That fact has not been in dispute by either party, so readers in Missouri may wonder why that is significant. But the decision by the Tennessee Court of Appeals in April to recognize a ruling by a Texas court means that the man's home state officially recognize that his signature on the boy's birth certificate is a fiction. This could give the mother leverage in negotiating a shared child custody plan, something both sides say they want, though they have not agreed on who should get most of the parenting time.
]]> The man says the mother approached him and his wife to take the child while she was pregnant because she could not afford to keep him. Instead of going through the adoption process, they agreed to have the man pose as the child's biological father and sign the birth certificate, then raise the child, according to the man. He says that the mother changed her mind after 15 months and that giving the boy back to his mother now would be disruptive for him.The mother says that she never agreed to give up her son and that the man signed the birth certificate and took the child without her consent. She obtained a ruling in Texas acknowledging that the man is not the boy's biological father, but until recently, Tennessee refused to honor that decision.
Now it appears that the mother has the legal advantage due to her biological relationship with the boy, though the man has been raising him for six years.
Source: Kingsport Times-News, "Custody fight over Maryville boy continues," Sheila Burke, May 17, 2012
]]>When most of us in St. Louis hear that a couple with children is getting a divorce, we may assume that the children will spend most of their time living with their mother, who would then receive financial support from the father. With Mother's Day just behind us, now is a good time to consider that trend.
]]> The survey, conducted by the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, also reported that 47 percent of divorce attorneys have seen more women either agreeing to pay spousal support to their ex-husbands or being ordered to do so by the court. Both this and the similar child support trend indicate that, more and more, women are acting as the primary breadwinner in two-parent households.This trend indicates that, while women still frequently earn less than their male colleagues for the same work, there are many families where the wife out earns the husband. When the marriage ends, courts generally find that the primary earner should continue to support the child financially.
It also suggests that more fathers are asking for and receiving primary child custody after divorce, which seems to go against claims by some observers that child custody decisions are biased against fathers.
Source: Huffington Post, "This Mother's Day, More Moms Paying Child Support," Ken Altshuler, May 12, 2012
]]>The shelter said in a recent news article that it provided beds for 776 alleged victims of physical and sexual abuse last year for a total of 9,404 nights, a 14 percent increase in hours over 2010. True North's executive director said that the poor economy and a growing population in Columbia contributed to the increased need for services, which came as the shelter experienced a 3.6 percent drop in revenue.
]]> The national study found that those staying in shelters to escape violence reported more serious abuse 58 percent of the time compared with previous years. The executive director said that women often are forced to stay with an abusive partner because she cannot afford to move out. "If money is tight, they may have to stay and take the abusive lifestyle," she said.Local law enforcement reports a 12.3 increase in domestic violence calls in 2011. A detective with the police department downplayed the role finances played in the increase, though he seemed to cite anecdotal evidence to support his theory. He said that when he started on the Columbia police force, men accused of abuse tended to be the household's income earner, but that now the women are often the breadwinners.
Source: Columbia Tribune, "Shelter cites rise in domestic violence," Brennan David, May 7, 2012
]]>In the 1950s and '60s, many middle-class households were based on the nuclear family model of the husband who works outside the home and the wife who is a homemaker. According to a professor from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business, when women began having careers of their own, many couples entering this new reality found they could no longer get along.
]]> The professor said that many people who would make a good spouse in a traditional household may not do as well in a two-income family. That, along with reforms making it easier to obtain a divorce, led to a sharp increase in divorce in the late 1960s and '70s.But over time, men and women came of age in an era when women working outside the home was no longer strange or a challenge to old-fashioned ideas about gender roles. That may explain the lower number of people in certain age ranges who reported being "ever divorced" from 1996 to 2009. In the earlier survey, 34.1 percent of men aged 40 to 49 said they had been through divorce. By 2009, only 28.5 percent of those in that age range had been divorced.
The numbers were similar for women, with 37 percent of 40-somthings having been divorced in 1996 versus 31 percent in 2009.
Source: CNBC, "As Two-Income Family Model Matures, Divorce Rate Falls," David Milstead, May 7, 2012
]]>"There is no way I would agree for my kids to go there and stay there," the mother said.
