Tag: Best Family Divorce Attorney

Divorce and Short Term Marriages

Posted by Ron Kauffman on

Baretta action star, Robert Blake, has filed for divorce from his third wife, Pamela Hudak, just a year after the two strolled into Beverly Hills City Hall to obtain their marriage license. What is the impact of such a short-term marriage on divorce?

divorce alimony

And that’s the name of that tune!

According TMZ, actor Robert Blake filed docs in Los Angeles Friday to call the relationship quits. The 85-year-old married Pamela Hudak in Spring of 2017. The couple had known each other for decades and even dated years ago. Blake was previously married to Sondra Kerry from 1961 to 1983.

Florida Divorce

I’ve written about divorce and the length of a marriage before. Florida Statutes actually define what the length of your marriage means. For example, in order to determine alimony, there is a rebuttable presumption in Florida that a short-term marriage is a marriage having a duration of less than 7 years.

Florida Statutes define a moderate-term marriage as a marriage having a duration of greater than 7 years but less than 17 years. And, a long-term marriage is a marriage having a duration of 17 years or greater.

How do you measure the marriage term? In Florida, the length of your marriage is the period of time measured from the date of your marriage until the date of filing of an action to dissolve your marriage.

The Length of your marriage is very important when it comes to determining the kind of duration of alimony payments. For example, permanent alimony is generally for longer term marriages if the statutory criteria are met.

In shorter term marriages and for moderate term marriages, permanent alimony may be considered, but the burden of proof is much higher.

Conversely, bridge-the-gap alimony is generally awarded to allow a person to transition from being married to being single. So, bridge-the-gap alimony is designed for short-term needs. In fact, the length of an award bridge-the-gap alimony may not exceed 2 years.

Durational alimony helps provide a person with economic help for a set period of time after short or moderate length marriages or following a marriage of long duration if there is no ongoing need for support on a permanent basis.

The length of your marriage also factors in to property divisions. When a court divides the marital assets and debts, the court begin with the premise that the distribution should be equal. One of the factors a court can look to in justifying an unequal distribution includes the duration of the marriage.

Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time.

Blake was accused of murdering his second wife, Bonnie Lee Bakley. Blake was her tenth husband. Bakley was fatally shot while sitting in Blake’s parked car outside a Los Angeles-area restaurant in May 2001.

In 2002, Robert Blake was charged with Bakley’s murder, solicitation of murder, conspiracy and special circumstance of lying in wait. In March 2005, a jury found Blake not guilty of the crimes.

Seven months later, Blake was found liable in a wrongful death lawsuit brought against him by Bakley’s children. Officially, Bakley’s murder remains unsolved.

The TMZ article is here.

 

Happy “Good Divorce Week”?

Posted by Ron Kauffman on

Well it is the holiday season. According to the Financial Times, it’s “Good Divorce Week” (that’s really a thing). In Britain the aim is to help resolve a divorce in a constructive way and minimize the impact on children. The idea may work well here too.

Divorce

The Long and Winding Road

For most people — especially those going through a separation — a “good divorce” sounds like an oxymoron. Contentious splits are common, and likely to involve a lot of wasted time, anger and money.

But going to court is not the best way to resolve family issues. Mediation and negotiation can be cheaper, quicker and less stressful.

Increasingly, the collaborative process is becoming more widely requested by clients and helps keep costs and anger down.

Why do people in the UK divorce? According to the article, unreasonable behavior is the most common basis for divorce — accounting for 52% of divorce petitions brought by women, and 37% of those by men. However, research says adultery is the most common reason for divorce, followed by couples growing apart, struggling with money issues, abuse and addiction.

Let it Be: Florida Divorce

I’ve written about divorces before, and the “good divorce” too. Historically in Florida, in order to obtain a divorce, one had to prove the existence of legal grounds such as adultery. This often-required additional expenses on behalf of the aggrieved party, only serving to make the divorce process more expensive and cumbersome than it already was.

Florida Statutes actually still provide that these things may be considered under certain circumstances in the award of alimony, equitable distribution of marital assets and liabilities, and determination of parental responsibility. However, case authority shows little consideration from a legal perspective, relegating them to more of an emotional appeal.

