The law setting out the presumption of paternity is found at Indiana Code section 31-14-7-1. This 2004 Indiana Court of Appeals opinion, Richard v. Richard, 812 NE 2d 222, gives us an idea of how not to address a questionable child of the marriage:

In the case at bar, Carl and Carmen’s divorce was finalized on September 15, 2000, and C.R.R. was born on June 1, 2001—well within the 300 day period set forth in I.C. § 31-14-7-1(1)(B). In addition, DNA testing indicated that there is a 99.999% probability that Carl fathered C.R.R. Nevertheless, the presumption may be rebutted by direct, clear, and convincing evidence that the husband: (1) is impotent; (2) was absent so as to have no access to the mother; (3) was absent during the entire time the child must have been conceived; (4) was present with the mother only in circumstances which clearly prove there was no sexual intercourse; (5) was sterile during the time the child must have been conceived; or (6) can show that the DNA test of another man indicates a 99% probability that the man is the child’s father combined with uncontradicted evidence that the man had sexual intercourse with the mother at the time the child must have been conceived. Minton v. Weaver, 697 N.E.2d 1259, 1260 (Ind.Ct.App.1998), trans. denied. However, the record reveals no such evidence here.

To the contrary, Carl’s testimony shows that, although he adamantly denies having sex with Carmen, he had access to her during the period of time that C.R.R. would have been conceived. Likewise, he presented no evidence that he was impotent or sterile. Our supreme court has previously held: “[f]or the putative father to merely state that he did not have relations with his wife when he had opportunity to, regardless of the quality or credibility of his testimony, is not sufficient to set aside the presumption.” L.F.R. v. R.A.R., 269 Ind. 97, 99, 378 N.E.2d 855, 857 (Ind.1978).

***

Despite Carl’s contentions, we find nothing in Charles’ testimony that constitutes 228 the direct, clear, and convincing proof necessary to overcome the statutory presumption that Carl is the biological father of C.R.R. See Minton, 697 N.E.2d at 1260. Thus, in the same vein that our supreme court has held that a putative father cannot overcome the presumption by merely denying he had relations with his wife, we hold that Carl cannot overcome the statutory presumption of paternity by merely presenting testimony of his identical twin brother that the child is probably his and he is willing to pay child support. See L.F.R. 378 N.E.2d at 857. As a result, we hold that the trial court committed no error in determining that Carl is the biological father of C.R.R.

View full post on Sam Hasler’s Indiana Divorce & Family Law Blog

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Michael Mastracci, an attorney from Baltimore, Maryland, publishes one of my favorite blogs, “Divorce Without Dishonor.” He is a huge proponent of utilizing the collaborative law model in divorce and custody matters whenever possible. He recently posted an excellent piece, with which I agree, well worth sharing. I have added a few of my own thoughts at the end.

When I was in law school one of the adjunct professors was a circuit court judge with years of experience presiding over cases involving dueling parents arguing about virtually every aspect of their children’s lives. His advice, probably the best advice in three years of law school, was to know your judge. His Honor was not speaking about knowing the judge personally (although that never hurts) but knowing what he or she is likely to do in any given situation or factual scenario. What does that mean?

When I was in law school one of the adjunct professors was a circuit court judge with years of experience presiding over cases involving dueling parents arguing about virtually every aspect of their children’s lives. His advice, probably the best advice in three years of law school, was to know your judge. His Honor was not speaking about knowing the judge personally (although that never hurts) but knowing what he or she is likely to do in any given situation or factual scenario. What does that mean?

People often tend to forget that judges are people, people who likely either knew the governor or knew people close to the governor in order to get appointed. Judges are not necessarily appointed because they are smart. There is no judgeship test or certification to wear the robe once appointed (that is appointed and not anointed as some may think).

There are many judges who care deeply about the divorce and child custody litigants that come before them. There are many fine judges that have earned the respect of the lawyers and the citizens that appear before them. They may have the best of intentions and have all the good qualities one may hope for and yet they may make a ruling that will haunt you and your family for years to come. Why would you let this happen?

While judges generally receive a great deal of respect you cannot forget that they are people too and we all have shortcomings and we all have faults and areas of our lives that could use some improvement. A judge goes to work just like anyone else. For a judge, deciding the custody and child access issues of your case would be just a routine part of any given day; just another day at the office. Don’t lose sight of these sorts of things when you decide to take your business to the courthouse. From this day forward, make sure you are in the business of co-parenting.

And remember, when a court order is entered, it lasts until your child reaches the age of majority unless modified by agreement or subsequent court order. Look for alternatives to litigation and do all you can to Stop Fighting Over the Kids.

