In re the Marriage of: Richard Leo Bassing, petitioner, Appellant,

This opinion is nonprecedential except as provided by
Minn. R. Civ. App. P. 136.01, subd. 1(c).

STATE OF MINNESOTA
IN COURT OF APPEALS
A22-0207

In re the Marriage of:
Richard Leo Bassing, petitioner,
Appellant,

vs.

Barbara Laraine Bassing,
Respondent.

Filed December 27, 2022
Affirmed
Segal, Chief Judge

Anoka County District Court
File No. 02-FA-19-1286

Glenn P. Bruder, Mitchell, Bruder and Johnson, Eden Prairie, Minnesota (for appellant)

Beverly K. Dodge, Rachel L. Farhi, Barna, Guzy & Steffen, Ltd., Coon Rapids, Minnesota
(for respondent)

Considered and decided by Gaïtas, Presiding Judge; Segal, Chief Judge; and Kirk,
Judge.
∗
NONPRECEDENTIAL OPINION
SEGAL, Chief Judge
In this appeal from a marriage-dissolution judgment and decree, appellant-husband
claims that the district court abused its discretion when it awarded respondent-wife a

∗ Retired judge of the Minnesota Court of Appeals, serving by appointment pursuant to
Minn. Const. art. VI, § 10.
2
disproportionate share of the value of the marital estate. Husband also claims that the
district court incorrectly valued promissory notes and a bank account and assigned a value
of $0 to cash awarded to wife. We affirm.
FACTS
In July 2019, appellant Richard Leo Bassing (husband) petitioned the district court
for a dissolution judgment to end his nearly 50-year marriage with respondent Barbara
Laraine Bassing (wife). The case was tried to the district court in April 2021. The parties
stipulated to the value and distribution of a significant portion of their marital assets,
including real property and vehicles, but disputed the value of several items. Wife sought
spousal maintenance or, in the alternative, a disproportionate marital property award in lieu
of maintenance . Wife also sought conduct- based attorney fees, claiming that husband
caused her to incur unnecessary litigation expenses.
The district court heard testimony from the parties regarding their health and
medical costs, employment histories, hobbies, businesses, income, and expenses. In
addition, wife presented testimony from an electrician who stated that husband asked him
to lie at the trial and say that he had performed work on the parties’ home that he did not
do. Prior to trial, husband provided wife’s attorney with a fa lsified invoice from the
electrician. Husband claimed, untruthfully, that he had paid the invoice and was entitled
to reimbursement for the alleged payment as a marital expense.
Following trial, the district court issued its findings of fact, conclusions of law, order
for judgment, and judgment and decree. In the judgment, the court found wife’s monthly
income to be $1,213 from Social Security, and that she received additional income of
3
$1,187.42 per month from the parties’ son to repay a loan wife had made to the son from
her nonmarital inheritance. The court found wife’s reasonable monthly expenses to be
$2,793. The court found husband’s monthly income to be $2,132. Husband claimed
monthly expenses of $2,571, which included $1,000 for gambling and $300 for hobbies.
The court rejected husband’s proposed gambling expense as discretionary and reduced
husband’s reasonable monthly expenses to $1,571. The court found that wife’s monthly
income was insufficient to pay her monthly expenses and that husband’s monthly income
exceeded his monthly expenses.
The district court also concluded that husband’s conduct during the litigation
process had increased the length and expense of the proceedings. The court supported this
conclusion with findings that husband arranged to sell the parties’ rental property and
“attempted to evade disclosure of the sale to Wife,” and that husband failed to disclose a
loan, a bank account, and $19,400 in cash he had hidden in a safe at the parties’ cabin. The
court also pointed to husband’s attempt to suborn perjury from the electrician in order to
inflate the amount husband claimed he spent on improvements to the parties’ marital home
prior to sale.
The district court awarded wife a disproportionate share of the marital estate in lieu
of making an award to wife of spousal maintenance and conduct-based attorney fees. The
court found the total value of marital assets to be $2,452,880.97 and awarded wife about
$259,000 more than husband.
Following the district’s court order, husband moved for an amended order. Relevant
to this appeal, husband argued that the disproportionate division of the marital estate was
4
inequitable, and he challenged the distric t court’s valuation of certain assets. The district
court denied husband’s motion.
DECISION
On appeal, husband challenges the district court’s decision to award a greater share
of the marital estate to wife and asserts that the district court failed to apply a proper
valuation of certain promissory notes, assigned an erroneous value to a bank account that
husband claims had a zero balance, and improperly accounted for cash awarded to wife
that she had discovered in a safe at the parties’ cabin. In our analysis, we first review
husband’s argument about the disproportionate division of the marital estate and then
address husband’s challenges to the district court’s valuation of various assets.
I. The district court did not abuse its discretion in awardi ng a disproportionate
share of the marital estate to wife.

