Fourth Court Reverses Child Support Provision Entered Without Trial-Level Resolution of Amount, but Upholds Most Divorce Injunctions

Lorkovic v. Lorkovic, 04-24-00798-CV, April 29, 2026.

On appeal from 456th District Court, Guadalupe County, Texas

Synopsis

The Fourth Court of Appeals held that a divorce decree may include permanent injunctive protections supported by the pleadings, conservatorship issues, and the trial evidence, even if the decree’s wording does not mirror the oral rendition verbatim. But the court reversed the child-support provision because the amount had not actually been adjudicated at trial; the trial court contemplated later calculation or further hearing, so the final decree could not simply insert a support figure without that issue first being resolved.

Relevance to Family Law

This opinion matters directly to Texas family-law litigators because it sits at the intersection of three recurring decree problems: the scope of permanent injunctions, the relationship between oral rendition and written decree language, and the frequent temptation to “fill in” unresolved child-support terms during decree drafting. In divorce and SAPCR-related litigation, Lorkovic confirms that injunctive provisions tied to pleaded protective relief and the parent-child relationship may survive appellate scrutiny even when the drafting is broader than the exact oral pronouncement, but it also warns that child support is different: if the amount was not truly decided in evidence and rendition, the decree is vulnerable to reversal and remand.

Case Summary

Fact Summary

George and Alexis Lorkovic tried their divorce in a one-day bench trial in Guadalupe County. They had one child together. Alexis’s counterpetition requested, among other relief, a permanent injunction of “No harmful contact with Counterpetitioner.” Temporary orders required George to pay $650 per month in child support and prohibited the parties from coming within 100 feet of each other.

At trial, both parties testified about income, the child, and alleged family violence or threatening behavior. George testified that he received Social Security income and additional Social Security funds attributable to the child, and that he supplemented income with occasional independent-contractor work. Alexis testified that George had shoved and slapped her, had shoved one of her older children, and had caused disruption at the child’s school, including conduct that led to a lockdown. When asked about permanent injunctive relief, she testified that 100 feet had not been enough to make her feel safe and suggested a larger buffer.

At the close of trial, the court orally rendered divorce-related rulings, including joint managing conservatorship, Alexis’s right to designate primary residence, expanded standard possession for George, a “Loving and Caring” order, communication through AppClose, and an order that George never go to Alexis’s residence. The court also said George would be “responsible for child support” and that unreimbursed child expenses would be split 50/50. The court did not orally state a child-support amount.

Several months later, the signed final decree imposed permanent injunctions against George, including prohibitions on physical harm or threats, most communications with Alexis except those relating to the child, coming within 100 feet of Alexis’s residence and place of employment, and interfering with Alexis’s possession of the child. The decree also ordered George to pay $650 per month in child support and stated that the amount complied with the guidelines.

George moved for new trial, arguing that several injunctions exceeded the pleadings or the oral rendition and that the trial court had never ruled on the amount of child support. At the motion hearing, the trial court indicated some decree language should be modified regarding employment restrictions and communications, and it explained that it had expected the parties to calculate child support and bring any disagreement to the court before entry of the final decree. The court also stated that if necessary it could hold a hearing on disputed calculations. No written order granting new trial was signed.

Issues Decided

The Fourth Court addressed these principal issues:

• Whether the permanent injunctions in the final divorce decree were impermissible because they were not supported by Alexis’s pleadings.
• Whether the decree improperly included injunctive terms that did not track the trial court’s oral rendition.
• Whether the decree’s child-support award could stand when the trial court had not actually adjudicated the amount at trial and instead contemplated later calculation or further proceedings.
• Whether statements made at the motion-for-new-trial hearing altered the appellate analysis in the absence of a written order granting new trial.

