Where the court was dividing up assets derived from a personal injury settlement worth $1.8 million, dissipation in the amount of injury settlement worth $1.8 million, dissipation in the amount of $7,800 used in trips and gifts involving respondent’s girlfriend and in unaccounted-for expenditures would not necessarily materially effect the division of property; there was no abuse of the trial court’s discretion in failing to find respondent’s dissipation of assets required a major charge against his share of marital property.  In re Murphy

Assignment
 Where one party is substantially responsible for the creation of the debt and has a substantially greater capacity to earn money, it is not an abuse of discretion for the trial court to assign the overwhelming majority of debt to that party.  In re Werries
Contingent Liabilities
 Contingent liabilities are not fairly treated as marital debt.  Blackstone v. Blackstone
Dual Responsibility
 The trial court determination that wife should not be responsible for the parties’ staggering debt, including the $300,000 debt to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), which included $80,000 in penalties and interest, was an abuse of the trial court’s discretion as both ineffective and unrealistic where the court specifically found wife was a party to the irresponsible, overindulgent, and lavish lifestyle established during the marriage.  In re Dumseth
Equal Division
 Where the partners to a marriage accumulate debts exceeding the value of their assets, then that debt must be distributed equitably, the same as marital assets.  In re Simmons
Excess of Assets
 An award of $10,000 in marital property out of a marital estate in which the debts appeared to exceed the assets was upheld.  In re DeGironemo
Reimbursement
 Because marital debts exceeded the value of the marital property when husband left the marital home, the court’s refusal to order husband to reimburse wife for one-half of the marital debts which exceeded the value of marital property resulted in substantial injustice to wife and constituted an abuse of discretion.  In re Simmons
Tax Liability
 Portion of tax liability for spouse’s income earned prior to dissolution was a marital liability; fact that parties were living separately did not change marital nature of their income, nor marital nature of income tax liability on that income, although the incurring of penalties and interest by one party may be deemed dissipation of assets.  In re Charles

 The general rule is that, in a divorce proceeding, the court will not transfer to the wife, who has prevailed in the suit, the fee-simple title to real estate of which the husband is seized unless the wife shows special circumstances and existing equities which justify it.  Ylonen v. Ylonen
 Where special circumstances exists, a court of equity may, in a divorce proceeding, divest the defendant husband of his interest in real estate and award it to the wife.  Harwood v. Harwood
 While courts in divorce actions are empowered to determine the property rights of the parties solely upon the basis of equitable ownership and regardless of fault in the dissolution of the marriage, special circumstances and existing equities sufficient to justify the conveyance are required to be alleged in the complaint and established by the evidence.  Persico v. Persico
 Under a similar prior provision, in order to warrant the court to direct a conveyance of property from one party to the other, there must have been special circumstances and existing to justify the conveyance, and such special circumstances and equities must have been alleged in the complaint.  Skoronski v. Skoronski
 In a divorce action, under former section 18 of the Divorce Act, the court could compel the conveyance of property held by one party which in equity belonged to the other, and could adjust the equities of the parties in any property owned by them jointly; in order to warrant directing the conveyance of property belonging to one to the other, there had to be special circumstances and existing equities justifying the conveyance, and such special circumstances and equities had to be alleged in the complaint and established by the proof.  Podgornik v. Podgornik

Diversion of Funds
 Trial judge denied wife’s motion to stay a divorce action until separate actions the wife filed against her husband and others were resolved, even though the wife claimed in her separate actions that the husband had diverted funds from a corporation she owned and that the husband’s action affected the parties’ marital property.  Partipilo v. Partipilo
Personal Injury
 A separate trial within the dissolution proceeding to decide the issue of damages claimed for transmission of a sexually transmitted disease is not authorized by this Act; the proper method of obtaining such relief would be a separate personal injury action. Foran v. Foran
Consolidation of Action
 Chancery court could have considered that, in the absence of any action seeking to reopen 1973 domestic relations case in 1983, nothing was pending in which transfer or consolidation to domestic relations division of divorce action would have been proper.  In re Mercer
Trusts
 Where the wife’s eligibility to receive a portion of a trust was an expectancy contingent upon the discretion of the trustee or upon his intestate death and not a realization, the circuit court erred when it apportioned the interest to her as a current asset.  In re Eddy

