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Unbundling in Georgia? Really?

2011-11-20T23:17:00.000-05:00

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Clause.

I have been writing, however, not in this forum. Check out the new blog, attached to our web site at http://www.allfamilylaw.com/blog/.

Tonight's post tells about how The Manely Firm, P.C. is announcing that Unbundling is available for Family Law Services in Georgia and we know this because we are the first firm in Georgia to offer them!

What is unbundling? Follow the link to see...

Michael Manely

International Society of Family Law

2011-03-28T23:36:00.000-04:00

We've recently returned from nearly a week in Nassau, Bahamas, where we attended a conference of the International Society of Family Law, of which we are members.

The Conference concerned "The Legal and Social Consequences of the Disintegration and Reconstitution of Families." We spent several days listening to the presentation of papers from distinguished jurists, professors, practitioners and social service providers on this subject.

Since the Conference was held in the Caribbean, far and away the largest group of attendees and presenters came from Caribbean nations. Other attendees and presenters came from as far away as Sweden and Serbia. Britain was particularly well represented.

We learned much, mingled much and ate much. We met many, many new people in our larger community. We were graced by the distinctly different accents from the many Caribbean islands. We were treated to high state dinners and exquisite sun sets while the Defense Forces Band played on into the night.

If you would like to peruse the Programme you can find it here: http://www.law2.byu.edu/isfl/2011bahamasconf/ISFLCARIBBEAN%20REGIONAL%20CONFERENCE%20-%20FINAL%20PROGRAMME.pdf

I'll write much more about this Conference in the weeks to come, but tonight I want to sum it all up in little more than a thought. What we learned, first and foremost is that families and family issues are the same everywhere. And I do mean everywhere. The Judges in Trinidad are dealing with the exact same issues as the Judges in Fulton County. The approaches to family issues of the Judges in Serbia and London are the same as the Judges in Cobb County. The remedies employed by the Judges in Grenada are the same as the remedies employed by the Judges in Gwinnett County.

Bottom line: people are people and families are families no matter where you go. It was a wonderful confirmation of a guiding principle in our practice.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/PracticeAreas/International-Family-Law.asp

Termination of Parental Rights: love them or lose them.

2011-03-09T23:55:00.000-05:00

Children. Yours. Do you love them? Do you want them? Do you take care of them?

Almost every one of you answered, "Yes, of course!" As if that were a silly series of questions.

But people are made differently. Some people have stronger parenting genes or drives than others. Some folks obsess about their kids. Some folks don't give them a second thought. In my practice I see the gamut. This blog post is about those who want to have their cake and eat it too.

Regular readers of this blog know that I posit neither gender as having exclusive title to parent of the year. But when it comes to private termination of parental rights, I run into this issue besetting fathers far more than mothers.

The issue arises some time after the mother has remarried, long after moving on from the father of the children. The new couple have been raising the children together, far more as though they were the children's mother and father, rather than mother and step-father. The couple consult with me to discuss the possibility of the step-father adopting the children. However, before the step-father can adopt the children, the biological father's parental rights have to be terminated.

From a legal and practical standpoint, there are three issues to address to terminate a biological father's parental rights. Two of them must be true. The third is a nice icing on the cake.

One, has the biological father provided no support for the children for a protracted period of time? A year is good. Three years is better.

Two, has the biological father failed to contact the children for a protracted period of time? Again, a year is good. Three is better. And the complete absence of contact is better than the occasional Christmas or Birthday card and present.

Three, is there something particularly bad about the biological father? Is he in jail? Has he done time for violent crimes or significant drug violations? Did the mother and biological father separate because of domestic violence? Did the biological father abuse the children?

If all three apply, the odds are exceptionally strong that the judge who decides the children's fate will choose to terminate the biological father's parental rights.

But so often in these cases when the couple petitions the court to terminate the biological father's parental rights, the biological dad gets a sudden case of "my babies" and wants to swoop in to express his undying affection, affinity and affiliation with his long estranged children.

Here's where the discretion of the trial judge comes in. The good trial judge will take a Sergeant Friday approach seeking, "just the facts, m'am." The drama takes a back seat to the reality on the ground. But some judges get caught up in the draconian aspect of the death sentence of termination of parental rights and give that biological dad just one more chance.

So, if you are a biological dad and your ex has moved on to a real swell who is sweeping your children off of their feet, get busy. Show your children you love them. Show them that you are constantly thinking about them. Pay support. Don't miss visitation. And if you can't keep up that schedule, if you can't foot the bill the State of Georgia decided was necessary to raise healthy children into responsible adulthood, seriously consider where you're coming from and what is in the children's long term best interest.