Husband argues that the district court abused its discretion by awarding a greater
share of the marital estate to wife. He challenges the district court’s determination that the
disparity was justified as an alternative to awarding spousal maintenance and conduct-
based attorney fees to wife.
Minnesota law requires that, in marriage-dissolution cases, a district court must
“make a just and equitable division of the marital property of the parties without regard to
marital misconduct, after making findings regarding the division of the property.” Minn.
Stat. § 518.58, subd. 1 (2022). Even though a district court’s authority “is limited to that
provided for by [the marriage-dissolution] statute, the district courts are guided by
equitable principles in determining the rights and liabilities of the parties upon a dissolution
5
of the marriage relationship.” DeLa Rosa v. DeLa Rosa, 309 N.W.2d 755, 757-78 (Minn.
1981) (citation omitted). An “equitable division does not require equal division.” Vinnes
v. Vinnes, 384 N.W.2d 589, 592 (Minn. App. 1986).
District courts have “ broad discretion in evaluating and dividing property in a
marital dissolution and will not be overturned except for abuse of discretion.” Antone v.
Antone, 645 N.W.2d 96, 100 (Minn. 2002). An appellate court “will affirm the [district]
court’s division of property if it had an acceptable basis in fact and principle even though
[the appellate court] might have taken a different approach.” Id. “A district court abuses
its discretion by making findings of fact that are unsupported by the evidence, misapplying
the law, or delivering a decision that is against logic and the facts on record.” Woolsey v.
Woolsey, 975 N.W.2d 502, 506 (Minn. 2022) (quoting Bender v. Bernhard, 971 N.W.2d
257, 262 (Minn. 2022)).
A. The district court did not abuse its discretion in considering wife’s need
for spousal maintenance in making its disproportionate award.

Husband claims that the record demonstrates that the parties had equal financial
statuses and that the district court erred in determining that wife had a need for spousal
maintenance. We are not persuaded.
Under Minnesota statutes, the court’s marital-property division should be based “on
all relevant factors including the length of the marriage, any prior marriage of a party, the
age, health, station, occupation, amount and sources of income, vocational skills,
employability, estate, liabilities, needs, opportunity for future acquisition of capital assets,
and income of each party.” Minn. Stat. § 518.58, subd. 1.
6
A district court “may” grant maintenance if a spouse “lacks sufficient property,
including marital property apportioned to the spouse, to provide for reasonable needs of
the spouse considering the standard of living established during the marriage.” Minn. Stat.
§ 518.552, subd. 1(a) (2022); see Lyon v. Lyon, 439 N.W.2d 18, 22 (Minn. 1989) (stating
that an award of spousal maintenance requires a showin g of need). In determining the
amount and duration of maintenance, the court should consider “all relevant factors
including: . . . the financial resources of the party seeking maintenance”; “the standard of
living established during the marriage”; “the duration of the marriage”; “the age, and the
physical and emotional condition of the spouse seeking maintenance”; and “the ability of
the spouse from whom maintenance is sought to meet needs while meeting those of the
spouse seeking maintenance.” Id., subd. 2(a),(c),(d),(f),(g) (2022).
We review for abuse of discretion the district court’s decision to award spousal
maintenance. Curtis v. Curtis, 887 N.W.2d 249, 252 (Minn. 2016) (“Given the fact-
dependent nature of the inquiry, we have said that a trial court has broad discretion in
deciding whether to award maintenance . . . .” (quotation omitted)).
The district court’s determination regarding wife’s need for maintenance after the
dissolution of this nearly 50-year marriage is supported by the district court’s findings: the
court found that wife’s reasonable monthly expenses were approximately $400 more per
month than her income and that husband had sufficient income both to meet his own
reasonable monthly expenses and to contribute to spousal maintenance. The district court
thus acted within its discretion in concluding that wife had a need for spousal maintenance.
7
Husband also disputes the district court’s findings on wife’s income. Husband states
that the court should have assigned income potential to a rental property awarded to wife.
The parties’ son lived at the property and the district court noted that wife did not want this
property “but agreed to take it [as part of her share of the marital estate] after Husband
repeatedly threatened to evict the parties’ son and sell the property . . . . Wife believe[d]
[the son] would find himself homeless if he were evicted.”
In its order on husband’s posttrial motion, the court directly addressed husband’s
argument regarding rental income, stating that the “stipulated value of the property was
assigned to [wife] and accounted for in her portion of the . . . award. Furthermore, no
evidence was presented—at trial or in the motion paperwork —as to the value of renting
the property.” With no evidence provided by husband as to the rental value of the property
or that rent would be paid by the son, we conclude that the district court acted within its
discretion in excluding any potential rental payments from wife’s income calculation. See
Eisenschenk v. Eisenschenk, 668 N.W.2d 235, 243 (Minn. App. 2003) (stating that “[o]n
appeal, a party cannot complain about a district court’s failure to rule in her favor when
one of the reasons it did not do so is because that party failed to provide the district court
with the evidence that would allow the district court to fully address the question”), rev.
denied (Minn. Nov. 25, 2003); see Hesse v. Hesse, 778 N.W.2d 98, 104 (Minn. App. 2009)
(applying this aspect of Eisenschenk).
Husband also argues that the district court should have found wife had income-
producing assets related to an inheritance. The district court, however, credited wife’s
testimony at trial that she had no such income because she gave her inheritance money to
8
husband when she agreed to take over the loan to the parties’ son.1 As an appellate court,
we defer to the district court’s credibility determinations. Goldman v. Greenwood, 748
N.W.2d 279, 284 (Minn. 2008).
B. The district court did not penalize husband for marital misconduct; it
was within the court’s discretion to consider conduct-based attorney fees
in the disproportionate award.

