General legal information furnished as a service of Fort Lauderdale / West Palm Beach family law attorney Janet Langjahr
Like police officers and firefighters, child support workers are selflessly dedicated to helping others, in this case, children.
In Savannah, among other places, noncustodial parents sometimes get hot under the collar when child support enforcement personnel attempt to collect overdue child support.
Sometimes these parents even get violent.
Which, sadly, makes child support enforcement a hazardous career, just like law enforcement and first response.
Savannah is addressing the dangers of the job proactively, training staffers in self defense.
Read more in this Savannah [GA] WSAV 3 TV article: Child Support Workers Learn to Deal with Danger.
Regular readers of my blog are probably familiar with the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction.
Another Hague conference is convened to consider entering another treaty even as I post, a treaty to permit child support obligations entered in one country to be enforced in other countries that are parties to the treaty. One hundred countries are in attendance.
Such a convention would close a “loophole” that some noncustodial parents are only too happy to avail themselves of - leaving the country to avoid paying support (with impunity).
Currently, enforcement of US child support obligations overseas is hit or miss, depending on the country in which enforcement is sought.
In our increasingly mobile society, The Convention on the International Recovery of Child Support and Other Forms of Family Maintenance is an idea whose time has come.
Read more in this Digital Journal article: Legal experts to finalize global child support convention.
A Wisconsin assistant district attorney describes her mission of criminally charging non-custodial parents who are seriously delinquent in their child support payments.
She aptly points out something that custodial parents often don’t get: the court can’t force a non-custodial parent to be a good parent. To actually visit their child, call their child, care for their child, do for their child, etc.
But under the right circumstances, there is one thing the court can do. Make sure the non-custodial parent pays their child support obligations. Sooner or later. Or risk jail time.
Read more in this Washington Post article: Corralling Deadbeat Dads.
Financial Considerations In A Divorce Settlement:
Read more in this Kansas City Fox 4 News article, FOX 4 Finance: Divorce Settlements.
It took until July of this year. But since that time, the Cherokee Nation has had its own child support enforcement program.
And the program has gotten off to an impressive start.
A case opened on July 31st culminated in the program’s very first child support payment, which was made within just two weeks of the opening of the case.
There aren’t many state support enforcement agencies (and custodial parents) that wouldn’t envy that quick a turnaround time.
And the Cherokee child who benefited had not previously received any support from her father.
Read more in this Tanasi [Southeast American Indian] Journal article out of Oklahoma: New Cherokee Nation Office Enforces Child Support.
Child support enforcement has a powerful new weapon in its arsenal: the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative, which requires travelers returning to the US from Canada, Mexico, the Carribean, Bermuda and central and South America possess passports.
The new laws require many people who did not previously have passports to obtain passports for travel outside the US.
Only they can’t if they owe more than $2,500 in child support arrearages.
So people who really want to travel outside the country must pay up - or stay home.
Connecticut, as an example, has seen support collection rise dramatically as a result of the implementation of the new rules.
And it’s not just Connecticut.
Whatever the benefit to national security, these new passport rules surely benefit someone - children owed child support.
Read more in this Government Technology article: New Passport Rules Boost Connecticut Child Support Enforcement.
A West Palm Beach father was taken to task in an Ohio court for attempted criminal nonsupport of his four children.
The man was extradited and jailed for an arrearage of approximately $61,000.
The man was convicted and sentenced to six months of confinement to be followed by 5 years of probation.
After being sentenced, the father somehow managed to come up with $25,000 toward his arrearage.
If he keeps up his payments, he will avoid more jail time.
In the words of the Ohio prosecutor assigned to the case “[h]e got the message” and began complying with the court’s orders to pay.
A most effective incentive, which struggling custodial parents all eventually come to hope for when their ex refuses to pay on an ongoing basis.
Read more in this Cleveland Plain Dealer article: Father of four coughs up past due child support.
Granted, taxes are not foremost in the minds of most couples going through a divorce.
But for couples with sufficient assets, income and civility, tax impact is an important consideration which may be factored into any divorce settlement.
Couples should pay particular attention to alimony, the sale of the house, income tax filing status and timing of the divorce.
An interest in real estate can be transferred from one spouse to another tax-free, but alimony payments are normally taxable income to the receiving spouse.
Capital gains treatment on sale of real estate may favor selling as a couple before the divorce, rather than as a single after the divorce.
For late-in-year divorces, it may pay to wait until early the following year.
In appropriate cases, it may be well worth consulting a tax accountant or tax attorney on the structuring of any divorce settlement.
Read more in this [New Jersey] Courier Post article: Keep your cool in a divorce to avoid tax headaches.
Kansas, which reportedly has a large and growing number of grandparents raising their grandchildren, passed a law intended to provide financial assistance to those grandparents.
But it turns out that the statute is only aiding a tiny fraction of these grandparents (and only a tiny bit at that). The reason: as in other states, aid is limited to grandparents with formal legal custody of their grandchildren.
Yet many of these grandparents, de facto parents, don’t - and couldn’t - get formal legal custody of their grandchildren.
Ironically, the legal trend in most states makes it harder and harder for grandparents to obtain full legal custody of their grandchildren.
Read more in this Kansas Morning Sun editorial: We must find a way to help all custodial grandparents.
It has been almost fashionable for the last year or two to rail against “rampant paternity fraud” in the US. See my previous post, Paternity Fraud: How Much of It Is There Really?
So-called “rampant paternity fraud” may not be universal, however.
In Barbados, ninety-nine (99%) percent of unmarried fathers who challenge paternity reportedly are in fact the biological fathers! It is alleged that these fathers mount their challenges in bad faith, to delay the inevitable support obligation as long as possible.
Try reconciling these two extremely different portraits of the world of paternity cases …
Read more in this Barbados NationNews.com article: Fathers ‘using DNA testing as delay tactic’.
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