In a perfect world, the children's divorced daddy is very much an integral part of their lives, just as much as the divorced mommy. The kids continue to be loved and protected by both parents. But if one parent is voluntarily absent, let the children fill that void with someone blessed with a stronger parenting gene.

They are your children. But you have to love them or you will certainly lose them.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/

A closed mind; a closed heart.

2011-03-08T22:39:00.000-05:00

I often write about how you must know as much as possible about the Judge who will decide your fate. It is important for your attorney to have face time with that Judge. It is important for your attorney to have a history with that Judge. But this knowledge doesn't just come from being pro-active and engaged in events close to the judiciary, this knowledge also comes from the school of hard knocks, the school of unfortunate results. Lessons learned the hard way. Losses that were unforeseen.

Some time back I tried a case as good as a case can be tried. My trial team left no effort in the war room; everything was spent on the court room floor. We had uncovered the opposing party's hidden bank accounts, stolen property, misappropriated business and malicious scheming of the highest order. We had documents condemning her by her own hand. We had testimony from those who knew her best and outed her lies in the clearest terms. We had photographs irrefutably proving her perjury on every level.

The opposition "phoned in" their case. They conducted no investigation. They provided little discovery. They made a paltry effort. Their case consisted of the most base innuendo, mere suggestions, nothing that would constitute proof in any serious court of law. Their accusations were easily dis-proven by hard evidence, the veracity of which even they eventually had to concede.

But the trial judge hammered us. The judge decided the case based upon bias and bias alone. As I was told from the bench, "These people lie. It's what they do." "These people," are originally from another nation. Theirs is a nation that has a perceptibly high percentage of people who engage in fraud. But, for example, if you knew that more people per capita from Ukraine sped than from any other nation, a judge should not find a Ukrainian guilty of speeding without some evidence of the crime committed. "Sir, your countrymen speed, therefore you sped." That is not allowed. That is not good judging. That is not American Justice.

But I learned. This judge has a bias streak a mile wide and a fathom deep. This judge had a closed mind and a closed heart. Evidence doesn't enter into it. Don't bring a client from a perceived discredited population before this judge and expect the evidence to control the outcome. Now I counsel my clients who fit that bill to use another method to resolve their matter if justice is what they seek.

Lesson learned the hard way. And as you can probably tell, I'm still not over it. I always demand Justice, America style whether the judge will give it to me or not. And given the reality I learned in that court room, I won't let another client climb that sacrificial alter to judicial bias.

Know your judge, open mind, closed mind or indifferent mind. It can't help but improve the outcome.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Local-Knowledge-Local-Courts.asp

“The Best Interests of the Children” and the Guardian Ad Litem

2011-03-07T16:01:00.000-05:00

Today's blog post is scribed by Jeremy Abernathy.

This oft used phrase refers to the standard the Court must apply in making decisions for cases involving children. The General Assembly intentionally left the standard vague because there are a sundry of factors that weigh into what is best for a particular child. Each case has separate facts and circumstances that add a degree of complexity to this standard, and uniqueness as to how the standard is applied. The Judge does not have the advantage of having a “cookie cutter” formula in making decisions affecting the health and welfare of the child.

The Judge has to sift through the divorcing parties’ warring viewpoints of case resolution relative to child custodial issues. Further, the Judge must decipher which allegations are genuine or without merit. The attorneys are often wrapped up in zealously arguing their clients’ perspective of what is in the children’s best interests. Everyone’s job is tough, and unfortunately, what can get lost are the children.

The Court, however, has assistance available. The Court, under Uniform Superior Court Rule 24.9 can appoint a guardian ad litem. The guardian ad litem serves as an “extension of the Court’s eyes and ears.” The guardian can visit the home of the children; interview the teachers of the children; interview a party’s new spouse or mate. There are limitless ways in which the guardian can assist the trier of fact, so therefore, guardians profoundly affect the case.

Consequently, it is important to be courteous and respectful to the guardian. The tried and true old adage about kindness applies here: “you catch more bees with honey than vinegar.” An additional adage equally applies: “kindness is the first step to cruelty.” The balance must be struck between respect for the guardian and also, challenging the guardian to be accountable and thorough in their very important function.

In conclusion, there are many factors that weigh into what is in the best interests of a child. The factors vary from case to case. A guardian ad litem assists the Court in reaching its decision. Therefore, guardian should be treated with high regard, but also challenged in a cordial manner to provide the Court a complete picture.

Jeremy Abernathy
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/Bio/JeremyAbernathy.asp

A New Chair!

2011-02-10T23:28:00.000-05:00

I write here about weighty issues that dominate peoples' lives. I write here about the pain suffered when one parent brutalizes another with their children as the weapon of choice. I write here about seeking, demanding and obtaining justice for Georgia families.

