By The Law Offices of Ronald H. Kauffman of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Monday, August 22, 2016.

New York keeps their divorce court documents sealed for 100 years. What was it like to get divorced 100 years ago? The New York Post finds out.

I’ve written about New York divorces before, especially the Tom Cruise divorce and why they chose New York. Only one other state, Alaska, automatically seals matrimonial cases, and that’s for 50 years.

Divorce was rare then. There were only 50 cases filed in Manhattan Supreme Court in 1915, compared to 15,000 in 2015. Living alone then was almost unimaginable for women, and men didn’t want to live alone either. The rules were different too.

Cheaters Barred from Remarrying

Otto and Frieda Bardenheier were in a10-year marriage when she began an affair with a man in October 1914. They continued their trysts at his West 66th Street apartment until her husband filed for divorce in 1915.

Judge Daniel F. Cohalan chose to punish Frieda with what was a popular penalty for cheaters at the time: He barred her from remarrying.

Name-calling was common

David Ackerman’s contemporary Herman Haenelt hit his wife, Anna, choked her and pushed her up against a wall while calling her a “dreck-sau” and “mist-stick,” German slang for “dirty pig” and “piece of s-t.”

Faking Evidence

Back then, a spouse had to be legally ‘at fault’ to divorce, which led to accusations of adultery, neglect, abuse, and fraud. If one of those grounds was not present, unhappy couples made it up.

Men would often take posed photos on a bed with a prostitute – even if he didn’t sleep with her – to try to prove that he was an adulterer and had given proper grounds for divorce.

Florida has taken efforts to keep confidential family court filings in our courthouses. In an effort to protect the privacy of parties to a divorce, and prevent identity theft, Florida recently adopted a confidentiality rule to better protect social security and bank account numbers for instance.

But Florida court filings are not private. Privacy – and confidentiality of court filings – are easily overlooked issues when filing for divorce, and something you should be aware of in deciding in which state to file.

The New York Post article is here.

By The Law Offices of Ronald H. Kauffman of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Monday, August 1, 2016.

As the incoming president of the First Family Law Inns of Court, I was proud to co-sponsor a Town Hall Meeting with Dade County Circuit Judge Scott Bernstein, administrative judge of the family division.

The family division of the Dade County Court system is one of the largest in the country, and handles thousands of divorces, paternities, child custody and child support cases a year.

Navigating your family through this complex system requires experience. As administrative Judge for the family division, the Hon. Scott Bernstein, has been a shining light in getting feedback from the community on better ways to improve our family division.

The First Family Law American Inns of Court in Miami is a group, consisting of lawyers and judicial officers dedicated to professionalism, ethics, civility and excellence.

In co-sponsoring the Town Hall meeting today, the Inns of Court hopefully fulfilled its mission to inspire the legal community to advance the rule of law by achieving the highest level of professionalism through example, education and mentoring.

By The Law Offices of Ronald H. Kauffman of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Friday, February 19, 2016.

Purposefully losing your divorce sounds crazy. But one Chinese company just lost a lawsuit on purpose. What would it take to lose your divorce if you really wanted to?

It seems like an unlikely topic, losing a lawsuit. But, some companies are trying to avoid China’s new strict capital controls – which limit sending overseas $50,000 a year – except for business-related payments.

One Chinese company found out that if they deliberately lost a lawsuit for a phony breach of contract claim, a $3.5 million payout could be used to pay its own entities in the U.S. to get around currency controls.

I’ve written on courtroom tactics before. The Chinese situation got me to thinking about family law. What would you have to do to lose a divorce case on purpose?

Avoiding Chinese capital controls may not apply to most American divorces, but if you really want to lose your divorce case, here are some practical tips:

Hide Your Records

The first thing you want to do is hide all your important financial records: tax returns, pay stubs, bank statements. Afterwards, you can walk into court and plead ignorance. Basically, you’re forcing your spouse’s attorneys to subpoena the documents which will be re-created, after a lot of time and extra expense.

Drain bank accounts

Closing all the bank accounts will force your spouse to run to court on an emergency basis. That’s exactly what you want, having the judge associate your case with crisis. The best part: there’s a new administrative order that specifically prohibits that kind of thing.

Cancel health insurance

Canceling your spouse’s health insurance not only violates the new status quo administrative order, it is another way to get hauled back into court on an emergency basis, and increase your legal fees. If you’re looking to avoid any Chinese monetary controls, spending your cash on a lawyer is as good a way as any.