In the years leading up to the enactment of “no-fault” divorce, courts often granted divorces on bases that were easier to prove, the most common being “mental cruelty.”

In Florida, either spouse can file for the dissolution of marriage. You must prove that a marriage exists, one party has been a Florida resident for six months before filing the petition, and the marriage is irretrievably broken.

Back in the UK

Sarah Coles, has been researching the costs of divorce in the UK, and how a good divorce can reduce these. For starters, fighting in court can be expensive, so you need to ask yourself whether you really need to fight over who gets the pots and pans.

Mediation can dramatically cut costs of a divorce. If you have a reasonably good and equal relationship with your ex, this brings you together in a room with a single lawyer to hammer out the details.

To enable this, separating couples need to keep the channels of communication open.

Unsurprisingly, it is the financial settlement that causes huge stress. The article advises couples to decide their priorities when it comes to finances and matters relating to their children.

Remember that a bad credit record can affect you both, and that if you move out of the family home, but are still named on the mortgage, you are still jointly liable for the monthly repayments.

The Financial Times article is here.

 

Happy Thanksgiving

Posted by Ron Kauffman on

The divorce and family law offices of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. will close at 1PM on Wednesday, November 21 for the Thanksgiving holiday. We will re-open at 9AM on Monday, November 26. We wish you and your family a safe and happy Thanksgiving holiday.

Thanksgiving timesharing

Before Thanksgiving’s arrival is the time to resolve child custody and timesharing problems so you can enjoy your turkey dinner with minimum stress for you and your children.

Below are suggestions to make your Thanksgiving visitation issues a little easier:

Alternate. Some families alternate Thanksgiving every other year. If you get the kids for Thanksgiving this year, next year will be the other parent’s turn. Having a regular plan to fall back on can eliminate the potential for what is fair.

Be flexible. An easy Thanksgiving schedule for everyone may require some changes from the normal visitation schedule.

Be respectful. You may not want to be friends anymore, but you need to figure out how to communicate with your ex without all the emotional baggage.

Don’t mix issues. Do not bring up unrelated issues which could make a problem free Thanksgiving dinner impossible. Set aside your differences until after the holiday season.

Pick your battles. Thanksgiving may be more important to you than Easter is to your ex-spouse. Don’t fight just for the sake of fighting.

Protect the children. Your children’s memories of Thanksgiving should be about great food and family fun. They should not be forced to witness you and another parent arguing.

Plan. Start talking about the holiday visitation schedule sooner rather than later, the longer you wait the harder it can be.

Thanksgiving can be stressful. But the weather has cooled and the kids are on vacation. Try to make the holidays the best time of year.

 

My Big Fat Gray Divorce

Posted by Ron Kauffman on

Nia Vardalos has filed for divorce from husband Ian Gomez. Her 1993 nuptials inspired the hit movie “My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” and the marriage lasted for nearly 25 years. Nia’s is another example of the recent phenomenon of “gray divorce.”

Not Zorba the Greek

As PEOPLE magazine reports, after the couple’s 1993 wedding, Vardolos wrote the one-woman play “My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” partially based on her own experiences. She starred in the 2002 hit movie playing Toula Portokalos, who falls in love with non-Greek Ian Miller. Gomez played Corbett’s best man, Mike.

The actress, 55, filed on Tuesday in Los Angeles County, citing irreconcilable differences as the reason for their split, according to court documents obtained by The Blast.

Vardalos said she separated from her husband over a year ago on June 29, 2017, almost 24 years after they said, “I Do.”

Florida Gray Divorce

I’ve written about gray divorces before. The legal nuances of gray divorce can be different than what other couples might encounter. In a gray divorce, the financial considerations take on more importance than the children’s issues – because the children are emancipated or nearly so.

When couples choose to divorce in their 30s or 40s, they still have time to recover financially, because adults at that age have several years, if not decades, left in their careers.

But when divorce occurs when a couple is in their 50s or later, the so-called “gray divorce”, careers may either be coming to a close or are completed, and spouses are often living on fixed incomes provided through Social Security or retirement benefits.