Rules Applied

The court applied familiar but important principles governing family-law judgments and decrees:

• A judgment must conform to the pleadings. See Tex. R. Civ. P. 301.
• In family-law cases, injunctive provisions may be supported not only by explicit requests for injunctive relief, but also by pleadings and issues necessarily tied to conservatorship, possession, access, and the protection of parties and children.
• A written decree is the operative judgment, but it may not adjudicate substantive matters that were never actually decided.
• Oral rendition and subsequent written decrees are often compared to determine whether the decree merely memorializes the ruling or instead adds new substantive relief.
• Child support requires an actual adjudication of the amount based on evidence or a proper post-trial determination; a decree cannot insert a support amount merely because a temporary order used that figure or because the court generally intended support to be paid.
• A trial court’s oral comments at a post-judgment hearing do not, without a signed written order, operate as an order granting new trial.

Although the provided excerpt does not include the entire authorities discussion, the opinion’s reasoning reflects the standard Texas distinction between permissible decree detail and impermissible substantive expansion, with special sensitivity to support obligations because they require an adjudicated amount, not just a general obligation.

Application

On the injunctions, the Fourth Court drew a practical line. It first concluded that the decree’s prohibition against causing physical contact, bodily injury, or threats of imminent bodily injury was supported by Alexis’s pleading for “No harmful contact” and by her trial testimony describing physical abuse and safety concerns. That was enough to satisfy Rule 301 as to the core personal-protection relief.

For the remaining injunctions, the court viewed them through the broader lens of the divorce and conservatorship record. The trial evidence concerned the parties’ conflict, communication problems, school-related disruption, denial of possession, and concerns about interference with the child. In that setting, provisions restricting communications to child-related matters, barring George from Alexis’s residence, and preventing interference with Alexis’s possession of the child were treated as sufficiently anchored to the issues tried and to the court’s authority to structure workable post-divorce boundaries. The appellate court was not persuaded that every variance between oral rendition and decree language constituted reversible error. In substance, the decree’s injunctive protections fit the relief the court had announced and the problems the evidence showed.

The child-support analysis was materially different. The Fourth Court focused on the absence of an actual trial-level resolution of the amount. The trial judge had orally said George would be “responsible for child support,” but had not rendered a number. At the later hearing, the judge confirmed that the parties were expected to calculate support themselves and, if they disagreed, present competing calculations or return for a hearing. Those comments undercut any suggestion that the amount had already been adjudicated. Because the amount remained open, the decree’s insertion of $650 per month was not a ministerial reduction of a prior ruling to writing; it was an unresolved substantive term. On that point, reversal was required.

Just as importantly, the absence of a signed written order granting new trial did not save or change the support ruling. The appellate court did not treat the trial court’s oral comments as having formally granted a new trial. Instead, it looked to whether the decree itself reflected a child-support amount that had been validly decided. It had not.

Holding

The court affirmed the permanent injunctions in substance. It held that the pleaded request for harmful-contact relief, together with the evidence presented at trial, supported the personal-protection injunction, and that the remaining decree restrictions relating to communication, proximity, and interference with possession were not reversible on the record presented.

The court rejected the argument that the injunctions necessarily failed because they did not mirror the oral rendition word for word. The written decree, viewed in context, did not warrant reversal simply because the language was more detailed than the oral pronouncement.

The court reversed the child-support provision. It held that while the trial court intended George to pay child support, the amount had not been adjudicated at trial, and the court’s own later comments confirmed that further calculation or a further hearing was contemplated. Because the decree supplied a support amount that had not been resolved, that portion of the judgment could not stand.

The case was therefore affirmed in part and reversed and remanded in part, with remand limited to further proceedings on child support.

Practical Application

For trial lawyers, Lorkovic is a decree-drafting case disguised as an appellate opinion. Its most immediate lesson is that injunctions are safest when they are expressly pleaded, tied to specific trial evidence, and connected to conservatorship administration or party safety. If your client wants no-contact provisions, school or workplace exclusion zones, or communication restrictions, plead them specifically. That said, the opinion is useful for appellees because it recognizes that family-law decrees are not drafted in a vacuum; where the pleadings, testimony, and conservatorship issues fairly put protective restrictions in play, appellate courts may uphold those provisions even when the decree is more precise or expansive than the oral shorthand used at rendition.