But tonight, I write about my new chair.

As you know, The Firm has four offices, so I have several chairs. These chairs are critical to my life. Even though I'm in court quite often, like most office bound workers I spend an inordinate amount of time sitting down in my chair. I'd say I come close to spending as much time in my chair as I do in my bed. (I don't really get much sleep if you are doing the math.) So chairs are really important.

Today I bought, built and sat in for the first time a new chair for my Atlanta office. It is a beautiful leather chair, rather roomy, rather well appointed, solid, firm and soft, all at the same time. Though evening was rolling in and darkness was falling outside, I could scarcely pry myself away from that luxurious throne, a veritable monument to the glories of desk work.

It was expertly engineered, a cinch to assemble, taking barely more than 15 minutes, and even came with its own Allen wrench. The instructions were clear in English, French and Spanish (I'm trusting they were clear in French and Spanish). The casters glided flawlessly across the ancient hard wood floor of that glorious space (not that I did an inordinate amount of gliding, mind you.)

As I sat in my chair, my feet were inexorably drawn up to my desk (it's actually more of a table), where they rested, one atop the other as I kicked back in resplendent splendor, basking deeply in the comfort of this leather creation as the evening crept on. So there I sat and there I dreamed of the exquisite briefs I would draft in the years ahead, supported by the fine work of art which cradled me.

Viva la chair!

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

International Family Law

2011-02-09T23:50:00.000-05:00

As regular readers already know, my firm handles many International Family Law cases. These cases most often center on the Hague Convention on Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction ("Hague Convention"). I have yet to find any firm in Georgia that handles more Hague Convention cases than we do. We didn't start out to become an international family law behemoth, it just turned out that way. If you read the article on the "In the News" page on the website regarding Andrew Bowey and Google the issue, you'll see the case that catapulted us into the International Family Law arena and into the international press spotlight.

Since then, we've handled cases on every continent except Antarctica. We've developed relationships with cooperating counsel all around the world. We've rescued children from the far reaches of the globe such as Cyprus and China and kept them from being carried off to countries such as Nigeria and Brazil. Fortunately, now it seems that if someone is searching for an International Family Law attorney in Georgia, they will come knocking on our door.

Because of our extensive work in International Family Law and Hague Convention cases, John Marshall Law School kindly invited me to speak on the subject today at a Continuing Legal Education Seminar they presented to the State Bar. The event was well attended. I saw many of my present and former opposing counsels in the audience. Joining me on the dais were Karen Brown Williams who has worked as a Guardian ad Litem on a number of International Family Law cases, Randy Kessler and Marvin Solomiany of Kessler, Schwartz, a very high end family law firm that practices downtown, and two professors from John Marshal, including Jeffrey Van Detta.

We discussed our experiences both legal and diplomatic in the international arena. We discussed "Habitual Residence" and the substantive absence of any "Best Interest of the Child" test extensively. I discussed the Grave Risk of Harm defense with the two prong test often overlooked by opposing counsel. I also discussed the pleasure of trying cases in foreign countries with exceptional co-counsel. Randy talked about acquiring a bond before a foreign spouse was allowed to travel with the children; Karen talked about Japan's hostile position to the Hague Convention. Marvin talked about the intensity demanded in a Hague Convention proceeding. We all debated whether it was best to have a speedy hearing in Hague Convention cases in which the removing party has had months if not years to plan, scheme and create evidence in order to win the case when the left-behind party is, at best, frantically reacting to the surprise abduction and not at all ready to win at what amounts to a legal ambush. (Can you tell which side I argued?)

All in all it was an information packed event. It was good to share observations with collegues in the hopes of raising the bar for the Bar in the presentation of International Family Law cases.

I've been asked to present on the same subject in May to a State-wide gathering of Family Law Attorneys when we convene on Amelia Island for our annual conference. It is a great honor to be recognized as a leading advocate for such a complex, critical and growing field of law. It is a great honor to be entrusted to ensure the return of so may abducted little children.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/In-the-News.asp
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/PracticeAreas/International-Family-Law.asp

Do Grandparents Matter?

2011-02-08T23:46:00.000-05:00

Tonight's guest blogger is none other than our own, Kairi Smith Gure.

I recently met with a lady, a grandmother, seeking information about getting visitation with her grandson. At one time, Grandparent visitation was a pretty hot topic in the legal community because of all of the constitutional fundamental rights that are implicated at the mention of someone other than the biological parents having rights concerning their child. The state of Georgia has decided that Grandparents will be granted visitation when it is “in the best interest of the child” to do so.

