UK attorneys are looking slightly into the future to predict that evidence collected from social networking websites like Facebook and MySpace will be admitted in divorce cases.

Absolutely. Just as happened with e-mails and online chats before social networking sites sprang up.

The value of the type of evidence likely to be developed will vary between so-called no-fault states / countries like Florida and fault-grounded states / countries.

But consider this UK case. A man was barred from any contact with his wife.

The man signed up on a social networking site. The social networking site sent an automated “friend request” to everyone on the man’s e-mail list – including his wife.

The man was sentenced to ten days in jail based on that “friend request”.

Could make the friendliest person think twice about approving “friend requests” …

Read more in this UK Citizen article: Solicitor warning over Facebook flirting.

The place is Mississippi.

A local man, a judge and city attorney, reportedly faces contempt of court for failing to pay past due child support of $1,500.

The man contends that he can’t afford to pay it and that it is an unreasonably high amount of child support, more suited to a Hollywood celebrity than a local judge and attorney.

The man may think that the judge who presided over his divorce is biased against him. That judge awarded custody of the man’s baby to its mother.

The man expects to be jailed for contempt.

On the other hand, the judge who originally drew his case recused himself.

All concerned are awaiting appointment of another judge to hear the case.

In an interesting side note, the mans’ wife and her cousin were arrested for allegedly stealing computer disks from the man’s law office.

Read more in this Jackson [MS] Clarion-Ledger article: Judge recuses himself from colleague’s child support case.

According to the Pentagon, only 3.3% of military couples divorce. The military attribute this to large amounts of support that the military provides to military couples.

Some find the numbers surprising considering the currently prolonged, stressful separations during deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Others find the numbers misleading in that they fail to reflect the number of couples who hit the skids in the military but who don’t actually divorce until after discharge.

Others challenge the numbers because the army does not actually follow the same couples over time, but counts how many military couples are married each year.

And, of course, the military doesn’t count unhappy couples.

Going against the tide of this report, military women are now divorcing at a much higher, and rising, rate of about 8%, compared to 2.6% for military men.

Read more in this Forbes article: Military Divorce Rate Holding Steady.

No more is it true that “where there’s a will, there’s a way”. No need. At least in India.

Now, if an Indian living abroad wants easier options, he’s got them.

A Delhi court has agreed to allow a New Jersey resident to appear at his divorce hearing(s) via video conference.

This could simplify and speed up about twenty percent of divorce cases in India where one party doesn’t live in the country – or near the city where the divorce is taking place.

One perk of divorce by videoconference is that the fallen-out couple don’t have to come face to face again.

On the other hand, that is also a negative in that last ditch reconciliations won’t be inspired either.

Read more in this IndiaTimes InfoTech article: Want divorce? Go high-tech.

Nothing else has stamped out domestic violence yet.

One relatively recent, creative approach established in Massachusetts: educational theater.

Theater with a message. Plays depicting different types of domestic abuse (sexual, violent, verbal, etc.) – and targeting different audiences (civilian vs. military, adults vs. children, etc.).

The rationale is that an engaging story carries more impact than a thousand lectures.

The programs educates both victims and “bystanders” in a position to help, highlighting warning signs and illustrating how to be part of the solution.

Performers lead discussions after each performance.

Read more in this Woburn [MA] Daily Times Chronicle article: Fighting domestic abuse through theatre and the Deana’s Educational Theater website.

The Florida Department of Children and Families receives about 1,000 reports of abuse per month in Lee County that must be investigated.

Investigations must begin within twenty-four hours, three if a child is believed to be in imminent danger.

An investigation takes at least 4 hours of interviews with the child, the person reporting the abuse, family members, neighbors, teachers, etc.

Investigators typically investigate two reports per day.

Background checks of every adult in the home are par for the course.

Investigators are college-educated and receive ten weeks of training plus substantial oversight and mentoring.

And still children die of abuse or neglect.

One six year old child recently died – after three separate reports of abuse, including one from his school.

DCF investigated but concluded that the child was not at risk and, later, at low risk.

That child was later killed by his stepfather, who now faces criminal charges.

Too little, too late.

Read more in this News-Press guest editorial: DCF needs community’s help protecting children and this WXTX Fox 4 News Team Coverage piece: Jenkins Case File.

Once upon a time, non-parents might have visitation or even custody rights, most commonly grandparents.

Then the US Supreme Court ruled that such third party rights trampled the rights of parents, which should be superior – provided the parents are fit parents.

Since then, some states have tried fashioning constitutional statutes granting third parties visitation or custody rights.

The most popular third parties are still grandparents. But there are other beneficiaries as well.

Stepparents. And the gay parent who is not the biological parent.

Utah is one such unlikely state to pass a new law allowing a non-parent to seek visitation or custody rights.

Arguably, in defiance of local court rulings.

Read more in this Salt Lake Tribune article: Measure would boost rights of stepparents.

In many divorce cases, the most thorny property division question is: what to do with the marital home?

That is especially likely in a depressed real estate market like the current one.

One commonly agreed to option is for the spouse who wants to remain in the house to refinance the other spouse’s name off the mortgage.

But what if the occupying spouse doesn’t have sufficient income or credit to accomplish what was agreed to?

Well, that may depend on what state you live in.

A Virginia women is apparently facing jail time for not being able to refinance as agreed.

Due to the downturn in the real estate market, she also has been unable to sell her way around the refinancing obligation.

Read more in this WAVY TV 10 (VA) article: York Co. woman faces possible jail time for failing to refinance, sell home.

A millionaire and his wife are pitted against each other in an ongoing custody battle … over their dog.

The “father”, who has no children, has spent over $60,000 to win custody of the pooch.

At first, the couple engaged in roughly equal timesharing, by agreement.

Then the “mother” accused the “father” of abuse.

The judge didn’t buy it, and the “father”‘s timesharing resumed …

Until the “mother” moved to Connecticut.

Since then, the “father” has had no time with their pet.

The “father” is filing an appeal.

Read more in this New York Daily News article: Fur flies over dog custody.

When children are taken into foster care due to alleged abandonment, abuse or neglect, it sets in motion a series of events, including various hearings in juvenile dependency court.

Juvenile dependency court is unlike any other court.

Many of the families of removed children are indigent. Parents attorneys’ and children’s attorneys are typically court-appointed. They handle hundreds of cases per year.

They barely know their clients, let alone the parents and the family’s circumstances.

Yet these overburdened court-appointed attorneys are the just about the only thing standing between children – and removal from their parents and families.

The courts don’t allow much time for parents to defend return of children to their families. In California, sometimes just five minutes or less.

That’s all the time a judge has to get the facts and determine the best outcome. Informed only by attorneys and case workers who have inadequate time and too large caseloads to sort out the truth and come up with solutions.

And so children are removed from their homes … whether or not they should be …

Read horror story after horror story in this troubling Mercury News article: How rushed justice fails our kids – BROKEN FAMILIES, BROKEN COURTS: A MERCURY NEWS INVESTIGATION.