Represent yourself

The old saying: “the person who represents themselves has a fool for a client” is probably wrong. Lawyers are for the rich and famous. If you can handle your own dentistry, you can easily handle your own divorce.

Lie

Lying has two big advantages:

Lying to your attorney will surprise him in court, and lawyers love to be surprised in court. And, if you want to lose, there’s really no substitute for lying to the judge deciding your case.

If losing your divorce on purpose becomes a necessity, remember that lying, hiding assets, cutting off health insurance and representing yourself is a great way to do it.

The Wall Street Journal article is here.

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Monday, April 1, 2013.

With all of the talk about marriage, divorce and the U.S. Supreme Court oral argument in the Defense of Marriage Act case, there is a timely decision out of Phoenix, Arizona about the Thomas Beatie divorce, a matter I blogged about a while ago. Do you remember Tom?

To recap, Tom was born Tracy Lehuanani Lagondino in Oahu, Hawaii. She began undergoing testosterone therapy, and after psychological testing, her first surgeries were performed in 2002. After that Tracy’s birth certificate and driver’s license changed. Six months later, Tracy became Tom.

Tom married his girlfriend Nancy in 2003, and because Nancy couldn’t have children, Tom had the child. Tom conceived – with donated sperm – and gave birth to children who are now 4, 3 and 2 years old. The couple eventually moved to Arizona.

When news leaked out of the pregnancy, Tom became an instant hint as “The Pregnant Man,” appearing on Oprah, Barbara Walters, Letterman etc. He also wrote a book, and is a motivational speaker for transgender rights.

Now Tom wants to end his marriage to Nancy, and filed in Phoenix, Arizona. Arizona, like Florida, bans same-sex marriages, which prevents Tom’s nine-year union with Nancy from being recognized as a valid marriage. So, Tom’s divorce plans stalled last summer when a judge said he was unable to find legal authority defining a man as someone who can give birth. However, the case has been left in legal limbo for a while.

Last week Maricopa County Family Court Judge Douglas Gerlach ruled that Arizona’s ban on same-sex marriages prevents Thomas Beatie’s nine-year union from being recognized as valid. Gerlach said he had no jurisdiction to approve a divorce because there’s insufficient evidence that Beatie was a man when he married Nancy Beatie in Hawaii. As USA Today reports:

“The decision here is not based on the conclusion that this case involves a same-sex marriage merely because one of the parties is a transsexual male, but instead, the decision is compelled by the fact that the parties failed to prove that (Thomas Beatie) was a transsexual male when they were issued their marriage license,” he wrote in Friday’s ruling.

The judge’s ruling also said it didn’t address whether Arizona law allows a person who was born female to marry another female after undergoing a sex change operation. Gerlach’s ruling also noted that Thomas Beatie halted the testosterone treatments and that he didn’t provide documentation for any additional non-surgical efforts.

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Tuesday, November 20, 2012.

The divorce process forces spouses against each other, to view each other with suspicion, and as enemies. Not surprisingly, good relations after the divorce seem unlikely, and future friendships seem impossible. It takes a lot to make up with the person who may have ruined your life, or who has been public enemy #1 for a year or more. But just as it takes two to marry, it takes two to make a good or bad divorce. Here are some tips to help keep good relations after the lawyers and judges are long gone. And who knows, maybe it could save your life one day:

– Never express negative sentiments about your ex in front of your children.

– Give up blame, and take responsibility for how you act.

– Be polite. Minding your P’s and Q’s is never out of line.

– Don’t ask your children to keep secrets from their other parent.

– Take the high road.

– Respect your ex.

So how could following any of these guidelines save your life? Consider the following two cases:

Case No. 1 -Su Dan, 32, of China, gave part of herself – literally – to her former ex-husband, Tian Xinbing, 39, when she donated a portion of her liver to him. Dan and Xinbing divorced in July after 10 years of marriage. Two months later, Xinbing was diagnosed with liver cancer and late-stage cirrhosis. After learning that her ex was tenth on the donor waiting list, Dan offered to donate part of her liver.

Case No. 2 – Erica Arsenault, of Massachusetts, volunteered to donate a kidney to her former mother-in-law years after her divorce. The woman made the incredible offer nearly 10 years after she divorced the woman’s son. Six weeks ago, a successful transplant operation was performed and both women are healing now. They say the whole ordeal has brought a family separated by divorce closer than ever.

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Thursday, October 18, 2012.