So, I guess that becomes the question; when is it in the best interest of the child for a Grandparent to have visitation with the child against the wishes of the parent? I am not talking about situations where the parents are neglectful or harmful to the child in some way. In those cases the Grandparents would be able to gain custody of the child, not just visitation. When the parents are NOT bad parents is there ever a reason to usurp the parents authority and award a Grandparent visitation?

Being a parent myself I didn’t like the idea of someone telling me what is best for my child, so when I first learned of courts granting Grandparents visitation I thought it was wrong. But then I began to think about it in terms of the best interest of the child standard. When I think about the added benefit to most children’s lives from maintaining a relationship with their Grandparents it makes sense. The standard is the best interest of the child, not the best interest of the parent's ego.

In the case of the lady that I met, she had raised her grandson when his teenage mother, the lady's daughter, became overwhelmed with young motherhood and asked her to take over. Now, ten years later, her daughter is stable, married and, like Grandmother and her daughter had planned, is parenting her child again. All was fine until the Grandmother's daughter's husband decided that Grandmother had too much influence in the life of the child and decided to cut the Grandmother off. I listened to this lady tell me her story and felt bad; not just for her, but also for the eleven year old boy that was cut off from his Grandmother, the person who nurtured and raised him the first ten years of his life. I have to wonder if this lady’s daughter was thinking about what was best for her son when she decided that his Grandmother would be cut off from all contact with him, all because the step-father said so.

I don’t think that the daughter was.

Kairi Smith Gure
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

It is universal

2011-02-07T23:16:00.000-05:00

I relate the stories that come through my office, the cases I've litigated, the successes and tragedies my clients have lived through. Those stories are universal, they are experienced by everyone on some level, at some time. But the family law stories are not confined to my practice...

Yesterday I was at the gym, a place I visit far too infrequently, when I overheard a conversation between two gentlemen of moderate age. Before you think I was eavesdropping, guys in a gym don't tend to share secrets as they pump iron, rather what they discuss they broadcast in semi-boisterous tones without regard, or sometimes with regard, for whether the nearby weight-lifters can listen in on the conversations. It doesn't matter whether it is politics, sex (a frequent subject) or, pertinent to my story tonight, family.

What really captured my attention was that they were talking about their sons. Having three myself, the subject is near and dear to my heart. Their sons were now grown. The men had both been divorced when their sons were young. The men related how they had gone through great difficulty with their sons, but with the passing of time, things were made right.

The first man was talking, "my wife and I split up when my boy was seven. My wife was in a bad way at the time. I got custody. Things were rocky, hard to manage, we got by I think mostly because I ran such a tight ship, tried to make it like clockwork. I think that kept me from going crazy in those days."

After awhile, my ex pretty much got her life back together. She finally stayed in one place for longer than six months and found a job. My boy and I were arguing more, he didn't like my rules, like, 'do your homework,' 'clean your room,' 'be back home by 9:00' kind of stuff. So, when he was old enough, he decided to move to his mom's. Broke my heart. I mean, I shouldn't have minded so much since I'd had him for seven years but it broke my heart. And he decided right after a big argument about whether he could stay out all night with a bunch of friends, including his little girl friend. I said no. His mom said she didn't see a problem with it and there you go, next thing you know, my boy's living with his mom.

"We went through a few months where I couldn't look at him, it pissed me off so much. Then it got better, he started coming over every now and then. I kept up with him to see how he was doing in school. Of course his grades were tanking, but then he was in ninth grade. Anyway, two years pass, its the summer before he's a junior and he calls me up, asks me if we could have dinner together. At dinner he says, 'I need to be a success, and I'm just not going to be a success at mom's house. It's too disorganized.' You could have floored me. I felt like I was grinning all over my face. He moved back in about two weeks before school started. His mom thought that was probably best, too."

Then the other man shared, "my son's momma would fuss and cuss every time it was my weekend. She'd come up with some excuse to keep him from me like, 'he's gotta study today' or 'he's gotta mow the lawn' or some such #&*%!." (Talk runs like that at the gym.) "Got to where I couldn't break through, I couldn't keep her back long enough to see him when I was supposed to.

"Then he became a teenager and it got even worse. He got all angry, sullen, accusing me of ditching his momma when it was she that filed for divorce. Got to where he wouldn't even talk to me anymore, said he was too busy. I never really lost track of him, I just barely saw him. It became usual to where a few months would pass when I wouldn't see him. That became the way it was. So he drifted away from me.

"But now he's 22, a young man. He's got a good girlfriend. He's finished school. And he wants to hang out with me. Can you beat that? He wants to hang out with me. He was over the other day, I had my dad there too, and my son says to my dad, Grandpa, you raised a pretty good son. I got so choked up I gave him another beer."