Husband argues next that the district court erred in determining that wife was
entitled to conduct-based attorney fees. Husband maintains that the award violates the
statutory prohibition against basing a division of marital property on “marital
misconduct.”2 Minn. Stat. § 518.58, subd. 1. The district court, however, did not base the
determination on husband’s marital misconduct, but on his misconduct in the litigation
process.
A district court impermissibly divides marital property based on “marital
misconduct” under the statute when it makes its findings based on the fault or behavior of
one party during the marriage. Stassen v. Stassen, 351 N.W.2d 20, 23-24 (Minn. App.
1984). In contrast, a district court may award conduct-based attorney fees “based on
behavior occurring during the litigation process.” Geske v. Marcolina, 624 N.W.2d 813,
819 (Minn. App. 2001). Such “[c]onduct-based attorney fees . . . may be awarded against
any party ‘who unreasonably contributes to the length or expense’ of family-law

1 We note that t he district court stated in its posttrial order that it found wife “generally
credible and believable” and found husband “generally incredible and unbelievable.”

2 Minn. Stat. § 518.58, subd. 1, provides in applicable part that “the court shall make a just
and equitable division of the marital property of the parties without regard to marital
misconduct.”
9
proceedings under Minnesota Statutes chapters 518 and 518A.” Baertsch v. Baertsch, 886
N.W.2d 235, 236 (Minn. App. 2016) (quoting Minn. Stat. § 518.14, subd. 1 (2014)). While
these awards are within the district court’s discretion, “[t]he district court must make
findings to explain an award of conduct-based attorney fees.” Brodsky v. Brodsky, 733
N.W.2d 471, 477 (Minn. App. 2007); see also Szarzynski v. Szarzynski, 732 N.W.2d 285,
295 (Minn. App. 2007).
Here, the district court did not consider husband’s fault or behavior toward wife in
the context of their marital relationship. The district court’s findings were based, instead,
on husband’s conduct in the litigation of this case. The court found that “the length and
expense of trial was increased by Husband’s failures of disclosures and repudiation of
multiple agreements on the record.” The district court made specific findings of fact
regarding husband’s conduct during the proceedings, including:
37. The electrical work Husband claimed was
performed by [an electrical contractor] was actually done by
Husband himself. Husband compounded this fraud by asking
its owner . . . to lie in court. [The electrician] refused to lie and
upon being subpoenaed by Wife testified in Court that he never
performed the work, was never paid by Husband, and had
refused Husband’s request that he commit perjury.

. . . .

43. At the beginning of this dissolution action Husband
made written disclosures to Wife in the hopes of procuring a
quick settlement without discovery. Husband failed to disclose
the sum of $19,400 cash he had hidden in a safe at the parties’
cabin property.