Savings Account
 Respondent was not entitled to a credit on the parties’ savings since his act of commingling his pre-marital savings with marital savings transmuted the funds into marital property.  In re Schriner
Traceability
 Wife was entitled to have her $9,000 reimbursed from husband’s non-marital estate because such amount was retraceable by clear and convincing evidence and not intended to be a gift.  In re Snow
 Commingling non-marital property with newly acquired marital property did not transmute the non-marital property into marital property where the amount injected into the marital account was ascertainable and did not result in a loss of identity.  In re Landfield
Confidentiality
 Disallowing ex-wife’s attorney’s participation in an in camera hearing regarding ex-husband’s claimed credits against trust property was not an abuse of discretion; where ex-wife had fled the jurisdiction with their child, ex-husband did not want to reveal progress of his search for his son to ex-wife’s attorneys.  In re Kriegman

Art Objects
 Where alleged commingling was with clearly identifiable and traceable art objects which did not lose their individual identity upon remaining in husband’s business inventory after marriage, the trial court properly held that the disputed personal property was originally non-marital property and retained that status even after the marriage.  In re Crouch
Business
A business begun in 1960 by the parties was marital property because the parties’ business was commingled and intertwined with father’s business following his death, and the trial court erred in its finding that $193,571, which was the book value of the stock inherited by the husband and held in the husband’s name alone, was non-marital property.  In re Jones
Cash Management Account
A cash management account, initially opened entirely with inherited assets, is considered a non-marital asset; however, the subsequent commingled marital and non-marital property resulted in a loss of identity of the initial contributed estate, therefore preventing the differentiation of marital and non-marital assets and the account was thus considered a marital asset.  In re Davis
Gifts
Trial court did not err in determining that the husband’s transfer of a joint tenancy account to the wife was a gift that was presumed to be non-marital property despite the fact that the property was presumed to be marital under 750 ILCS 5/503(b)(1); where the husband and wife presented conflicting testimony regarding the husband’s donatives intent, it was for the trial court to make the credibility determination.
 Even if transfer gifts from husband’s parents were considered to be non-marital property, i.e., gifts to husband individually and not to the marriage, the funds lost their identity when they were invested in the marital house; that commingling resulted in a transmutation of the funds into the classification of the estate receiving the contribution (the house), which was marital property.  In re Schmidt
Home Construction
Trial court erred in ruling that the parties’ home was non-marital property of husband where the husband claimed in his testimony that some $87,000 of his non-marital property went into the construction of a home which he testified cost some $145,000 to $150,000 to construct and, although the construction cost was disputed by the wife, it was clear that the balance of the funds were not shown to have come from non-marital sources and in addition, there was no evidence that even the funds which the husband sought to trace from property owned by him before the marriage were kept separate and distinct and solely used for the parties’ residence.  In re Amato
Purchase of Real Property
While one residence was acquired in part with proceeds from the sale of another residence, which petitioner contended was non-marital property, marital funds were also used and so there was a commingling of funds; therefore, residence was deemed marital property.  In re Van Ness
Although at the time of parties’ marriage, home was husband’s non-marital asset, payment of mortgage with marital assets consisting of husband’s income during the marriage, caused a commingling of marital and non-marital assets and transmuted the entire property into marital property.  In re Smith
Where substantial marital property was diverted to enhancement of resident purchased prior to marriage, there had been a commingling of marital property and non-marital property which served to transmute the entire property into marital property.  In re Lee
Where respondent’s non-marital funds were used in conjunction with parties’ marital funds to purchase real property, the real property was marital property.  In re Schriner

 When equitably apportioning the marital property of the parties, trial courts are to treat as marital property the workers’ compensation award of an injured spouse, provided the award arose out of a claim accruing during the marriage.  In re Thomas
 A workers’ compensation award is marital property if the claim thereto accrues during the marriage, regardless of when received.  In re Dettore

 Real property purchased by the parties during their marriage was properly classified as marital property, notwithstanding that the funds used to purchase the property were traceable entirely to the husband’s non-marital assets, since the property was transmuted into marital property when it was placed in joint tenancy by the husband.  In re Gattone
 Property designated as non-marital pursuant to exceptions in this Act may still be presumptively transmuted into marital property by the affirmative act of the contributing spouse.  In re Hagshenas

 As to newly acquired property, clear and convincing evidence is required to show that it has been acquired in exchange for non-marital property in order to classify it as non-marital property, and any doubts must be resolved in favor of finding that the property is marital.  In re Eddy
 There is a legislative preference for classifying property as marital.  In re Rink
 Where real property in question was placed jointly in the names of the parties before their first marriage was declared invalid, such was presumptively marital property.  In re Flatow

 Given the equitableness of property distribution, it could not be concluded that the trial court was prejudiced against husband where those portions of the record which the husband claimed demonstrated bias against him merely represented attempts by the trial court to either clarify testimony or further the progression of the trial.  In re Randall