General legal information furnished as a service of Fort Lauderdale / West Palm Beach family law attorney Janet Langjahr
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.
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.
In Detroit, felony non-payment of child support is truly at the noncustodial parent’s peril.
The punishment for criminal non-support includes … court-ordered television.
Really.
A Detroit criminal court judge requires monthly viewing of a daytime television talk show as a condition of probation for felony non-payment of support.
The show reportedly focuses on paternity-related disputes with some frequency, and paints the proverbial “deadbeat dads” unfavorably.
The judge also requires the convicted parent to review and discuss the program with their probation officer.
Since beginning this practice, the judge has been a guest on the television program.
And the show’s host is a fan of the judge.
Presumably, the court-ordered TV is not the only punishment meted out in this judge’s courtroom for criminal non-payment of child support.
Read more in this Detroit [MI] Free Press article: Behind in child support? ‘Maury’ may be in your future.
Seventy year old New Mexico Father is behind on child support, to the tune of $13,500.
Father is held in contempt of court.
As punishment for his contempt, Father is sentenced to up to three months of incarceration.
Who is the insolent Father who appears to have no respect for the Court’s child support order or the law?
None other than a former municipal court judge.
Who was reportedly also previously accused of sexual harassment by three court clerks.
Read more in this [Midland, TX] KWES NewsWest 9 TV news article: Former Santa Fe judge jailed over child support.
Woman alleges that North Carolina Man is father of her child and should pay child support.
Man is certain he is not the father and willingly submits to DNA paternity test.
Test results arrive in Man’s mail.
Cover letter concludes that Man is the father.
Man reads on …
Actual report of test results states that Man is not the father.
Man reports inconsistency to testing company.
Company maintains that this is an unusual clerical mistake, which would have been caught even if Man didn’t catch the error.
In any event, Woman’s case is dismissed and Man can go on with his life, free of years of child support obligations.
Moral: When it comes to legal proceedings, read everything … all the way through.
Read more in this Charlotte [NC] Observer article: Office error could have cost Garner man thousands in child support payments..
Deja vu.
A Maryland man working for the state’s child support enforcement agency collected more than just a paycheck.
He also had child support checks made out to his own wife … and deposited them into his account.
Over a seven year period.
The man pled guilty and was sentenced to 10 years’ incarceration and restitution of $49,000.
Read more in this Baltimore Sun article: Man admits stealing child-support checks.
Very commonly, child support is paid to a state agency acting as intermediary between the noncustodial parent and the custodial parent.
This system serves as a buffer between parents and generally works well.
But it is not without its flaws.
An employee of a private company under contract to collect child support for the state has been indicted for identity theft.
The job furnished access to sensitive personal information of many people.
The employee allegedly sold the personal information of about 1,000 of those people, such as social security numbers and bank account numbers, to an undercover law enforcement officer.
The transactions reportedly date back to October 2008.
Read more in this Denver CBS TV 4 article: Child support employee accused of ID theft.
A Michigan man is behind on his child support obligations.
$530,000.
He hasn’t made any payments in six years.
Stopped over a bad taillight on his Mercedes Benz, the man is now in jail.
And there he will remain for 90 days, unless he comes up with almost $28,000.
The man has 14 children by 13 different women.
The man contends that most of the children are not his and that the mothers set him up by claiming to have served him in paternity cases using phony addresses.
The man tried to persuade the arresting officers that he is someone else, with a different social security number.
When arrested in his Mercedes, the man had $5,000 cash in his possession and plane tickets to Florida.
The man is reportedly unemployed.
The man is trying to negotiate his child support debt.
The man is also in violation of his probation.
I have posted more than once recently about the impact of the recession on noncustodial parents struggling with child support obligations.
Their situations are tough, but parents will not lose custody of or access to their children due to unemployment.
Millions of American grandparents raise their grandchildren, because their children are unable to do so.
If they can’t support their grandchildren, though, they may well lose custody and/or guardianship of them.
In this recession-weakened economy, older workers who lose their jobs are having an especially difficult time replacing them … sometimes eventually giving up.
In addition to the stresses of prolonged unemployment that one might expect, those raising grandchildren bear the additional fear that they will be taken away from them and placed in foster care with strangers.