On child support, however, practitioners should assume zero tolerance for ambiguity. A court’s oral statement that a parent “will pay child support” is not enough if the amount, net resources, credits, deviations, and start date remain unsettled. If the amount is to be calculated later, get a written bifurcation, a subsequent evidentiary setting, or a clear on-the-record stipulation. Otherwise, decree entry becomes a trap: what one side characterizes as “ministerial drafting” may actually be an unadjudicated support term subject to reversal.

This case also underscores the importance of using the motion-for-new-trial hearing carefully. Trial-court comments can create a record showing that a term was never finally decided, which may help on appeal. But unless those comments are reduced to a signed written order, they do not themselves grant new trial or alter the judgment. In practice, if the judge says the decree needs modification or a matter needs further hearing, counsel should leave the courtroom with a signed order, a signed amended judgment, or at minimum a firm reset and written directive.

For family-law litigators handling decrees after bench trial, Lorkovic suggests three strategic habits:

• Treat injunction language as trial relief, not boilerplate.
• Treat child-support numbers as adjudicative facts, not drafting details.
• Treat oral clarification hearings as incomplete until memorialized in a signed order.

Checklists

Pleading and Proving Permanent Injunctions

• Plead specific injunctive relief, not just generalized requests for “equitable relief.”
• Include requested restrictions on:
• harmful or threatening contact
• communications
• residence access
• workplace or school proximity
• interference with possession or access
• Tie requested injunctions to conservatorship, safety, and best-interest allegations.
• Develop testimony showing why each requested restriction is necessary and workable.
• Create a record of prior violations of temporary orders, school disruptions, harassment, or interference with possession.
• Ask for clear oral rendition of each requested restraint at the close of trial.

Protecting the Decree During Drafting

• Compare the proposed decree line by line against:
• the live pleadings
• the oral rendition
• the evidence actually admitted
• Distinguish between clarifying language and new substantive relief.
• If adding detail to an injunction, make sure the added detail can be justified as implementing relief already tried and rendered.
• Circulate a redline showing where each decree provision came from.
• Object in writing to decree language that adds obligations or restrictions not adjudicated.
• Request a decree-entry hearing if the parties dispute whether language is ministerial or substantive.

Locking Down Child Support Before Final Decree

• Prove net resources with admissible evidence.
• Address Social Security benefits carefully, including any derivative benefits paid for the child.
• Obtain an express ruling on:
• monthly net resources
• guideline percentage
• credits or offsets
• any deviation from guidelines
• the exact monthly support amount
• the start date
• medical support and unreimbursed expenses
• If the court wants counsel to calculate the amount later, ask the court to:
• defer final judgment on support expressly
• sign an interim order
• set a follow-up hearing
• Do not allow a final decree to recite that support complies with the guidelines unless the amount was actually adjudicated or stipulated.

Using Post-Judgment Hearings Strategically

• If the court orally agrees that the decree should be modified, present a written order immediately.
• If the court indicates additional evidence or calculations are needed, request a signed order setting the issue for hearing.
• Preserve the reporter’s record of all post-judgment clarifications.
• Do not rely on oral comments alone to establish that a new trial was granted.
• If the court’s comments reveal an unresolved substantive issue, frame that issue clearly in the appellate record.

Appellate Preservation for the Complaining Party

• File a timely motion for new trial identifying each challenged decree provision.
• Specify whether the complaint is:
• lack of pleading support
• variance from oral rendition
• absence of evidentiary support
• insertion of an unadjudicated substantive term
• Obtain a hearing and make the trial court explain whether the disputed term was previously decided.
• Request a ruling or signed order when possible.
• On appeal, separate complaints about injunctions from complaints about support; they are analyzed differently.
• Ask for partial reversal and remand where the defect affects only a severable decree provision, such as child support.

Citation

Lorkovic v. Lorkovic, No. 04-24-00798-CV, 2026 WL ___ (Tex. App.—San Antonio Apr. 29, 2026, no pet.) (mem. op.).

Full Opinion

Read the full opinion here

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