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In many divorce cases, assets are often declared to be marital property unless one spouse kept an asset completely separate. However, in one recent case, the 4th District Court of Appeal declared a couple’s home in Loxahatchee to be the husband’s separate property, even though the couple used their pooled incomes to pay the property’s mortgages and expenses. The ruling stated that, since the property was worth less when the couple divorced than when they got married, the wife’s contributions did not enhance the value of the property, meaning the home remained the husband’s alone.

Years before he married his wife, Lori, William Weaver purchased a property in Loxahatchee. When the couple decided to marry, Lori Weaver sold her house and obtained a profit of $40,000. During their marriage, the Weavers paid the monthly mortgage payments, as well as all expenses on the Loxahatchee home, using their pooled incomes.
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One of the biggest steps in any divorce process, for a couple without children, is the division of property. A marital settlement agreement puts all of the terms of a couple’s property division decisions into writing. Once a couple completes a marital settlement agreement and the court approves it, there are only a few situations where it can be set aside. One Broward County husband’s situation did not fit into any of the categories recognized by the law, so the 4th District Court of Appeal upheld a trial court’s decision rejecting the husband’s request to start over.

The couple, Gilbert Hall and Susan Hall, met for mediation in 2012. The mediator used a “shuttle style” of mediation, meaning that the husband and his attorney sat in one room, the wife and her attorney sat in another, and the mediator “shuttled” back and forth between the two rooms. The mediation eventually produced a resolution on all issues, which was put into writing in a marital settlement agreement.
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It may sound surprising, but there are some instances when a party to a family law case in Florida may lose his right to have an appeal of his case even considered. That was the case recently for one Palm Beach County husband, when the 4th District Court of Appeal ordered a dismissal of his appeal of a contempt finding unless the husband achieved “substantial compliance” with the trial court’s support orders within 30 days.

The couple, Michel Whissell and Sheronne Whisell, sought a divorce in Palm Beach County. As part of that case, the trial court ordered the husband to make temporary support payments to the wife. The husband, however, did not make these support payments. On multiple occasions, the wife initiated contempt proceedings. Eventually, the husband racked up multiple contempt findings and a support arrearage in excess of $100,000.
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In television’s daytime soap operas, familial relationship dynamics can be complex, and tracing one’s family tree sometimes is… challenging. In the real world, when your child is the product of a non-traditional situation, this can sometimes greatly heighten the hurdles you face when it comes to obtaining and exercising your rights to be a part of your child’s life. One father recently obtained some good news when the 4th District Court of Appeal reinstated his paternity order, ruling that the child’s mother could not contest that order based upon her having been married to another man at the time of the child’s birth.

The case revolved around the paternity of C.M.D., a child born to Ruby Kane. Kane, at the time of C.M.D.’s birth, was known as Ruby Struber and was married to Christopher Struber. C.M.D.’s biological father, however, was Jordan Drouin.
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Some spouses like to joke with their partners by reciting the well-worn humorous phrase, “What’s mine is mine and what’s yours is ours.” Florida law allows spouses to have certain assets that belong to that spouse alone. However, the law creates certain triggers that, if they occur, convert a non-marital asset into a marital one. That’s what happened to one Polk County woman, whose $78,000 in cash gifts from her mother were, according to the 2d District Court of Appeal, marital because she commingled that cash in an account that also contained marital funds.

Roberta Dravis’ mother was very generous toward her daughter. Every Christmas and birthday, the mother gave her gifts of cash. Dravis deposited these gifts in an account at CenterState Bank that she and her husband, Dean Dravis, jointly owned. By the time the couple separated, the total sum of the mother’s gifts to her daughter amounted to $78,000.
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All aspects of the American legal system, including family law cases, are based on certain basic principles. One of these is due process of law, and one component of due process is that both opposing sides of a case should, with only a few exceptions, have an opportunity to be heard by the court before a ruling is handed down. In family law cases, the need to protect children can create situations in which an ex parte hearing is necessary in the case of an emergency. In one recent Orlando area case, a trial court custody order was overturned by the 5th District Court of Appeal precisely because the parent who obtained the ex parte change in custody never offered proof of an actual emergency.

The dispute centered around the custody of the four children of Safa Suleiman and Basem Yunis. After Suleiman and Yunis divorced in early 2008, the mother became the primary custodial parent, but both parents continued to live in Orange County, where the children also attended school. The mother later remarried and, in the fall of 2014, moved 28 miles west to a home in Polk County. The mother withdrew the children from school in Orange County and enrolled them in Polk County schools.
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Earlier this summer, the US Supreme Court ruled on the case of Obergefell v. Hodges. In that decision, the court narrowly ruled that the 14th Amendment recognized a constitutional right to marriage for same-sex couples. As part of this ruling, not only must states issue marriages to same-sex couples seeking to unite in Florida, the state must also legally recognize as valid same-sex marriages and civil unions granted by other states. This requirement that all states recognize all validly issued same-sex marriages provides a degree of clarity when it comes to same-sex divorces, and it resolves the legal limbo that entrapped some couples living in Florida.

These couples included Keiba Lynn Shaw and Mariama Changamire Shaw, who married in Massachusetts in 2010. A year after their wedding, the couple moved to the Tampa Bay area. In the fall of 2013, they separated and began seeking a divorce early in 2014. The divorce was uncontested, with the couple having no children and completing a settlement agreement to divide their assets and debts. Courts uniformly refused to grant them a divorce, however, concluding that a Florida court could not dissolve their marriage because, under the Florida Constitution, the marriage never validly existed in the first place.
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The law regarding alimony contains several nuances. One of these is a statutory rule that says that the amount of evidence a spouse must offer in order to obtain permanent alimony differs based upon how long the couple was married. This rule recently led to the reversal of a Tampa court’s decision to deny a wife permanent alimony, since the 2d District Court of Appeal concluded that the lower court denied the wife’s permanent alimony request based upon the wrong standard of proof.

In Irene and Randy Banks’ case, theirs was a long-term marriage, having wedded before NASA launched the first space shuttle or the University of Miami won its first national football championship. The couple separated in 2011, with the wife filing for divorce shortly before the year’s end. At the time of their divorce, the husband made $90,000 a year and received a military pension that paid him almost $2,300 per month. The wife was unemployed but, in the trial court’s opinion, had a ability to earn $25,000 per year.
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Two of the most important decisions many parents will make regarding their children center around the children’s education and their religious affiliation. Two recent cases, one from the 3d District Court of Appeal and one from the 2d DCA, demonstrate the importance of documenting the entirety of your and your spouse’s agreement regarding your children’s education, and of understanding exactly how tuition payments may affect child support calculations.

If both parents agree that their child (or children) should attend private school for some or all of their education, the marital settlement agreement between the parents should be very clear about what the couple agreed to, since when an agreement is silent on an issue, the courts will construe that to mean that the couple did not resolve that issue.
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The recent economic recession created financial hardships for many, including numerous people who lost their jobs. When you lose your job, you have many things you must deal with. If you owe child support and you’re unemployed, there are certain situations in which your child’s support may be calculated based upon an income you don’t have. In a recent case from Martin County, the 4th District Court of Appeal highlighted the rules for child support obligations in these situations.

The case involved the support of the one child of Miguel Perales and Jennifer Heard, born in 2009. Each parent asked the trial court for a determination of child support in 2010. At that time, the mother was unemployed, having lost her job as a deputy sheriff after she was caught improperly recording conversations with Perales and accessing the driver’s license and vehicle information database for non-work related reasons, namely researching Perales’ girlfriend and attorneys.
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