What assistance there is for grandparent-custodians is rapidly being depleted by those in need because of the weak economy.
Many grandparent caregivers could simply become foster parents to their grandchildren. That would provide them with greater financial assistance from the government for raising their grandchildren.
But it would also put the grandchildren “into the system” and subject them all to monitoring and intrusions.
Read more in this Wall Street Journal article: ‘Grandfamilies’ Come Under Pressure.
Among the hardest hit by the recession are … children of separated parents.
The reality of rising unemployment and underemployment on the one hand.
And the fear of impending layoffs or other job loss on the other hand.
Family courts everywhere are busy with noncustodial parents seeking downward modifications of child support, even while custodial parents are seeking enforcement of existing child support obligations.
Some parents who never missed payments before are struggling and missing them now.
In New York state, for example, many family court judges are granting reductions of child support obligations frequently under the circumstances, sometimes dramatic reductions.
Since children still need support regardless of a noncustodial parent’s unemployment, layoffs or the like, however, custodial parents are turning to public assistance of various kinds, often for the first time.
And it’s not just people “on the fringes” who are affected.
Family court judges are seeing among those seeking modifications of child support recently comfortable to wealthy Wall Street executives, who have been wiped out by shrinking portfolios.
Unemployment benefits are income, however.
Read more in this New York Times article: Fighting Over Child Support After the Pink Slip Arrives.
It’s very common for divorcing parents to be ordered to attend a parenting class for divorcing parents.
Never-married parents may be required to attend the same class, but they frequently feel that it “doesn’t apply to them”.
Ohio’s Stark County is attempting to address that program flaw by instituting a separate class for never-married parents.
The course emphasizes communications skills and appreciating the importance of both parents to a child.
The new program provides mediators and a psychologist to educate parents on “psychological wellness for kids”.
It is hoped that the new program will benefit the growing numbers of children of unmarried parents as well as the unmarried parents themselves.
In future years, the new course will be funded through court fees.
Read more in this Stark County [OH] Press-News article: New parenting program offered to never married parents who are separating.
A divorced Canadian man (”Father”) could apparently write the book on irritating the judge presiding over his case.
Father and his former wife (”Mother”) have a 5 year old child together (”Daughter”).
Mother took Father to court to increase Father’s child support payments.
Father, apparently, bitterly attacked Mother in court for trying to transfer his wealth to her, completely ignoring, reportedly even denying the fact that child support is for Daughter.
In 2005, when the original child support award was apparently calculated, Father earned less than Canadian $83,000 per year.
In 2006, Father’s income catapulted to Canadian $3.5 million.
In 2008, Father’s income soared to Canadian $6.5 million.
The Canadian Court evidently viewed the exponential change in Father’s income as justifying a change in child support for Daughter, despite Father’s objections.
In fact, the Court ordered temporary monthly child support of $31,000.
That is said to have broken the record for the greatest temporary child support award in Canada.
Read more in this Edmonton [Canada] Sun article: Millionaire must pay hefty child support.
In more than sixty percent of the child custody cases in Staten Island, a borough of New York City, the noncustodial parent does not pay their court-ordered child support. Sixty percent.
In many of these cases, the custodial parent and children are pushed into poverty and draw on public assistance and services.
But the City is now beginning to crack down on deadbeat parents by
Some of these enforcement measures can be implemented administratively by the Office of Child Support Enforcement without further court orders, after the initial support order.
As a result, last year, the state collected $1.7 billion in child support, a 6.4% increase over the previous year.
Read more in this Staten Island Advance article: Epidemic of child support deadbeats.
The concept of “fault” has become nearly obsolete in divorce law throughout the United States.
But one state, Arizona, may be resurrecting it, at least to a degree, after a thirty year hiatus.
A bill may allow fault to be proven and weighed in property division, alimony and even child support.
Fault could include anything from domestic violence to blowing the family savings on gambling - or an affair.
Fault might even include seeking the divorce.
But fault would not be required as a ground for divorce.
Such changes would actually bring Arizona in line with some other states’ versions of no-fault divorce law, including, to a large extent, Florida’s.
Read more in this Arizona Daily Star article: Ariz. may get adultery and other ‘misconduct’ back in divorce court.
The issue of parents in the military suffering adverse rulings in family courts at home while they are away on deployment just doesn’t quit.