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From Family Law Week comes Collaborative prenuptial agreements find favour

According to The Law Society’s Gazette, a rising number of clients contemplating marriage are asking for prenuptial agreements to be prepared using the collaborative law model. The report records a shift in attitude among clients who would prefer to adopt a more consensual approach to agreeing a pre-nuptial agreement rather than employ the more traditional, oppositional method of negotiation.

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Pay attention to 10 things your children will thank you for from Woolley and Co. Solicitors:

1. Keeping arguments away from them and avoid criticism of the other parent.
2. Being able to talk to the other parent about their needs (even though it may be hard sometimes)
3. Allowing them to miss the other parent and make contact when they want to, even encouraging contact when you think they might want it.
4. Recognise they have feelings which might be confusing and contradictory.
5. Ask them what they think and listen to what they say (but do not make them responsible for decisions)
6. Value them as developing people with their own friends and networks
7. Remember they can cope with different rules so long as they know what to expect in each household.
8. Be consistent about arrangements made and not letting them down
9. Be flexible to their changing needs.
10. KNOWING THEY LOVE YOU BOTH AND WANT TO BE ABLE TO EXPRESS THEIR LOVE

I am going to suggest that the parent who cannot do these 10 things ought not be thinking of joint or shared custody.

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Tips to Rebuild Your Life and Your Goals after Divorce contains some good advice.  The information there is not really specific to Alabama divorce law. In fact, the article doesn’t really deal with divorce laws at all.  Rather, the focus of the article is on how to move on with your life after divorce.  And, on that note it is helpful.

Here is a summary of the tips there:

1. Work through your grief
2. Recognize your survival mechanisms
3. Assess your talents
4. Start living consciously
5. Write your own story
6. Develop a project for the future
7. Plan for obstacles
8. Deal with the fears
9. Take incredible care of yourself along the way

Check out the link above to read the details for each step.  If you are recently divorced or going through a divorce now, it is worth a read.  The last tip is really what the entire article is about: taking care of yourself.  When I am helping a client go through an Alabama divorce, I try to urge them to take care of themselves mentally, phyiscally, emotionally and spiritually.  Often divorce attorneys are so focused on protecting our clients in their legal case, that it is easy to overlook these equally important issues of their health.  So, not only is this a good article for someone going through divorce, it was a good reminder to me, as a divorce lawyer, to not lose site of this important aspect of my client’s life.

This post from the AlabamaFamilyLawBlog.com where you can find information about Alabama divorce and family law.

How to Move on After Divorce

Related divorce and family law info:

1. Should I move out of the house? There is no blanket answer to this question. It depends…
2. Top 10 Mistakes Made in Divorce The Indy Star has this article posted today. It focuses…
3. Divorce spikes in January The commonly held opinion among many divorce professionals is that…
4. Divorce Preparation: Step 10 – Stay Put (until further notice) Divorce Preparation: Step 10 – Stay Put (until further notice)…
5. 7 Steps to Survive Divorce I came across this excellent article entitled, 7 Steps to…

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Jason C. Brown, the publisher of the Minnesota Divorce and Family Law Blog, recently posted a very practical article outlining some important steps to take if you are anticipating filing a divorce action. I am grateful that he has allowed me to repost it here. I concur with his wise “nuts and bolts” type suggestions. Remember the old adage, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure”.  Plus, this “ounce of prevention” might well save you thousands of dollars in attorney fees!

Once you break the news of your desire to dissolve your marriage, interesting things may start happening at your house. Critical records and valuable items of personal property may suddenly vanish. It pays to be proactive to ensure that you have all the information you will need to move forward as efficiently as possible.

The wasted time and cost associated with hunting down missing documentation can be staggering. We’ve handled cases where everything from an expensive diamond ring to boxes of business records have taken a “vacation”. We almost always find them, but not without substantial effort. In cases where they are not found, the Court will impose substantial sanctions and assume the missing evidence is favorable to you.

To help avoid the mess, we’ve assembled a list of 12 things you should gather to ensure that you have all critical information in hand before your spouse has a chance to conceal, transfer or sell items. These include obtaining:

To help avoid the mess, we’ve assembled a list of 12 things you should gather to ensure that you have all critical information in hand before your spouse has a chance to conceal, transfer or sell items. These include obtaining:

Investing some time in gathering these items will ensure that your spouse cannot take advantage of you during the divorce process. The denial of the existence of an asset is a fraud upon the Court. Once your spouse knows that we have all of the key information in hand, they are far less likely to engage in bad faith conduct and be honest in their disclosures throughout the process!

If you believe that it is prudent in your case to copy a computer’s hard drive to preserve information, be sure you have a qualified professional undertake the task. It is very easy to accidentally run the “ghost drive” backwards and, in so doing, wipe out the original hard dhard drive! Not good at all!