Here are some things to consider:

  • By the time a couple enters the golden years, there may be gold to divide, including businesses, retirement funds, and vacation homes. Valuing these assets can be difficult. A financial advisor may be an important component in the divorce.
  • Health insurance is often tied to the employment of a spouse. Courts may need to intervene if one party has dwindling capacity to handle their own affairs.
  • Wills and trusts need to be reviewed to make sure they reflect post-divorce wishes. The same is true for long-term care, such as medical directives, living wills and trusts.
  • Retirement plans can be substantial and complex. Retirement plans vary, and they all have different restrictions, tax consequences, distribution and vesting rules.

There are special concerns involved in a gray divorce. As always, information is power, so make a point to seek out experts for guidance.

Most gray divorces involve marriages that have lasted for several decades, which makes it difficult to disentangle the spouses from each other. However, couples who divorce after many years together should receive a close-to-even split of assets, legally putting each spouse on an equal playing field for the future.

A Woman’s Way

In a joint statement obtained by PEOPLE, the couple said:

“We’ve been respectfully separated for a lengthy period of time. Our relationship became a friendship so the decision to end the marriage is completely mutual and amicable. It is our hope that decency will prevail on the reporting of this story which will soon be yesterday’s news. Thank you for respecting our privacy.”

Unlike many gray divorces, the couple share an 11-year-old daughter whom they adopted in 2008. She is asking for joint legal and physical custody of their daughter. The actress also asked that spousal support to be “determined in mediation.”

She and Gomez received the news that they had been matched with their then 3-year-old daughter in 2008 after more than nine years of struggling to become parents.

The PEOPLE article is here.

 

Family Law Super Lawyers

Posted by Ron Kauffman on

I am very pleased to announce that I have been selected to the 2018 Super Lawyers list in the area of Family Law. Super Lawyers is a rating service of outstanding lawyers from more than 70 practice areas who have attained a high degree of peer recognition and professional achievement.

Family Law Superlawyer

Superlawyers

Super Lawyers is a rating service of outstanding lawyers from more than 70 practice areas who have attained a high degree of peer recognition and professional achievement.

The annual selections are made using a patented multi-phase process that includes a statewide survey of lawyers, an independent research evaluation of candidates and peer reviews by practice area. The result is a credible, comprehensive and diverse listing of exceptional attorneys.

The Super Lawyers lists are published nationwide in Super Lawyers Magazines and in leading city and regional magazines and newspapers across the country. Super Lawyers Magazines also feature editorial profiles of attorneys who embody excellence in the practice of law.

Florida Board Certification

“Board Certification” in Florida, mean certification from The Florida Bar, and recognizes attorneys’ special knowledge, skills and proficiency in various areas of law and professionalism and ethics in practice.

Board certified lawyers are evaluated for professionalism and tested for expertise. Certification is the Florida Bar’s highest level of evaluation of the competency and experience of attorneys in the 26 areas of law approved for certification by the Supreme Court of Florida.

In addition to being named in Superlawyers, I am also board certified in marital and family law, currently serve on the Executive Council of the Family Law Section of the Florida Bar, and I am a member of both the California and Florida Bars. One of my recent article “To Catch a Time-sharing Deviation” was published in The Florida Bar Journal.

The article, “To Catch a Time-sharing Deviation”, is also cited as a reference in the Florida Benchbook – which is published by the Office of the State Courts Administrator. I am also a frequent speaker, and have lectured to different professional organizations including, the Florida Bar, the Florida Chapter of the AFCC; Miami-Dade County Family Court Services; and The First Family Law American Inns of Court.

For more on Family Law Super Lawyers visit Superlawyers.

 

Hiding Money in Divorce

Posted by Ron Kauffman on

“Martin” actress,Tisha Campbell-Martin, is accusing her estranged husband of hiding money during their divorce proceedings. Hiding money, especially when you are going through a divorce raises all kinds of concerns . . . for both parties. What are some of the consequences?

hiding assets in divorce

Campbell-Martin filed legal documents in court – which were obtained by TMZ – claiming her husband Duane Martin was hiding and misappropriating money while they were married.

It’s unclear how much money she thinks he was hiding from her or what specific remedies she is seeking.

Hiding Assets in Divorce

In Florida divorce, judgments and marital settlement agreements can be set aside on various grounds, including fraud. Divorce fraud has become very common, and I’ve written on the subject before.