The latest state to enter the fray is South Carolina, with its pending Military Parent Equal Protection Act.
The proposed legislation is intended to stop permanent changes to custody orders or entry of permanent custody orders while or because a parent is deployed in the military.
The bill also requires the parent with physical custody to allow visitation during the military parent’s leaves from active duty.
Another change in the pending act is a prohibition of permanent changes to child support orders based on military pay.
The main theme is keeping any changes made to accommodate or otherwise because of military service by one parent as temporary changes.
Unfortunately, if passed, the legislation would likely make more work for family court judges and tend to clog their dockets.
Read more in this Beaufort [SC] Gazette article: Legislators: Military members on active duty shouldn’t have to fight custody battles.
Wisconsin Father divorces in 1995. Father ordered to pay child support for his 2 year old.
Father enters plea agreement with prosecutor’s office over his failure to pay support for years. Agreement places Father on probation and defers prosecution.
Father doesn’t comply with agreement. Father convicted of felony failure to support his child.
Father in arrears by more than $25,000 by 2006. Father then sentenced to five years’ incarceration.
Plus a year’s “supervision” and two years’s probation after that. During which Father must work and continue paying child support arrearages.
Not paying timely certainly worked out well for Father…
Read more in this Baraboo [WI] News Republic article: Man gets 5 years for not paying child support.
Husband and Wife divorce in 1997.
Husband is ordered to pay child support of $512 per month for Daughter.
Now, a court has ordered Husband to pay about $5,000 more in monthly child support than was previously ordered.
The court has also ordered retroactive support of $160,000 to adjust support for prior years.
Husband characterizes these rulings as “absolutely laughable”.
The judges aren’t laughing though.
It turns out that Husband is an heir to the Dow Jones fortune, with trust funds valued at at least $4 million at the time of his divorce.
The court has found that Husband deliberately concealed his assets.
Husband maintains that he had no knowledge of his trust funds until after the divorce.
It is unclear whether Husband voluntarily came forward on his own to dislose his tremendous trust fund assets when he allegedly discovered them.
Read more in this WAOW TV 9 article: Dow Jones heir: Child support ruling ‘laughable’ and this Dubuque [IA] Telegraph Herald article: Wisconsin: Wealthy heir blasts back child support ruling.
Husband and Wife have two children.
Wife has medical condition which prevents her from working.
Husband takes off on a fishing trip one day in April of 2006 … and appears to disappear from the face of the earth.
Wife seeks financial assistance in court.
Court repeatedly refuses to award Wife child support from Husband’s estate.
Court refuses to allow Wife Husband’s share of proceeds from sale of marital home.
Wife struggles along on food stamps and other public assistance to support her two teenaged sons without child support or a job.
Even though
Wife reportedly says her family is trying to live on $84 per month.
After the third anniversary of Husband’s disappearance, Wife may seek to have him officially declared dead - in the hope that her sons may collect social security benefits as a result.
Read more in this Albany [NY] Times Union article: Woman denied child support funds in missing man case.
A Montana Indian Reservation is following the lead of reservations in Washington state, Wyoming and Oklahoma and will be implementing their own child support legal systems independent of nontribal legal systems.
All they are waiting for is final comments from the Indian population for federal funding to kick in and then the Tribe will exercise jurisdiction over child support matters involving tribe members.
The state and the tribe are working on interagency cooperation agreements.
The new system will allow the parties to a dispute to opt for resolution in the Traditional Circle, a traditional, tribal forum, rather than in a court.
The Montana tribe is the first to really use the Traditional Circle.
Read more in this Havre [MT] Daily News article: Rocky Boy rolling out child support programs.
Canadian billionaire Father cohabits with much younger immigrant woman, Mother, for 10 years.
They have three children together.
They are not married.
Father pays $35,000 Canadian per month in child support.
Mother wants more.
Challenging Quebec province and other Canadian law that denies property division and alimony to common law partners or mere cohabitants, Mother sues for both.
Florida law also generally precludes a cohabitant from claiming an interest in the other partner’s property or seeking alimony or support other than for children in common.
This case has generated a lot of media attention in Canada.
Read more in this Montreal CJAD NewsTalk Radio article: Quebec multi-millionaire mystery man testifies in alimony case.
Husband and Wife are from Utah.