Marriage and divorce are important events. Not surprisingly, researchers, policy makers, and the public are always interested in up-to-date information about the demographic characteristics of marital events, and they reveal a lot about nationwide patterns.

The New York Times recently reported on the latest Census figures about marriage and divorce. According to the 2011 American Community Survey released last month by the U.S. Census Bureau, New Jersey ranks last among the states in the percentage of residents 18 and older who are divorced.

The New York Times article notes a few reasons. “The composition of New Jersey married individuals is quite favorable across several indicators, providing some evidence for the low divorce rate,” said Susan L. Brown, a sociology professor and co-director of the National Center for Family and Marriage Research at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. “These factors include education, race-ethnicity, age, and age at first marriage.”

However, the Census revealed a lot of other interesting variations among U.S. states, and between men and women. For instance, the states with the highest divorce rates for men were Arkansas and Maine. But, the states with the highest divorce rates for women were different. Alaska and Oklahoma topped the charts in that category. How did Florida rank? Not terrible, a little under the national average for both men and women 8.5 per 1,000 men and 9.9 per 1,000 women. The national averages for men and women were 9.2 per 1,000 and 9.7 per 1,000 respectively. So, while New Jersey has one of the lowest divorce rates, it also has one of the lowest marriage rates too. Maybe you don’t need to pack your bags for the Garden State so quickly.

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Friday, August 17, 2012.

While the overall divorce rate in the United States has decreased since 1990, it has doubled for those over age 50. The surge has spawned the term “gray divorce.” As Jay Lebow, a psychologist at the Family Institute at Northwestern University, says:

“If late-life divorce were a disease, it would be an epidemic.”

One out of three boomers will face older age unmarried, says Susan Brown, codirector of the National Center for Family & Marriage Research at Bowling Green State University in her new study The Gray Divorce Revolution.

By the time people are in their 50’s and older, issues of custody and child support may no longer be relevant. Instead, those issues are replaced with other challenges. Older people have had time to accumulate assets, one or both may be retired, and there are long term health care issues.

Many of those opting for gray divorces, however, fail to foresee its complications in today’s bleak economy. Here are some things to consider:

Valuing the Marital Estate – By the time a couple enters the golden years, they may have gold to divide, including businesses, retirement funds, and vacation homes. Valuing these assets can be difficult. The value of a business may not be apparent from balance sheets, and the sale or transfer of assets may have tax consequences. As a result, a financial advisor may be an important component in the divorce.

Medical Care – Health insurance is often tied to the employment of one spouse. With aging comes diminishing health, and declining cognitive ability. Courts may need to intervene if one party has dwindling capacity to handle their own affairs.

Long-Term Arrangements – Legal arrangements, such as 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 – After 20 years of marriage, retirement plans can be substantial . . . and complex. Retirement plans vary in kind, and they all have different restrictions, tax consequences, distribution and vesting rules.

Lifestyle adjustment – Younger couples have time to re-accumulate wealth after divorce, but in Gray Divorces, the spouses have less time to re-establish themselves financially. One or both may be close to or in retirement, and face living on half of what they earmarked for retirement.

There are special interests involved when an older couples divorces. As always, information is power, so make a point to seek out experts for guidance.

On behalf of Ronald H. Kauffman, P.A. posted in Divorce on Saturday, July 14, 2012.

The state of filing can have a big impact on the outcome of your divorce. Many people don’t have a choice. But if one party moves to another state, there may be a choice as to where to file.

Is one state better than another? Child support awards in California are typically higher than Florida, and Texas is rumored to be tough on alimony. Last year Bloomberg ranked all 50 states on the ease of divorce. You can read the ranking in: The Best and Worst States for Getting Divorced.

Which brings me back to the Tom Cruise divorce. Katie could have filed in New York or California, assuming she satisfied either state’s residency requirements. So, why New York over California?

I don’t think the reason has to do with the grounds for divorce, or any economic advantage. After all, New York and California, like Florida, are no-fault states, and Tom and Katie are believed to have a prenuptial agreement anyway.

I suspect one of the reasons is privacy. Unlike California or Florida, divorce filings in New York are not open to the public, so only the parties and their attorneys have access to documents filed with the court.

In an effort to protect the privacy of parties to a divorce, and prevent identity theft, Florida recently adopted a confidentiality rule to better protect social security and bank account numbers for instance. But Florida court filings are not private. Privacy – and confidentiality of court filings – are easily overlooked issues when filing for divorce, and something you should be aware of in deciding in which state to file.