this country needs an enema!!!
Posted on 07/24/2007 9:42:07 AM PDT by DogByte6RER
Alimony still required after ex-wife enters domestic partnership
ASSOCIATED PRESS
July 24, 2007
LOS ANGELES – A judge has ordered a man to continue paying alimony to his ex-wife – even though she is in a registered domestic partnership with another woman and uses the other woman's last name.
California marriage laws state alimony ends when a former spouse remarries, and Ron Garber thought that meant he was off the hook when he learned his ex-wife had registered her new relationship under the state's domestic partnership law.
An Orange County judge didn't see it that way.
The judge ruled that a registered partnership is cohabitation, not marriage, and Garber must keep writing the checks, $1,250 a month, to his ex-wife, Melinda Kirkwood. Garber plans to appeal.
The case highlights questions about the legal status of domestic partnerships, an issue the California Supreme Court is weighing as it considers whether same-sex marriage is legal.
An appeals court upheld the state's ban on same-sex marriage last year, citing the state's domestic partners law and ruling that it was up to the Legislature to decide whether gays could wed.
Lawyers arguing in favor of same-sex marriage say they will cite the June ruling in the Orange County case as a reason to unite gay and heterosexual couples under one system: marriage.
In legal briefs due in August to the California Supreme Court, Therese Stewart, chief deputy city attorney for San Francisco, intends to argue that same-sex couples should have access to marriage, and domestic partnership doesn't provide the same reverence and respect as marriage.
The alimony ruling shows “the irrationality of having a separate, unequal scheme” for same-sex partners, Stewart said.
Garber knew his former wife was living with another woman when he agreed to the alimony, but he said he didn't know the two women had registered with the state as domestic partners under a law that was intended to mirror marriage.
“This is not about gay or lesbian,” Garber said. “This is about the law being fair.”
Kirkwood's attorney, Edwin Fahlen, said the agreement was binding regardless of whether his client was registered as a domestic partner or even married.
He said both sides agreed the pact could not be modified and that Garber waived his right to investigate the nature of Kirkwood's relationship.
Garber's attorney, William M. Hulsy, disagreed.
“If he had signed that agreement under the same factual scenario except marriage, not domestic partnership, his agreement to pay spousal support would be null and void,” Hulsy said.
But if the judge ruled in favor of the ex-husband, then homosexual "marriage" could be legalized de-facto.
The judge should have just declared that the marriage was null and void due to the ex-wife's moral terpitude and that she was entitled to no alimony whatsoever.
Maybe this is how King Solomon would have "split this baby."
“whether same-sex marriage is legal.”
Nope, Prop 22
Ehh, live in Ca, what do you expect?
I’d go to jail first.
If the judge was an ethical individual, he'd have lowered the alimony payment to $1.00 per month.
My decree included “co-habitation or remarriage”. Blame your lawyer.
I thought California was a community property state. Why is he obligated to pay alimony at all.
I didn’t mean it was your lawyer.
King Solomon would've had the woman burned.
I don't know how California law treats shacking-up with someone of the opposite sex. Would that end the alimony, or doesn't it count either?
"Divorced female looking for divorced female"
this country needs an enema!!!
Work Wanted..Female : carpet cleaner...includes $1200 month expense allotment.
It’s only marriage for certain purposes, I guess.
I wonder to what extent the lesbian economy in the US is fueled by alimony.
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