Husband has been in the military, stationed in California, for some time now.
The parties divorced while Husband was stationed in California and the divorce was entered in California.
Wife returned with their child to live in Utah.
Husband seeks to have the amount of child support he must pay revisited in a Utah court, where the amount of child support would likely be lower.
But the Utah courts refuse to hear the case, holding that California has jurisdiction because Husband is still stationed there.
Husband is seeking a new hearing on the jurisdiction issue, and two branches of the service will be putting their two cents in.
It isn’t clear whether Utah would have taken jurisdiction of their divorce had it been filed there in the first place and, if so, why the divorce wasn’t filed there.
Utah’s rulling seems to run contrary to the spirit of federal law and contrary to the law in at least some US states.
And, under all the facts of this particular case, simply unfair.
Florida, for example, recognizes Floridians who are stationed elsewhere in the military as Florida residents, and will exercise jurisdiction over their divorces.
But that does not preclude the place where they are stationed from exercising jurisdiction.
Read more in this Salt Lake Tribune article: Marine from Utah can’t take divorce case home.
South Dakota Mother and Father split up before 5 year old Son is born.
Couple fight over custody and child support.
Mother is awarded temporary primary custody of Son, and Father is ordered to pay monthly temporary child support of $150. Later the amount is upped to $363.
Father continues to pay $150 for the next two years though. Father blames it on cash-flow problems in his farming business.
At trial, the court dismisses the child support issues as irrelevant to custody, and awards primary custody of Son to Father. Further, the Father manages to clear his arrearages by the second day of the trial.
But the main reason the trial court awards primary custody to Father is that Mother is allegedly alienating Son from Father.
On appeal, however, South Dakota’s highest court appears to second-guess the trial court’s factual findings, specifically rejecting the trial court’s finding that Mother has alienated Son from Father.
The South Dakota Supreme Court goes on to conclude that it would not be in Son’s best interests for Father to have primary custody, because Father hasn’t adequately provided for Son financially when Son was living with Mother.
Two judges dissent. The dissent seems more consistent with legal trends beyond South Dakota’s borders.
Read more in this Sioux City [IA] Journal article: Supreme Court overturns child custody ruling.
Father owes $7,500 in back child support. Bad enough.
Then he is arrested on a drug charge - again. With more than $15,000 in cash and jewelry on his person. And half that amount in illegal drugs.
Criminal court Judge is not happy with Father.
State seizes Father’s cash and jewelry.
Judge proposes that cash and proceeds of jewelry go to child support arrearages.
Except the state statute specifies what seized assets may be used for… Child support isn’t included.
But the prosecutors are researching whether the judge’s proposal can be implemented legally anyway.
Meanwhile, Judge sentences Father to two years under a plea deal, suspends his driver’s license for a year and orders him to pay a fine and court costs.
Sounds like the Judge is on to something, and the forfeiture statute should be amended to allow seized assets to be applied to support obligations.
Read more in this Cincinnati [OH] Enquirer article: A novel use for drug money.
In Pennsylvania, unemployment has been slowly rising for some time.
In fact, unemployment compensation is expected to start running out for significant numbers of non-custodial parents this spring.
The unemployed increasingly worry about their child support obligations.
Rather than waiting until they accrue arrearages, many are wisely looking to modify their obligations before they become delinquent.
In Pennsylvania, deadbeat parents fear that they face incarceration, despite the tough times.
The flip side of the unemployment problem is that custodial parents who might not otherwise have pressed for child support might have little choice now but to do so.
When asked for advice, child support enforcement authorities in Pennsylvania encourage non-custodial parents to pay what they can manage, even if they can’t pay all that is ordered.
This scenario will be playing out in many areas of the country where the local economies are especially hard hit by unemployment.
Read more in this Allentown [PA] Morning Call article: Job losses test child support.
Unmarried New Orleans Mother and Father separate.
Two year old Son lives with Mother.
Father chooses to have no contact with Son.
Court reportedly orders Father to pay child support arrearages of $4,000 for Son.
Father suddenly decides to exercise visitation with Son.
Father allegedly murders Son and leaves his body in a playground.
Father calls police and claims that Son has been abducted, although his story keeps changing.
Father is arrested on a charge of first degree murder.