The district court also cited husband’s failure to disclose a loan to an acquaintance
and a bank account— nondisclosures that necessitated “subpoenaing and deposing bank
10
and investment records.” The district court noted wife’s evidence that her attorney fees,
which totaled nearly $35,000 before trial even started, were due in part to husband’s
conduct in the litigation.
The only conduct within the marriage that the district court mentioned was
husband’s gambling. However, the court did so not to demonstrate husband’s fault during
the marriage, but to highlight the incompatibility of husband’s reported income with his
gambling losses—these losses ranged from $37,000 to $42,000 for the years 2015 to 2018,
despite husband’s claimed annual income of $25,584. Cf. Stassen, 351 N.W.2d at 24
(affirming the district court’s property division even though the court referenced husband’s
alcohol consumption because the decision was based on nonmarital-misconduct factors).
The court made findings of fact that support its determination that husband
unreasonably increased wife’s litigation costs and expenses. We therefore discern no abuse
of discretion in the district court’s determination that conduct-based attorney fees were
appropriate and in factoring that into the division of the marital estate.
C. The disproportionate division of the marital estate was within the
district court’s broad discretion to allocate marital property.

Husband asserts that, even if the court did not err in making allowances for spousal
maintenance and conduct-based attorney fees in its division of marital property, the extent
of the disparity in the award is inequitable and an abuse of discretion. We disagree.
Husband complains that wife received in her portion of the division a rental property
worth $265,200, noting that the value was nearly equivalent to the approximately $259,000
discrepancy between husband’s and wife’s shares of the marital property. But the district
11
court here credited wife’s testimony that she only agreed to accept that property out of fear
that husband would otherwise evict the parties’ son and sell the property. And “[a] [district]
court has broad discretion in utilizing its equitable powers to achieve a just result in a
marriage dissolution.” Nelson v. Nelson, 384 N.W.2d 468, 474 (Minn. App. 1986); see
also Vinnes, 384 N.W.2d at 592 (stating that an “equitable division does not require equal
division”).
Moreover, the disparate division here—approximately 55%-45% —is consistent
with the scope of disparity upheld in other cases. See Erlandson v. Erlandson, 318 N.W.2d
36, 40 (Minn. 1982) (affirming 54% -46% property division); Gummow v. Gummow, 375
N.W.2d 30, 36 (Minn. App. 1985) (affirming 53%-47% property division); Reynolds v.
Reynolds, 498 N.W.2d 266, 270 (Minn. App. 1993) (affirming 57.5%-42.5% property
division where the district court considered that, “were it not for appellant’s sporadic
employment history and historically low earnings from employment, respondent would
receive greater child support and spousal maintenance” (quotation omitted)). Therefore,
the district court did not abuse its discretion in making the disparate property division in
this case.
II. The district court did not err in its property valuations.
Husband’s second group of arguments revolves around the district court’s valuation
of promissory notes and a bank account awarded to him, as well as the court’s assignment
of a value of $0 to the cash awarded to wife that she had discovered in the safe at their
cabin. A district court’s valuation of an item of property is a finding of fact, and it will not
12
be set aside unless it is clearly erroneous on the record as a whole. Maurer v. Maurer, 623
N.W.2d 604, 606 (Minn. 2001).
A. The district court did not err in its valuation of husband’s promissory
notes.

Husband argues that the district court clearly erred in its valuation of promissory
notes awarded to him because the court utilized the wrong date for valuation. The district
court valued the notes at $126,667, which was the value at the time of husband’s discovery
responses. Husband argues that the district court should have instead valued the notes at
$76,842, which reflects the notes’ value at the time of trial. He cites Minn. Stat. § 518.58,
subd. 1, which states that “[i]f there is a substantial change in value of an asset between the
date of valuation and the final distribution, the court may adjust the valuation of that asset
as necessary to effect an equitable distribution.” Husband also contends that because he
used funds to pay marital expenses, he did not actually benefit from the monies he collected
during the proceedings.
While we review a district court’s property valuations for clear error, we review for
abuse of discretion the district court’s selection of the valuation date. See Grigsby v.
Grigsby, 648 N.W.2d 716, 720 (Minn. App. 2002), rev. denied (Minn. Oct. 15, 2002)
(stating that district courts have “broad discretion in setting the marital property valuation
date”).
The district court found that husband failed to present evidence to support his
contention that husband used the funds collected from the notes to pay marital expenses,
noting inconsistencies in the bank statements. In addition to inconsistencies in the bank
13
statements, husband testified at trial that he did not always deposit what he collected on the
promissory notes and instead cashed some of the checks. Husband testified that he used
some of that cash to play poker. Husband thus failed to document all of the funds he
collected from the notes or that he used all of the funds collected to pay marital expenses;
and we therefore conclude that the district court acted within its discretion in applying the
value of the notes at the time of husband’s discovery responses. See Fick v. Fick , 375
N.W.2d 870, 874 (Minn. App. 1985) (affirming district court’s valuation of bank accounts
at the time of parties’ separation instead of at the time of trial where evidence did not
establish how all the assets had been spent and where husband “exercised dominion over
the property and had discretion over the use of the money”).
B. The district court’s valuation of the Bank of the West account awarded
to husband was not clearly erroneous.