]]> The parents were married from 1996 to 2008, splitting their time between the U.S. and Gaza. When they divorced, the child custody order granted physical custody to the father and visitation time for the mother. Another provision did not allow the father to take the children, currently 13, 10, and 9, out of the country without the mother's permission.The father says that he received permission from his former wife to move the children to Gaza. But she says that she only agreed to have him take them to his sister's wedding in February. An email from his former husband appears to say that he had made arrangements for the children to return.
Complicating this child custody dispute is the fact that Gaza is not a party to the Hague Convention on international child abduction. According to a news report about the case, family law in Gaza is based on Sharia law, which tends to grant legal custody of children to the father and limit the mother's physical custody rights until the children are 9 in the case of boys and 12 for girls. Officials in the U.S. have charged the father with aggravated interference with parental custody and fleeing to avoid prosecution, but it is unlikely that Hamas officials will arrest him.
Source: Washington Post, "US authorities claim divorced father illegally moved 3 children from Kansas to his native Gaza," May 2, 2012
]]>Like in years past when spouses would hire a private detective to follow their husband or wife around, the spy technology is used to gather evidence that could be useful in a divorce or child custody proceeding. These include phone taps to capture the spouse's calls, teddy bears with cameras hidden inside -- even eyeglasses with cameras. The manager of a gadget shop said his store had sold a dozen pairs of the spy glasses in just a few days. He predicted that most of them would be used by parents locked in child custody disputes.
]]> The legality of using these devices is uncertain. While a spouse may not face criminal charges, he or she could be sued for invasion of privacy if the equipment is used in a place where the other spouse has a reasonable expectation of privacy, according to a family law attorney interviewed in the article. He discouraged people going through divorce from trying to play spy. "The bottom line is that if it doesn't feel right, it's probably not right," he said.Right or not, an invasion of privacy lawsuit can cost you more than you might have gotten in the divorce settlement. Another attorney said a client sued his former wife after discovering a recording device that she had sewn into their son's jeans. After the trial, the former wife was ordered to pay $10,000 in damages, plus attorney fees and court costs.
Source: Houston Chronicle, "Spy gadgets infiltrate divorces as domestic snooping booms," Mike Tolson, April 29, 2012
]]>The boy lives with his mother in St. Joseph, but travelled to St. Louis Children's Hospital for treatment. He was discharged the afternoon of April 24. His father, who showed up to the hospital, took him from his room and called the boy's mother to tell him he was taking him. The mother has primary custody of the boy and the parents have been fighting over their custody arrangement.
]]> The mother contacted police, who issued an Amber Alert. Authorities said the father was driving a silver sedan with California license plates. They tracked the vehicle to a town in suburban Chicago early in the morning of April 25 and arrested the father. The boy was unharmed but taken to a local hospital as a precaution.The boy suffers from cardiomyopathy, a thickening of the heart muscle. His mother recently placed him on a heart transplant list. He had been hooked up to an IV distributing medication when his father took him, but the bag had only one day's worth of medicine in it, new reports said.
Cases like this show that, while child custody disputes can be frustrating at times, taking your child in defiance of the law is never a good idea.
Source: Chicago Tribune, "Ailing boy kidnapped from Missouri hospital found safe in Alsip," William Lee, April 25, 2012
]]>According to news reports, there is a clause in the divorce decree that says each must keep all "intimate, personal and/or private information about the other party" between themselves. Interestingly, the clause specifically refers to "details of their personal and/or sexual relationships." Whether either Millán or his wife actually committed infidelity during their 18-year marriage is a matter of speculation.
]]> As is what evidence Millán's former wife might have of the "Dog Whisperer" star doing something embarrassing. The clause prohibits the release of any "photograph, film, videotape [or] recording ... which is not commercially available" that relates to possible cheating.Millán's former wife could lose a great deal in alimony if she violates the confidentiality clause. The divorce filing says that she will receive $23,000 per month in spousal support, along with a lump-sum payment of $400,000. Millán will also pay $10,000 per month in child support for the couple's two sons.
The couple was married in 1994. They separated in 2010, so this settlement was a long time coming.
Millán is the former owner of a dog rehabilitation center that focused on taming aggressive dogs. His show "Dog Whisperer" aired on National Geographic Channel for seven years before moving to Nat Geo WILD this season.
