Florida Divorce * Child Custody * Domestic Violence Law Lawyer | Boynton Beach

Turkish Man living in France seeks to marry and bring a Turkish Woman to live with him in France.

Only that particular Woman had been accepted to college and has her heart set on attending.

So the Man promises the Woman that she will be able to go to university after the marriage.

So the Woman marries the Man.

But he does not allow the Woman to go to college.

In fact, he literally locks Woman inside the house in France.

To do housework.

Woman returns to Turkey and files for divorce.

Woman alleges that Husband is violent and that his family mistreats her.

The Court grants the divorce and, concluding that this case is not that different from a case of physical violence:

• orders alimony for Woman
• orders actual damages for Man’s “social violence” toward Woman
• orders emotional damages for Man’s “social violence” toward Woman

Read more in this Hurriyet [Turkey] Daily News article: Man found guilty of ’social violence’.

Financial columnists recommend the less than romantic activity of reviewing each other’s credit reports before tying the knot again.

Overlooked or forgotten accounts with an ex-spouse can rear their ugly heads even after a divorce.

Times two can make for a double whammy.

Before the marriage is the time to address these issues squarely and assess what you’re getting into.

Truth be told, checking your credit report is a pretty good idea during the divorce as well.

Read more in this Pittsburgh Post-Gazette article: Family Finances: Know how credit impacts your marriage.

Husband and Wife married twenty-seven years.

Husband, former CEO of corporation, convicted of accounting fraud.

Husband ordered to pay over $3 billion as restitution.

Divorce filed. Uncontested.

In divorce settlement, Husband sells home to Wife for $10.

Prosecutors seek to intervene, contending that Husband bought assets using fraudulently procured funds and Husband should not be able to shield them through a sham divorce.

This is the latest in a veritable rash of reportedly sham divorces that authorities or private corporations have sought to intervene in to preserve access to allegedly misappropriated assets.

Read more in this American Bar Association Journal article: Feds Intervene in Exec’s Divorce, Argue It’s a Ruse to Avoid $3.3B Restitution.

Consciously or unconsciouly, one or both parents in divorce sometimes draw their children into the following roles:

1. Spy on the Other Parent
2. Side-Taker against the Other Parent
3. Messengers to the Other Parent
4. Partner or Confidante
5. Household Finances Stretcher
6. Teenager Peer
7. Spoiled as Compensation
8. Pawns in Visitation and Custody Battles
9. Captive Audience to Disparagement of Other Parent
10. Tool Wielded to Manipulate or Control the Other Parent

Drawing children in to the divorce is damaging to them both psychologically and emotionally.

Read more in this Tampa Bay [FL] Examiner article: Divorce and the games parents play.

New York state Husband and Wife have four children together.

Husband sustained a brain injury in a car accident several years ago and has a “mental health history”.

Wife files for divorce and child custody.

Husband allegedly stabs Son in the chest during a “domestic incident” at home.

Husband is charged with attempted murder of Son.

Husband is incarcerated pending his trial.

And the Court enters an injunction for protection against domestic violence, or order of protection, prohibiting Husband from writing or calling Wife or their four children.

The charge against Husband carries a maximum sentence of 25 years.

Read more in this Buffalo News article: West Seneca man indicted for stabbing his six-year-old son and this WIVB TV 4 article: Father charged with
stabbing son.

Haitian immigrant Mother thinks 6 year old Daughter is possessed by evil spirits.

Mother resolves to rid Daughter of them. With a voodoo ritual.

Mother allegedly pours rum on the floor in a circle surrounding Daughter and then pours some more on Daughter’s head and then … sets fire to Daughter.

When Daughter is engulfed in flames, Grandmother puts the fire out with water.

Then Mother and Grandmother simply bathe and put Daughter to bed, without any medical treatment.

Not until the next day, at a relative’s urging, does Mother take Daughter to a hospital.

Daughter has second and third degree burns over twenty-five percent of her body.

Mother is charged with assault and endangering the welfare of a child.

Mother denies her guilt and tells police the incident was an accident caused by Daughter startling her while she was boiling rice.

Mother also denies awareness of Daughter’s burns.

Mother blames Grandmother for putting Daughter to bed without medical treatment.

Grandmother is charged with reckless endangerment and endangering the welfare of a child.

Daughter, still in the hospital in a medically induced coma, is now in child protective custody.

Daughter told her foster caregiver what happened.

Neighbors reportedly heard Mother and Grandmother yelling at Daughter to remain down on her knees for hours on end on various occasions.