Father confesses, saying he’s “sorry”, but that he has been under “a lot of pressure” because he doesn’t want to pay child support.
Read more in this New Orleans Times-Picayune article: Father kills 2-year-old son, dumps him in park, police say.
Married Chinese couple immigrate to Canada. Sort of.
Husband actually still spends most of his time in China. But Wife and Son live in Canada.
Husband is reportedly part of Chinese mob. Husband is incarcerated in China for what may be a very long time.
After about eleven years of marriage, Wife files for divorce in Canada.
Wife claims that Husband is worth hundreds of millions of dollars, although Husband claims the figure is “only” around thirty-five million. Close enough, apparently.
Wife seeks the marital residence, her car and back child and spousal support of approximately $900,000. Wife claims that her English is poor and she does not have marketable job skills.
Court apparently buys into Wife’s world view, due to what it characterizes as “exceptional” circumstances of the case.
Read more in this Vancouver Sun article: Jailed gangster was worth $400m: divorced wife.
Iowa Mother is supposed to receive child support.
Father apparently pays child support.
Iowa collects the child support from Father.
And … deposits it into the wrong mother’s account.
For four years.
Iowa also allegedly adds insult to injury in two distinct ways.
First, it blames the misrouted payments on the Mother’s request to change the bank account into which her support payments are supposed to be deposited, and her failure and her bank’s failure to catch the change error on the supposedly e-mailed confirmations of the change.
But the Mother denies that she ever requested to change deposit accounts. Still, the financial institution did change hands at some point, which could have contributed to the error.
Second, after finally paying Mother the amount of money that was misrouted to another mother, the Iowa sent Mother a letter saying that it had paid her by mistake - and that she would have to give the money she had received back. Iowa has since apologized to Mother for that latest error.
Iowa admits to two other cases besides Mother’s where child support payments were routed to the wrong parties.
Iowa has not recovered the child support payments inadvertently sent to the wrong mother.
Read more in this Des Moines [Iowa] Register article: Glitch sends support pay to wrong person.
Parents separate.
Father is required to pay child support.
Court order is entered garnishing child support from Father’s wages from arms-length, third-party employer.
Father’s pay stubs reflect deduction of child support from Father’s pay before he receives it.
Yet Mother never receives child support.
How is that?
Well, there may be several possible explanations, of course.
But in at least some cases, it is possible that an employer fails to forward the garnished funds to the child support collection agency. Intentionally or otherwise.
One Wisconsin employer who is alleged to have engaged in a course of retaining wages ordered garnished for child support has been charged with contempt. And a bench warrant has been issued for his arrest.
Unfortunately, the parent whose wages have been garnished suffers a double “whammy” in such a situation.
First, they don’t get all of their wages.
Second, they don’t get credited for the child support garnished from their wages but not forwarded to the other parent.
Needless to say, income deduction should be terminated promptly in such a lose-lose scenario.
And the paying parent should probably look for a different job …
Read more in this Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article: Child support paid, not received.
Texas had a higher rate of teen pregnancy than the national average. And unmarried fathers often weren’t involved with their kids.
In an effort to remedy both problems, Texas added Parenting and Paternity Awareness to its high school curriculum this year.
In the class, kids learn how to calculate Texas child support and to anticipate the cost of raising children.
They also cover some basic family law legal terminology. And the father’s role in parenting.
Will it reduce teen pregnancy? And increase teen responsibility for out of wedlock babies?
Only time will tell …
Read more in this San Antonio News article: Teens learn what it means to have a child.
Father of Milwaukee children allegedly doesn’t pay child support for some time. Approximately $128,000 worth of child support.
Father goes to jail. For a time.
Then Father gets released on probation. One of the conditions of his probation is … that he pay his support … or go back to jail.
After Father is released, he allegedly stops paying child support again. But he doesn’t go back to jail.
Because the government can’t find him. But reporters find him, in Illinois, at the same address he has had for years.
Based on the reporters’ tip, law enforcement arrests Father again. Father now reportedly owes $200,000 in child support arrearages.
There is no indication that Father is unable to pay child support. But, apparently, he doesn’t want to.
Father may return to jail … again … and, perhaps, again.
Read more in this TMJ TV 4 Milwaukee news article: I-Team: Deadbeat Dad James Bartley.
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