Source: Fox News, "Dog Whisperer Facing Big Payout in Divorce," April 23, 2012
]]>Readers of this St. Louis family law blog may recall our posts about Rep. Walsh's alleged child support bill, most recently on Nov. 10. Last summer, the former wife of the first-term congressman from Illinois accused him of falling $117,437 in child support despite having ample income to make the payments.
]]> At the time, Walsh acknowledged owing some child support money, but not as much as the former wife claims. He also said that he could not afford to pay due to a fairly low income before he was elected to Congress. But in her lawsuit, the former wife claimed that Walsh loaned $35,000 to his 2010 campaign. She filed the suit soon after he was elected, though the dispute had gone on for years after their 2002 divorce.Of the couple's three children, two are now adults and the third is 17. But though the child support order no longer applies to two of the children, parents with primary custody may continue to pursue unpaid child support until the state's statute of limitation expires. In Missouri, the statute of limitations is 10 years from last recorded payment or some other form of revival of the order.
In the statement, released in both parents' names, Walsh and his former wife said they "mad our share of mistakes over the years," but said they have made good on those mistakes. "[W]e now agree that Joe ... does not owe child support," the statement continued. How much Walsh paid to settle the debt was not disclosed.
Source: Chicago Sun-Times, "Rep. Joe Walsh says child-support dispute with ex-wife is resolved," Abdon Pallasch, April 19, 2012
]]>Readers of this St. Louis family law blog may recall our posts about Rep. Walsh's alleged child support bill, most recently on Nov. 10. Last summer, the former wife of the first-term congressman from Illinois accused him of falling $117,437 in child support despite having ample income to make the payments.
]]> At the time, Walsh acknowledged owing some child support money, but not as much as the former wife claims. He also said that he could not afford to pay due to a fairly low income before he was elected to Congress. But in her lawsuit, the former wife claimed that Walsh loaned $35,000 to his 2010 campaign. She filed the suit soon after he was elected, though the dispute had gone on for years after their 2002 divorce.Of the couple's three children, two are now adults and the third is 17. But though the child support order no longer applies to two of the children, parents with primary custody may continue to pursue unpaid child support until the state's statute of limitation expires. In Missouri, the statute of limitations is 10 years from last recorded payment or some other form of revival of the order.
In the statement, released in both parents' names, Walsh and his former wife said they "mad our share of mistakes over the years," but said they have made good on those mistakes. "[W]e now agree that Joe ... does not owe child support," the statement continued. How much Walsh paid to settle the debt was not disclosed.
Source: Chicago Sun-Times, "Rep. Joe Walsh says child-support dispute with ex-wife is resolved," Abdon Pallasch, April 19, 2012
]]>As we will discuss in more detail in our next blog post, the father in the custody dispute did not establish paternity of the child by signing her birth certificate within 15 days as required by state law. But when the girl's mother put her up for adoption, the man objected and intervened, claiming to be the biological father.
]]> The man eventually gained custody of the girl, but if the current bill had been law at the time, he may not have been able to halt the adoption. The bill seeks to allow adoptions without the consent of fathers who do not have a "consistent and substantial relationship" with their child. It was written by members of the American Academy of Adoption Attorneys to clarify what fathers who wish to stop an adoption must do to establish a custody claim, according to one of its authors.The bill defines "consistent and substantial relationship" by setting out several criteria. These include evidence that the father provided consistent financial support while the mother was pregnant, including medical care; paid child support once the child was born; and established regular contact such as visitation. If a father has not signed the birth certificate, he would have to file with the punitive father's registry and file a paternity action, as well as begin assuming financial and custodial duties as soon as possible.
The bill has some critics, including those who say it would interfere with father-child relationships or possibly cause men who did not know they had fathered a child to get out of child support payments.
Source: KMOX-TV, "Fathers of Illegitimate Children Would Lose Rights to Adoption," Josie Butler, April 10, 2012
]]>Though this appears to be the end of their seven-year marriage, it looks like Lopez and Anthony will remain in each other's lives for some time. First, of course, is the fact that they will remain co-parents of their 4-year-old son and daughter. But a couple of business partnerships the two entered into when they were still together may ensure a fairly close relationship -- just not a familial one.