It does not appear that any of the neighbors ever called the child abuse hotline or the police to intervene on Daughter’s behalf.

Read more in this New York Daily News article: Prosecutors: Queens mom Marie Lauradin performed voodoo fire ritual that left daughter, 6, scarred.

Washington state Mother and Father, both Indian immigrants, marry and have Son.

As part of their divorce, the Court permits Son to travel to India with either parent.

Mother allegedly takes three year old Son to India.

Nearly a year ago.

And Mother and Son reportedly have not returned to the US since.

Father is entitled to court-ordered visitation.

And, since the abduction, Father has been awarded custody of Son.

But both orders are just so much paper, without practical effect.

Because India is not a party to the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction.

And India is indifferent to US court orders in family law cases.

Even the custodial interference charges filed against Mother in Washington state have no impact.

Practically speaking, Father has no legal recourse for return of his son.

Read more in this Kent [WA] Reporter article: A Father’s Day he won’t see: International child abduction devastates former Kent man.

Wisconsin couple files for divorce.

Big Corporation seeks to intervene in, or step into, the case…

To dismiss the couple’s divorce.

The presiding trial judge has one preliminary question before the Court will listen to the Corporation’s arguments for dismissal:

does the Corporation have standing to insinuate itself into the case?

Standing is a legal term that ponders what legal interest does this Corporation have that would entitle this Corporation to butt into this couple’s divorce?

A seemingly good question.

Here’s what the Corporation reportedly relies on to support its standing.

Apparently the Husband was indicted on 20 odd counts of defrauding Corporation by inflating invoices to the Corporation from his trucking businesses.

And then a civil court granted Corporation a judgment against Husband for over $200 million.

Several days later is when Wife filed for divorce from Husband.

In the divorce, Wife asks for pretty substantial sums for child support and alimony.

Corporation essentially alleges that the couple seeks to use the divorce as a way of shielding assets from the civil court money judgment in favor of Corporation.

And maintains that the couple took trips together just before and even after the divorce began.

Read more in this Madison & St Clair [WI] Record article: S.C. Johnson standing hearing Friday in Buske divorce.

An upstate New York Man doesn’t get the message.

On one occasion, the Man was found at a Woman’s home with a knife.

Man was sentenced to 2 years’ incarceration for stalking the Woman and criminal contempt for violating a no contact order.

The Man’s incarceration was concluded at a hospital. Upon his release from the hospital the Man went … to the Woman’s home.

The Woman called the police and the Man left … only to return later the same day. At which time he was arrested again.

Resisting arrest was added to the charges against the Man this time around.

The Man and Woman met online and had gone out a few times. The Man would not let the Woman break up with him.

The Man is obsessed. The Court let the Man off relatively easy, arguably perceiving the Man’s obsession with Woman as benign.

Read more in this Syracuse Post Standard article: Convicted stalker accused of stalking victim again.

According to a lawsuit filed by a Florida teenager’s mother, the athletic boy died of a heart attack … brought on by prescription psychiatric medications.

Allegedly, too many of them, including one to alleviate side effects of the others.

The boy’s psychiatrist reportedly prescribed sixteen different drugs for the boy over the course of a year.

The same doctor also allegedly prescribed a number of medications for a foster child … who subsequently committed suicide.

The Department of Children and Families (DCF) is investigating.

According to DCF, substantial numbers of children in the child welfare system, even those ranging in age from infants to 6 years old are on psychotropic drugs, that is, mind-altering drugs.

According to reports, one third of teens in the child welfare system are on at least one psychiatric medication.

Further, in all or nearly all of the cases of children in the child welfare system on these medications, neither the children’s parents nor a judge had consented to the treatment of the children with psychotropic pharmaceuticals – a prerequisite under the law.

In the case that is the subject of the lawsuit, it is also alleged that there was insufficient monitoring of children on these strong medications.

Food for thought … for any parent of a child from a broken – or intact – family.

Read more in this Miami Herald article: Lawsuit links psychiatric drugs to Tamarac child’s death.

A Texas surgeon (Mother) has been ordered to produce her eight year old Daughter in a Texas court.

The Mother is feared to have left the country with the Daughter.

Mother is now wanted on a state charge of interference with child custody and a federal charge of unlawful flight to avoid prosecution.

The Court awarded the child’s father (Father), a veterinarian, legal fees and investigation expenses to help him to locate and return Daughter to the US.

Since the couple divorced, Father moved around in an effort to keep up with his ex so he could be near Daughter.

Until Mother said she wanted to move to Mexico or Costa Rica.

