Albert Whitney Coburn v. Lara Brooke Seefeldt

Whether the Fourteenth Amendment permits a state court to impose civil contempt for nonpayment without making the ability-to-pay findings required by Turner v. Rogers and Bearden v. Georgia, even when the court openly admits it lacks the financial information necessary to determine ability to comply.

Whether the Consumer Credit Protection Act (CCPA), 15 U.S.C. § 1673, preempts a state court contempt order enforcing an obligation that requires withholding far in excess of federal garnishment limits, despite Congress’s express prohibition on any court making or enforcing an order that violates those limits.

Whether a state court may impose contempt sanctions for nonpayment of private school tuition after the State’s Title IV-D agency has refused to enforce that obligation as child support under federal law, and where the state court simultaneously classified the same obligation as both “not child support” (to avoid federal protections) and “child support” (to impose contempt).

Whether a state court may compel a parent to fund private school tuition for a disabled child—at a school not bound by IDEA—without evaluating educational necessity, appropriateness, efficacy, or the child’s right to a Free Appropriate Public Education under federal law. PARTIES TO THE PROCEEDING Petitioner is Albert Whitney Cobum, appellant in the Washington Court of Appeals and petitioner in the Washington Supreme Court. Respondent is Lara Brooke Seefeldt, respondent in the Washington Court of Appeals and respondent in the Washington Supreme Court.