When a California court considers a divorcing spouse’s request for alimony or spousal support, it generally looks at two things: the requesting spouse’s need for the money and the other spouse’s ability to pay. The first inquiry includes looking at the requesting spouse’s ability to work or otherwise earn income.…
California courts usually won’t change a spousal support award unless the person who wants to alter the award shows that there’s been a sufficiently significant change in circumstances to warrant the modification. On the other hand, state spousal support law carries with it a strong preference that a person receiving…
Gwyneth Paltrow’s announcement on her website Goop last year that she and husband Chris Martin were divorcing presented the views of Dr. Habib Sadeghi & Dr. Sherry Sami, apparently experts on what it means to divorce. Sadeghi and Sami use evolutionary biology and the structure of the human skeleton (“Life…
When a court considers whether to award spousal support in a California divorce case, it looks at both spouses’ financial situations to determine their need for support and ability to pay it. That often includes detailed information about their income, expenses, and job prospects. In a recent case, California’s Fourth…
A person seeking to increase or decrease spousal support payments in California generally has to show that the circumstances have significantly changed since the support award was initially ordered. In a recent case, the state’s Third District Court of Appeals explained that a court can’t modify a support award if…
California law allows a family court judge to deny or reduce spousal support payments in a divorce case when the spouse requesting or receiving the support has been convicted of domestic violence against the other spouse during the last five years. The law, set out in Section 4325 of the…
In most divorce cases, the terms of any spousal or child support obligation are set forth in either a court order or an agreement between the parties. Often, that includes a stipulation that spousal support payments will stop when the person receiving them remarries or otherwise “cohabitates” with another person.…
In California divorce cases, spouses often want to determine not only basic child support issues, but also how to cover future expenses related to their children’s higher education. In In re Marriage of Humphries, the Fourth District Court of Appeals addresses a dispute about college expenses. The Humphries married in…
In California divorce cases, courts typically calculate the amount of any spousal and child support awards based on not only the spouses’ current earnings, but also their respective capacities to earn. As the Sixth District Court of Appeals explains in In re Marriage of Lim, the latter figure can be…
A criminal conviction is a serious matter that may not only come with significant fines and even jail time, but also have other far reaching effects. For example, as California’s First District Court of Appeals explains in In re Marriage of Priem, a person convicted of domestic violence may be…