Valuing Marital Property – Fair Market vs Intrinsic Value Before a court can officially act on the division of marital property in any divorce case, a value must be placed on all spouses’ assets and liabilities. Having a value placed on property – even if it has been deemed one spouse’s separate property – allows…
Read articleSummary of Common Family Law Terms (Vol. V) We have discussed a great deal of family law terms over the last few months. Now it is time to take a brief timeout to look back on a some of the more noteworthy concepts I do this periodically because it’s not like this is everyday language.…
Read articleDoes the court hearing your divorce case have full jurisdiction? When divorcing, if spouses cannot agree on a fair and equitable division of marital property, they rely on the court to decide who gets what. That seems like a full proof way of settling the argument, right? Well, yes and no. Simply put, courts have…
Read articleDividing and Confirming – A Digestible Overview So you are getting divorced, and now the dreaded conversation of dividing up all that marital property – the house, land, retirement accounts, supposed separate property, etc. – is rearing its ugly head. Something has got to give, right? Which one of you is going to crack first?…
Read article
Suit for Grandparent Possession or Access – An everyday person unfamiliar with family law would assume that a grandparent has the inside track in any suit affecting the parent-child relationship – such as a conservatorship suit where a parent is not involved or deemed unfit. After all, the grandparent is family. The court should see…
Read articleSuit for Sibling Access – In certain circumstances, a situation may arise where an older sibling requests to gain access to, or custody of, a younger sibling. We have written at great length about conservatorship suits, so this blog will strictly stick to suits for sibling access. For a review of conservatorship suits, go here…
Read articleSome final thoughts on termination suits As part of our ongoing conversation on termination suits, I think it’s important to look at the effect a terminated parent-child relationship has on certain legal rights. Simply put: terminating a parent-child relationship does not completely sever all rights and duties between a parent and child. Below is a…
Read article
Termination Suits (Part II) To round out our blog conversation on a court’s decision to terminate the parent-child relationship, I think it’s important to discuss certain situations where the court may permit a parent whose parental rights have been terminated to have contact with their child. Again, the primary goal of a termination suit is…
Read articleTermination Suits We’ve discussed in great detail the court’s commitment to protecting a child’s best interest when it comes to everything from a standard divorce to issues of conservatorship, possession and access, and parentage suits. Looking out for a child’s interest can also mean completely severing the parent-child relationship. In this blog, we will attempt…
Read articleGenetic Testing and Parentage Suits We have all heard of the term genetic testing, and maybe you even saw instances of it being used on television in various shows and movies. It can be some pretty interesting stuff, but how does it work within the framework of parentage suits? That is the focus of this…
Read article