]]> One is the realty television series "Q'Viva!" The talent competition features Anthony, Lopez and a third judge travelling to Latin American countries to judge singers, dancers and other would-be entertainers, with the winners starring in a live show in Las Vegas. Lopez and Anthony also started a clothing line that is sold at Kohl's Department stores.It is not always easy to retain a cordial relationship between former spouses. But when there is a family-owned business -- or, more commonly, children -- exes must find a way to be able to communicate and find a method to resolve conflicts. Lopez and Anthony appear to have found a way to have a relationship despite their impending divorce.
It may help that both have begun dating again. Both have been spotted with their new, younger dating partners in public.
Source: Fox News, "Marc Anthony Officially Files for Divorce from Jennifer Lopez," Kacy Capobres, April 12, 2012
]]>Current Missouri law stipulates that mothers may surrender their children at a safe haven, such as a hospital, police station or fire station up to five days after the child is born. The child enters the custody of the state after the surrender. Those women will not face any criminal sanctions, and they will remain anonymous. Those who surrender their children after five days face reduced criminal charges associated with child abandonment.
]]> Advocates say that those provisions are unclear and unfair to mothers who may find themselves in desperate situations. Other states' safe haven laws accommodate mothers who choose to surrender their children up to 45 days after birth. Physicians say that the Missouri law is too complicated because they are generally unable to determine the exact age of a child; a 6-day-old child looks remarkably similar to one that is only five days old. Advocates are urging lawmakers to extend the safe haven provisions to prevent misunderstandings such as the one that led to the charges against that 19-year-old Ellisville woman.The woman named in the case faces at least five years of prison time if she is convicted of abandoning her child and could be sentenced to as many as 15 years. The woman, who had hidden the pregnancy, gave birth alone in a basement laundry room, and she immediately left the child beneath a tree. The Department of Social Services has assumed custody of the baby.
Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch, "Missouri rethinking safe haven law," Nancy Cambria, March 14, 2012
]]>The man, an attorney and official with a local university, divorced his wife in 2002. The couple had substantial marital assets and it took until 2006 for them to arrive at a settlement. Among the valuable assets was a retirement account the couple had with Madoff's firm that was valued at $5.4 million. The couple agreed to let the former husband keep the account in exchange for a $2.7 million payment to the former wife.
]]> In 2009, after Madoff's massive fraud was exposed, the ex-husband learned that the retirement account "never actually existed," he said. He sued his former wife on the theory that the spouses made the settlement on the mistaken belief that the account contained millions of dollars, a legal principle known as mutual mistake.The case reached the court of appeals, which ruled unanimously for the former wife on April 3. The court found that the couple's financial settlement was carefully researched and negotiated, indicating that voiding or amending the settlement was not appropriate. Though the former husband later learned that the account was never as valuable as Madoff had told him, the loss was like a valuable asset that unexpectedly lost value though the fault of no one, the court held.
Source: Reuters, "Divorce attorney can't recoup Madoff fraud losses," Dan Wiessner, April 3, 2012
]]>The other type of custody is known as legal custody. Legal custody refers to which parent will make major decisions about the child's upbringing. Sometimes, only one parent is in the picture and has sole legal custody, but often the parents share legal custody following divorce or separation. These include questions such as what school the child will go to and what religion he or she will be raised in, if any.
]]> Religious questions are very personal, and courts generally stay out of the matter. But in a recent case in Tennessee, the court of appeals recently upheld a decision to charge a woman on two counts of criminal contempt for her decision to baptize her children despite her ex-husband's objections.Both parents are Christian, though they belong to different Protestant denominations. The father believed that he and the mother should wait to baptize the children, both of whom are under 6, until they are older and better able to understand the significance of the ceremony. When the couple divorced, the father had added to the parenting plan an order preventing the mother from having the baptisms done without his consent. The order required the couple to enter mediation if they cannot agree on this sort of major religious question regarding the children's upbringing.
But the mother had the children baptized anyway and now faces criminal contempt charges. She appealed the decision to bring charges but the appellate court upheld the decision. They said the charges do not reflect the courts favoring one religion over another but the state's interest in upholding a court order.
If convicted, the mother could serve up to 20 days in jail and a $100 fine.
Source: New York Daily News, "Tennessee mom faces jail for baptizing her two children without husband's consent," April 1, 2012
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