One of the areas ripe with fraud is hiding money in a divorce. In certain cases, Florida allows you to challenge and vacate or modify a marital settlement agreement if the agreement was based on things like fraud, deceit, duress, coercion, misrepresentation, overreaching.

Additionally, Florida courts have allowed challenges to agreements where the marital settlement agreement makes unfair or unreasonable provision for the challenging party given the circumstances of the case.

Judgments may also be overturned because of fraud and fraud on the court. The thinking is that cheaters should not be allowed to prosper, and it has long been central to our legal system.

Florida rules of court expressly allow you to get some relief from a judgment if it was the product of fraud, misrepresentation, or other misconduct of an adverse party.

Courts have available to them all kinds of sanctions, in a wide variety of shapes, attempting to encompass the virtually limitless ways people in divorce manage to misbehave.

Truth or Consequences?

According to the article, actress Tisha Campbell-Martin is asking a judge to take legal action against her husband for hiding money during the divorce. She originally filed for divorce in February, after 20 years of marriage.

The couple separated in December of 2016. She is seeking alimony from her husband, and allegedly wants to block the court’s ability to award him spousal support. What are some of the remedies the judge in Campbell-Martin’s case can consider?

If you lie during the divorce process, during your deposition for example, in order to hide assets, you may have committed perjury – which is a crime. Also, if your lies are discovered by your spouse, your spouse’s attorney, or a judge, you may face severe sanctions.

Similarly, if you don’t properly report your assets on your financial affidavit or fail to disclose financial information to your spouse during a divorce, a court can order you to do so. If you defy the court when it, for example, orders you to share account balances and the location of money, you can be held in contempt of court.

The TMZ article is here.

 

Can You Pass the Divorce Test?

Posted by Ron Kauffman on

As if fighting with your spouse wasn’t stressful enough, in China authorities require that you pass a quiz to divorce. Here’s the rub: the better you do on the test, the less likely the divorce will be approved.

Divorce Quizzes

According to the New York Times, the Chinese Divorce Test, which has been issued in at least two provinces since last year, follow the format of a typical three-part school exam: fill-in-the-blank, short answer, and an essay.

Questions include the mundane — “When is your anniversary?” — and the philosophical: “Have you fulfilled your responsibility to your family?”

The quizzes — 15 questions, scored on a scale of 100 points — were developed as a way to prevent “impulse divorces”.

Local news outlets reported that the authorities considered a score of 60 points or higher to mean “room for recovery,” and those couples were encouraged to work on their marriages.

Florida No Fault Divorce

Florida has made it much easier to divorce, which is a subject I’ve written about before. For example, we have abolished fault as grounds for filing a divorce. The only grounds you need to file for divorce in Florida is to prove your marriage is “irretrievably broken.”

No fault divorce laws exist in all 50 states to make it possible for one party to get a divorce without proving any bad behavior took place, and without getting the permission of the other spouse.

Before the no-fault divorce era in the United States, people who wanted to get divorce either had to reach agreement in advance with the other spouse that the marriage was over or prove wrongdoing.

No-fault laws are the result of trying to change the way divorces played out in court. No fault laws have reduced the number of feuding couples who felt the need to resort to distorted facts, lies, and the need to focus the trial on who did what to whom.

China is different. China is going through growing pains and dealing with modern problems like separation and divorce. The Chinese Divorce Test is a novel approach to dealing with rising divorce rates.

Chinese Water Torture?

According to the Times:

Through the guidance of the questions, couples can reminisce on the moments of their relationship and reflect on their familial roles and responsibilities. Nearly two million Chinese couples divorced in the first half of 2017, an 11 percent increase from the year before, according to state news media. About 3 percent of all married couples sought a divorce last year, up from fewer than 1 percent in 2002.

The quizzes were meant only to be a starting point, not the deciding factor in whether a couple can split up. But at least one couple’s high score resulted in the authorities’ preventing their divorce in another province last year.

A court in Yibin, a city in Sichuan Province, refused to grant the couple a divorce in September after citing their stellar test scores, according to local news outlets.

More than 70 percent of divorces filed in China last year were initiated by women, The South China Morning Post reported, citing the Supreme People’s Court. In most filings, incompatibility was given as the major reason; 15 percent cited domestic violence.