Once Daughter is located, Father plans to file papers in the country where she is found to secure her return to the US.

In the meantime, the Texas Court has awarded Father sole custody of Daughter … and prohibited contact with Mother pending further order of the Court.

Read more in this San Antonio [TX] Express-News article: Fugitive Boerne mom ordered to bring back daughter and this San Antonio WOAI TV news article: Update: Father given legal custody of missing daughter.

As Father’s Day approaches, a pro-marriage nonprofit association encourages fathers and children alike to look beyond parental alienation or past hurts and reach out for understanding and reconciliation at this time.

They have even written some sample overtures for use between fathers and children, to facilitate the process.

They correctly remind that good fathers are sometimes separated from their own children, wrongly, either by the courts, or their children’s mothers alone.

Read more in this Christian News Wire article: This Father’s Day, Give the Gift of Reconciliation.

The Florida Highway Patrol (FHP) pulled over a Florida driver recently.

And hit pay dirt for two Massachusetts mothers.

FHP “ran him” and found a Massachusetts warrant out for the man’s arrest.

The man took off from Massachusetts, leaving behind two children from two different relationships, for whom he has allegedly paid no support for six years.

The man reportedly owes $125,000 to one of the mothers and $77,000 to the other one.

A Massachusetts judge recently sentenced the man to six months’ confinement.

And, of course, again ordered him to pay the support he owes the mothers of his children.

Read more in this Taunton [MA] Gazette article: State’s top deadbeat dad to serve six months.

A child welfare agency is breathing down their necks, threatening to remove their children.

They aren’t beating or starving their children.

Or leaving them unattended.

Why then?

The agency calls it medical neglect.

In one recent high profile case, hardly the first such case, the family refuses conventional medical treatment for religious reasons.

The child has cancer. A kind with an excellent prognosis with chemotherapy.

But the family’s religion frowns upon such treatment, preferring alternative, natural treatments.

And the boy and his mother go on the run … for a time.

When the boy’s condition worsens, they give in to the necessity of conventional treatment.

And the boy is allowed to stay with his parents.

In a second, lower profile case, a 14 year old child is obese, on the magnitude of 555 pounds.

To avoid a court hearing, this mother and son also go on the run.

And the mother is arrested for custodial interference.

Of course, it isn’t healthy for a child – or adult – to weigh over 500 pounds.

But is the child neglected? Should the child be removed from his or her family?

Are you following your pediatrician’s recommendations?

To the letter?

Is your child’s other parent keeping track?

Read more in this NewsWeek article: What Makes a Parent Negligent?

Israeli Husband and Wife divorce.

Husband was unfaithful to Wife.

Husband is ordered to pay Wife alimony.

Fast forward six years.

Husband returns to court.

With videotape.

Of Wife and another man having sexual relations.

Prior to entry of the divorce.

Wife challenges videotape, of course.

But police authenticate it.

And, because of Wife’s unfaithfulness, the Rabbinic Court revokes Wife’s alimony.

Read more in this Jerusalem Post article: Rabbinic judges revoke alimony after husband proves wife cheated, too.

Imagine.

Woman gets injunction for protection against domestic violence, or order of protection, against her ex-husband (Abuser).

Woman moves away to another city in the hopes of avoiding Abuser altogether.

Woman remarries and begins new life.

Abuser contacts police.

Abuser tells police that he has papers for Woman, but needs Woman’s address to get papers to her.

Police officer (Officer) locates Woman’s address in motor vehicle records …

Officer reportedly gives Woman’s address to Abuser.

Now armed with Woman’s address, Abuser allegedly sends Woman a note via a taxi to her home.

Abuser also allegedly makes threatening phone calls to Woman’s home.

All possible only because Officer gave out Woman’s address, to which Officer has access, for police business as a police officer, through motor vehicles records.

Woman and her husband sue Officer for allegedly handing Woman’s address over to Abuser.

Officer is found guilty of violating the Driver’s Privacy Protection Act.

Case is settled for $337,000, plus Woman’s attorney’s fees.

Officer is still on the police force.

But he was reprimanded for giving Woman’s address to Abuser, and possibly jeopardizing Woman’s life.

Imagine.

Read more in this [Janesville, WI] WCLO 1230AM news article: Lawsuit against Evansville police officer settled for $337,500.

Minnesota Boy removed from parents’ home and placed in foster care on a child welfare agency petition alleging that Boy needed protection or services.

Over two years later, still no resolution to Boy’s case.

Boy’s parents have had only supervised visitation with Boy since case began two years ago.

Why?

Boy’s parents’ first child died a death that was ruled a homicide.

