmative, and consequently, reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals.

Ardith Butler and Dale Turner had a child out of wedlock in 1984. They did not marry and Butler was the sole provider of support for the child until 1993 when she applied for public assistance from the DHR.1 Butler began receiving benefits in October 1993, and they continued for about a year. In 1994, the DHR brought a child support recovery action against Turner in order to establish paternity, to recover support payments for the child made by the DHR, and to direct Turner to provide future support for the child. A 1995 consent order, establishing Turner as the child’s biological father, required Turner to reimburse the state in the amount of $1,057 and to pay $400 per month in child support to the Office of Child Support Enforcement. The amount of ordered child support was based on the application of statutory child support guidelines to a finding that Turner’s gross income was $2,350 per month or $28,000 per year.2

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