However, a smaller number of divorces appear to be shams resulting from a quirk in Chinese real estate law. Some cities limit the number of properties a married couple can own. By legally divorcing, a couple can buy more real estate in some of the world’s most expensive cities.

Experts said the state’s focus on preventing divorce stems from a Confucian belief that a stable society is made up of complete families. Some Chinese citizens criticize the quizzes for treating people like children.

So, if you remember your wedding anniversary you can’t divorce? Divorce isn’t a case of amnesia.

The New York Times article is here.

 

When Gladiators Divorce

Posted by Ron Kauffman on

Actor Russell Crowe has filed for divorce, and will auction off his jewelry, mementos and other property. Will selling his assets before the divorce has ended maximize his property division, or will he be eating crow?

Enter the Coliseum

According to Australian news, Sotheby’s Australia will host an auction titled “The Art of Divorce” in which 227 different items from Russell Crowe’s private life will go up for sale.

The auction will take place on April 7, on what would have been his 15th wedding anniversary.

Rare movie memorabilia will be in the auction including:

  • The armor from Gladiator as Maximus will go under the hammer. The armor is expected to fetch $30,000, while a sword used in the film could sell for $4000.
  • A working chariot from the set of Gladiator will sell for between $5000 and $10,000.
  • A 2001 Mercedes, valued between $15,000 and $25,000, is also in the lot, along with two motorcycles that could command top dollar.

According to Crowe:

Divorce has its way of making you really examine the things that are essential in life — and the things that are not

Through the process I had a look around and realized I had a lot of stuff. Career stuff, stuff I’ve collected, and stuff in general. Boxes and boxes of stuff … so in the spirit of moving forward into fresh air, here’s a portion of that collection of stuff.

Although news reports are unclear whether the auction of the assets are planned in cooperation with his soon to be ex-wife, or his own, generally people should be cautious selling property after filing for divorce.

Florida Property Division

In Florida, courts distribute marital assets and liabilities between the parties with the premise that the distribution should be equal, unless there is a justification for an unequal distribution. I’ve written about various aspects of property division before.

Marital assets are properties acquired and debts incurred during the marriage, individually by either spouse or jointly by them.

Marital assets and liabilities also include the enhancement in value and appreciation of non-marital assets resulting either from the efforts of either party during the marriage.

Dissipation and Waste

One of the relevant factors courts look to in property division is whether one of the parties intentionally dissipated, wasted, depleted, or destroyed any of the marital assets after the filing of the petition.

Spouses can dissipate assets by giving away money irresponsibly, spending money on girlfriends, gambling losses, and drug usage. Some people would rather lose the money outright than split it with their spouses.

If the dissipation of an asset resulted from misconduct, the question is whether a spouse used marital funds for his own benefit unrelated to the marriage at a time when the marriage was undergoing an irreconcilable breakdown.

Misconduct is not mismanagement, or even a simple squandering of marital assets in a manner of which the other spouse disapproves.

Instead, there has to be evidence of the spending spouse’s intentional dissipation or destruction of the asset. Where marital misconduct results in a depletion or dissipation of marital assets, it can serve as a basis for unequal division.

Alternatively, courts can look at the misconduct, and can assign to the spending spouse as part of their equitable distribution, the misconduct losses.

As the Crowe Flies

The Crowes separated in 2012, share two sons, and their divorce should be finalized around the time of the auction.

Just as we collaborate on the upbringing of our kids, it’s easy for us to work together on something like this.

There are a lot of unknowns about Crowe’s planned auction, but he is fully embracing his breakup. Crowe’s been Instagramming and tweeting about the auction, even responding to curious fans.

It’s unclear if the earnings will go toward Crowe’s divorce settlement or a charity. A request for comment from his rep wasn’t immediately returned.

The Australian news article is here.

 

Is Divorce Genetic?

Posted by Ron Kauffman on

Are children of divorced parents more likely to get divorced than those who grew up in two-parent families? University researchers in Virginia and in Sweden are looking into the question of whether divorce is genetic or psychological. The results are surprising.

New Study

According to the report: people who were adopted resembled their biological — but not adoptive — parents and siblings in their histories of divorce.

The report also found consistent evidence that genetic factors primarily explained the “intergenerational transmission of divorce.”