Husband next argues that the district court erred by valuing a Bank of the West
account (the first account) allocated to husband at a value of $32,860 .03. Husband states
that, because this account was closed early in the dissolution proceedings, it should have
been valued at zero. Again, however, the district court’s valuation is supported by the
discrepancies identified by the district court in the account records and adverse inferences
the district court was entitled to draw from that evidence.
In a marital-dissolution proceeding, when parties fail to “make a full and accurate
disclosure of their assets and liabilities,” this failure “justifies inferences adverse to the
party who conceals or evades.” See Bollenbach v. Bollenbach , 175 N.W.2d 148, 155
(Minn. 1970); see Crockarell v. Crockarell, 631 N.W.2d 829, 834 (Minn. App. 2001)
14
(citing this aspect of Bollenbach), rev. denied (Minn. Oct. 16, 2001). The district court
made such an inference here. Husband initially failed to disclose this account in discovery
and did not provide complete bank statements. The court thus based the $32,860.03
valuation on the account’s balance as of February 6, 2019, two days after husband informed
wife that he was divorcing her.
When faced with this nondisclosure, husband claimed that he did not initially
disclose the first account because he used it to pay taxes and the account had been closed.
The district court noted, however, in its order on husband’s posttrial motion, that the
statements for husband’s four accounts at Bank of the West showed that three of those
accounts “were drawn down to $0 at one point or another in the year leading up to the filing
for dissolution,” and that one of the other accounts “had funds transferred into it from this
[first] account that [husband] alleges is empty.”
The district court further elaborated that it did not credit husband’s testimony that
he used multiple accounts “due to fraud in the accounts,” stating “[t]hat explanation seems
less than satisfactory to explain the use of four accounts, all with the same bank, three of
which were drawn to zero within months of each other, particularly with the transfers from
the [first] account to another Bank of the West account.” The court concluded that “[t]he
use of multiple accounts and the transfers back and forth would be suspect in the best of
circumstances,” but that husband’s “lack of credibility exacerbates this problem and his
own disclosures indicate that he was not fully truthful on where those funds went and what
was done with them.”
15
The district court was thus within its authority in making adverse inferences, which
husband failed to refute, and in basing its valuation on credibility findings and the evidence
in the bank statements.
C. The district court did not abuse its discretion in its allocation to wife of
the cash found by wife in a safe at the parties’ cabin.

Finally, husband contends that the district court erred in its accounting of the cash
that wife found in the parties’ cabin and used to pay attorney fees. The parties stipulated
at trial that the $19,400 in cash from the safe was to be allocated to wife. However, in its
dissolution award, the district court listed the cash’s value as $0 and noted that the cash
was used for wife’s attorney fees.
Husband argues that the district court’s listing of the cash at $0 in the division
violated Minnesota law providing that parties to a marriage dissolution owe each other a
fiduciary duty during the pendency of the proceedings. Minn. Stat. § 518.58, subd. 1a
(2022). Based on this fiduciary duty, if a party uses marital assets during the proceedings
for uses “except in the usual course of business or for the necessities of life,” the court
“shall” compensate the other party for such use. Id. The Minnesota Supreme Court has
recognized this court’s holding that paying attorney fees using marital assets violates this
statute and that when such a violation occurs, the “amount taken from marital property to
pay one party’s attorney fees should be accounted for . . . and the other party compensated
in the distribution.” Baker v. Baker, 75 3 N.W.2d 644, 653-54 (Minn. 2008) (quoting
Thomas v. Thomas, 407 N.W.2d 124, 128 (Minn. App. 1987)).
16
Baker, however, is distinguishable. In Baker, the supreme court noted that the
district court had ordered “that each party pay his or her own attorney fees.” Id. at 654. In
contrast, the district court here determined that husband should pay conduct-based attorney
fees and that it would consider such fees in its dissolution order. The district court
emphasized this reasoning in its posttrial order on husband’s motion for amended findings,
stating that it “did not hold wife to account for these funds as they served to cover a portion
of [her attorney fees], which amounted to nearly $35,000 before the trial had even
commenced as a result of the necessity of subpoenaing and deposing bank and investment
records.” While the district court’s methodology of valuing cash at $0 may be unorthodox,
the district court’s rationale—that the funds were being allocated to wife to offset the added
attorney fees incurred by wife as a result of husband’s conduct—is supported by the district
court’s findings and is not an abuse of discretion.
Affirmed.