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In a recent analysis of census data, the Pew Research Center found that the institution of marriage has undergone significant changes in recent decades as women have outpaced men in education and earnings growth. The study examined American’s 30 to 44 years old, a stage of life when typical adults have completed their education, have gone to work and gotten married. “Men now are increasingly likely to marry wives with more education and income than they have, and the reverse is true for women,” said Paul Fucito, spokesman for the Pew Center. “In recent decades, with the rise of well-paid working wives, the economic gains of marriage have been a greater benefit for men.” Clearly, these unequal gains have been accompanied by gender role reversals in both the spousal characteristics and the economic benefits of marriage.

I personally enjoy reviewing statistics. For those that don’t, be sure at least to read my conclusion at the end of this piece, especially if you are a woman contemplating entering into a marriage.
Here are some of the significant findings in the study, clearly demonstrating the new economics of today’s marriage:

• In 1970, 28% of wives had husbands who were better educated than they were, outnumbering the 20% whose husbands had less education. By 2007, these patterns had reversed: 19% of wives had husbands with more education, versus 28% whose husbands had less education.
• Only 4% of husbands had wives who brought home more income than they did in 1970, a figure that rose to 22% in 2007.
• The national economic downturn has hurt employment of men more than that of women. The income gap has grown even more in the latest recession, when men held about three in four of the jobs that were lost. Women are moving toward a new milestone in which they constitute half of all the employed. Their share increased from 46.5% in December 2007 to 47.4% in December 2009.
• Women now are the majority of college graduates. Their earnings grew 44% from 1970 to 2007, compared with 6% growth for men. That sharper growth has enabled women to narrow, but not close, the earnings gap with men. Median earnings of full-year female workers in 2007 were 71% of earnings of comparable men, compared with 52% in 1970.
• Unmarried men’s household incomes fared worse than those of women. Unmarried women in 2007 had higher household incomes than their 1970 counterparts at each level of education. But unmarried men without any post-secondary education lost ground because their real earnings decreased, and they did not have a wife’s wages to buffer that decline. Unmarried men who did not complete high school or who had only a high school diploma had lower household incomes in 2007 than their 1970 counterparts did.
• There is an important exception to the rule that married adults have fared better than unmarried adults from 1970 to 2007. Married women without a high school diploma did not make the same gains as more educated women: Their household incomes slipped 2% from 1970 to 2007, while those of their unmarried counterparts grew 9%. The stagnant incomes of married women without high school diplomas reflect the poor job prospects of less educated men in their pool of marriage partners. These less-educated married women now are far less likely, than in the past, to have a spouse who works — 77% did in 2007, compared with 92% in 1970.
• Among college-educated adults, married men are markedly more likely to have a wife who is college educated — only 37% did in 1970, compared with 71% in 2007. College-educated married women, though, are somewhat less likely to have a college-educated husband — 70% did in 1970 and 64% did in 2007.
• Americans are more likely than in the past to cohabit, divorce, marry late in life or not marry at all. There has been a marked decline in the share of Americans who are currently married. Among U.S.-born 30- to 44-year-olds, 60% were married in 2007, compared with 84% in 1970.

To read the full study, which includes many more findings along with excellent graphs and charts, click here.

CONCLUSION:

In my practice, I am seeing these “gender reversal” situations almost every day. It is not at all uncommon for divorced women to be ordered to pay spousal support to their ex-husbands. Also, men’s previous reluctance years ago to “accept” spousal support has seemed to have changed as well. I don’t hear, “I am a man and I don’t need any woman to support me”, like I once did. Yes, perhaps it is a good time for a reprise of Bob Dylan’s “The Times They are a-Changin”!

Another trend is that more women contemplating marriage are recognizing the benefits and importance of obtaining a well-written prenuptial agreement before they “tie-the-knot”. As many men had been doing for decades, we now see these successful women trying to protect themselves and their assets in the event of a subsequent divorce.

To learn more about Prenuptial Agreements, click here. I had the pleasure of being interviewed by “Big George” on BBC London radio in July 2009, to discuss the use of Prenuptial Agreements in America. It was lots of fun! Click here if you want to check that out!

I am also in the process of writing a follow-up article indicating how the local statistics in the Dayton area support the results of this Pew Research Center study. Keep an eye out for it!

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Give Allinotte Law Office’s Do you want to deal with this now or let your family deal with it later? a read. I think the article points out a few things not usually thought of when thinking of estate planning. Both the things needing planned (such as a funeral trust) and why which I think the article sums up quite well here:

The family will be shaken by the death of a loved one. In the immediate after math, and possibly even before death, there would be decisions that would have to be made.