The study’s findings about genes and divorce are notable because they diverge from the predominant narrative in divorce, that the offspring of divorced parents are more likely to get divorced because they see their parents struggling to manage conflict or lacking the necessary commitment, and they grow up to internalize that behavior.

Serotonin and Divorce

I’ve written about genes and divorce before. Other scientists are finding that the fault for divorce may reside in our genetic code. One gene involved in the regulation of serotonin can predict how much our emotions affect our relationships.

Researchers found a link between relationship fulfillment and a gene variant, or “allele,” known as 5-HTTLPR. All humans inherit a copy of this gene variant from each parent.

Study participants with two short 5-HTTLPR alleles were found to be most unhappy in their marriages when there was anger and contempt. They were most happy when there was humor and affection.

By contrast, those with one or two long alleles were far less bothered by the emotional tenor of their marriages.

The new findings don’t mean that couples with different variations of 5-HTTLPR are incompatible, but couples with two short alleles are likelier to thrive in a good relationship and suffer in a bad one.

What Causes Divorce?

Nearly all the prior literature emphasized that divorce was transmitted across generations psychologically, and the recent results about genes contradict that, suggesting that genetic factors are more important.

By recognizing the role that genetics plays in the transmission of divorce, therapists may be able to better identify more appropriate targets when helping distressed couples.

Previous studies haven’t adequately controlled for or examined something else in addition to the environment that divorcing parents transmit to their children: namely genes!

The study’s findings suggest new areas might be useful for therapists to target. For example, addressing underlying, personality-driven cognitive distortions through cognitive-behavioral approaches may be a better strategy.

The article from Virginia Commonwealth University is here.

 

Sweden’s High Divorce Rate

Posted by Ron Kauffman on

In a recent study of women in Sweden, 28 percent of people born to Swedish parents had divorced. But the divorce rate was much higher for immigrant women, where almost 60 percent had divorced in Sweden. The country may explain a lot about international divorce rates.

Stockholm Syndrome?

The divorce rates for immigrants in Sweden seem especially high when compared to the divorce rates in their home countries.

That the divorce rates are higher in Sweden may not be solely due to women’s higher workforce participation. In many patriarchal countries, like Iran, divorce is less accepted, and it can be legally more difficult to get divorced than in Sweden.

Rules about children can differ too. I’ve written on international divorces, especially as they relate to child custody issues and The Hague Convention on abduction.

International Divorces

I’ve written frequently about international divorce issues, especially international child abductions. The Hague Abduction Convention is a multilateral treaty developed by The Hague Conference on Private International Law to provide for the prompt return of a child internationally abducted by a parent from one-member country to another.

Sweden is a signatory to The Hague Convention, but many of the countries where Sweden’s immigrant population are from, are not signatories at all. This can be a problem if child abduction is an issue.

There are some essential elements to every Hague Convention case:

  • The country must be a Hague signatory country;
  • The child must be under the age of 16 years of age;
  • The wrongful removal must be a violation of the left behind parent’s “rights of custody;”
  • The left behind parent’s rights of custody “were actually being exercised or would have been exercised but for the removal.”

So, if a child under the age of sixteen has been wrongfully removed, the child must be promptly returned to the child’s country of habitual residence, unless certain exceptions apply.

The catch, of course, is that a child must be taken from a signatory country to another signatory country, and that is where understanding The Hague Convention comes in.

There is also a problem with hiding assets overseas. The problem of discovery of hidden wealth is even bigger in an international divorce because multiple countries, and multiple rules on discovery, can be involved.

Welcome to Sweden

Often, divorce is seen as a negative development. When families split up, children can find it difficult to adjust emotionally. But, not always for immigrant women in Sweden.

In a country like Sweden, the dynamics between the men and women change. Men who dominated their families because they had the economic power in their home countries lose that power when they integrate into a more gender-equal country like Sweden.

Women from patriarchal societies gain power when they integrate into a country like Sweden. There are more economic opportunities for them, and resources for women’s rights are more developed.

The welfare system is also extensive in Sweden, meaning that even women of low socioeconomic status can leave their husbands with no jobs and receive low-cost health care, education, job training, and a stipend from the government.

For women in Sweden who have migrated from more patriarchal countries, divorce may be an opportunity.

The Atlantic article is here.