But neither parent was ever charged in the death.

No one was charged in the death.

Reportedly because there was insufficient evidence as to which parent, or whether both parents acting together, were the aggressor. Or whether a third party was involved.

At a trial to terminate Boy’s parents’ parental rights, the court did in fact terminate their rights.

On appeal, the intermediate level appellate court reversed the termination due to insufficient evidence.

The Boy’s parents are now seeking his immediate return from foster care.

But the file has to come back from the appeals court first.

Then there is the hair-splitting question of whether the child protection investigation remains open, despite the reversal and closing of the termination of parental rights case.

Arguably an end run around the appeals court. Arguably not.

Read more in this St Cloud [MN] Times article: Custody of boy remains in limbo.

The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, which determines which country has jurisdiction in international child custody disputes, appears to be enjoying something of a resurgence.

Two long holdouts against entering the Convention are reportedly … considering signing it.

Carefully …

First, there is Japan – where, even among Japanese couples, the parent awarded primary custody is, in essence, the sole parent and the other parent is shut out of their child’s life and parental kidnapping is a rejected concept.

More and more children of mixed Japanese heritage are being denied any access whatsoever to one of their parents where there is an international child custody dispute.

Then, there is Russia. From which country a Finnish diplomat recently allegedly removed a five year old boy of dual Russian / Finnish citizenship, illegally according to the Russian view.

Read more in

• this [Singapore] AsiaOne article: Japan urged to sign accord against parental abductions
• this Japan Times article: Japan’s allies urge government to sign Hague convention on child abduction
• this [Russian] RIA Novosti article: Russia demands Finland clarify diplomat’s role in boy’s departure

Pension plans can be complicated things. Documented in thick manuals filled with arcane rules.

In the case of Continental Airlines’ pension plan, one such rule permits divorced, retired spouses to collect retirement benefits attributable to pilots still in active service.

Such pension benefits can amount to lump sums on the order of $1 million per spouse.

Continental alleges that nine of its pilots fraudulently divorced their spouses so that their spouses could collect their pension benefits early … and then, after receiving their benefits, each couple reportedly remarried.

The airline has sued the nine pilots.

Read more in this Oklahoman article: Pilot divorces spur lawsuit.

A bakery in neighboring Broward County, Florida recently added a new treat to its menu: divorce cakes.

Divorce cakes help to “celebrate” – what else? – divorce.

Ironically, divorce cakes taste the same as wedding cakes.

But they look a little different.

The happy bride and groom atop the cake are substituted with the customer’s choice of:

• a man and woman on separated sections of cake
• a prison cell and the proverbial ball and chain – with the chain broken
• a man taken out with the trash by the wife
• a man sitting on a street curb
• a woman about to push a man down a waterfall and
• the “broken marriage” cemetery, filled with tombstones and an open casket containing a ring.

Some folks actually believe that eating a divorce cake provides more closure than a divorce trial or uncontested final divorce hearing.

Read more in this Orlando [FL] Sentinel article by way of [Hilton Head SC] Island Packet: Divorce cakes help sweeten bakery’s business.

A new medical specialty emerges: child abuse pediatrics.

A physican can now study a concentrated curriculum and become board-certified in child abuse.

Unfortunately, there is much need for forensic experts in physical and sexual abuse of children.

Could the burn (or other inury) have been an accident?

Was the child sexually abused?

Forensic child abuse pediatrics holds the answers to these and many other equally disturbing questions.

Many suspected cases of child abuse are not borne out by forensics. They are likely either accidents or injuries resulting from unusual medical conditions.

These specialists will hold the keys to criminal prosecutions, removal of children from their homes, and child custody and timesharing decisions.

Read more in this New York Times article: The Marks of Childhood or the Marks of Abuse?

Child support is typically paid from the noncustodial parent’s salary.

In Asheville, North Carolina, that is no longer as true as it used to be.

Increasingly, child support is being funded by the noncustodial parent’s … unemployment benefits.

A noncustodial parent is three times as likely to pay support from unemployment benefits today than he or she was a year ago.

The amount of support funded by unemployment benefits across the state has grown from $2.4 million to $8.6 million over the last year.

Because unemployment benefits are generally lower than salary and, in North Carolina, garnishment of unemployment benefits is legally capped at twenty-five percent of the amount of benefits, the amount of child support received by custodial parents is down.

Many other communities across the country are likely seeing increasing amounts of child support obligations funded by unemployment benefits and severance packages.

Read more in this Asheville [NC] Citizen-Times article: Unemployment garnisheed for child support.