Time passes, wounds heal, wisdom grows. At least it can.

Families are a fundamental reality, they are universal and their stories, our stories, are universal. Good or bad they are a treasure for they are the stuff from which our riches are made. There's a blog that's getting underway, The Twisted Family at http://www.thetwistedfamily.com/2011_01_01_archive.html It is about blended, no twisted, families, our families. Real people. Real stories. Our stories. Check it out.

Full disclosure: my wife writes it. Look out, she might write about our family from time to time. Enjoy.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

Service of Process

2011-02-03T23:31:00.000-05:00

That's a boring title. Generally speaking, the subject matter is not much more thrilling. But it is critical. It is essential. It is the threshold issue to making a law suit a law suit.

The attorney can craft the most brilliant complaint every written, every cause of action spelled out to a "t," every fact intricately woven into the story capped by an ad damnum that brings tears to the Judge's eyes, but if you can't get the defendant served, you haven't got squat.

Service of process is about due process. It is a fundamental, constitutional issue. It is how the court becomes satisfied that the person you are suing has enough notice that he is being sued that you can get a judgment against him should he have the bad judgment to not respond to your complaint. If you get Service of the Process (the Complaint and Summons) then you get the defendant. If you don't get Service of the Process then you are indeed tilting at windmills. You have whole cloth and nothing more.

Different states have different rules about what constitutes Service of Process. Some states allow Service of Process by First Class, United States Mail. "Yeah, Judge. I mailed it to her. She knows to be here." "Okay, sir. I grant you the house, the cars, the kids and her bank account." I don't think so.

I like Georgia's rules best because they provide the most likely guarantee that the Defendant has notice of the action. Georgia requires personal service in most instances. This means that the Defendant himself is actually handed the Process. And not just handed the Process by any Tom, Dick or Harry, but by someone appointed by the Court to Serve Process. This almost always is either a Sheriff's Deputy or a Private Process Server who has been specifically appointed by the Court to accomplish that result.

So, Service of Process is key. Now on to the next issue.

Some Defendants like to hide out from Service of Process. They play hard to get. They figure if they lay low, the Plaintiff will just give up. But why would the Plaintiff ever give up? If it is a waiting game, Defendant is just forestalling the inevitable. Like a fugitive, Defendant becomes a wanted man, hunted constantly, forever having to look over his shoulder for that outstretched arm with folded papers. "Here you go, sir." Will it happen at home, at 3:00 in the morning? Will it happen at work during a critical staff meeting with the boss looking on? Will it happen on a date just as the waiter pours the wine? Will it happen at church just as the preacher calls for all sinners to come forth? It's all over and all of Defendant's efforts were for naught. Further, Defendant's shenanigans will cost him because the additional cost borne by Plaintiff to perfect service will be item number one when fees and expenses are sought. "Good hiding, sir. It took three extra months and $500 extra dollars to find you. Now pay an additional $500 to Plaintiff over there." I don't care who you are; I don't care what you do. I will find you, somewhere, somehow, some time. The Process Server Man does not rest.

So, there is no point in hiding. Now on to the next issue.

Sometimes the defendant is not in the state. Maybe they are in the next state over. Maybe they are in the next continent over. However, each jurisdiction, whether it is Alabama or Albania has its own rules about Service of Process. The States of the United States have agreements between them about Service of Process across State lines. Member Nations have treaties between them on these issues. Even if the defendant is holed up in a non member nation, if service is perfected by the rules of the plaintiff's jurisdiction, the Service will be recognized and the defendant will either have to show up for court or lose all. "Would you like a vacation in Nigeria, Mr. Process Server?"

The point here is that there is a way to perfect Service anywhere on this globe. We were recently asked how to perfect service in Afghanistan on a military contractor. True, the agencies to perfect service there are spotty and unreliable and it is hard to pay a Georgia process server to place life and limb in war-torn peril. Not much of a vacation there. But then there is leverage. Neither the military nor the State Department want any more glitches than they already have. And having a defendant avoiding Service of Process and not taking care of his children is a serious public relations glitch the government would love to avoid. So you perfect service by having the defendant put in a position where he either Acknowledges Service or is sent home by the government, never to return. In reality, the State Department is filed with good people. The State Department doesn't want dead beats who don't care for their kids avoiding their responsibilities by hiding behind the State Department's coat-tails. You can find these dead beats. You can get these dead beats.

So, there is no where to run, no where to hide.

Later on I'll write about tracking down the dead beats. There are great people who do just that. For many of them, it is their passion. But for now just know, if you've got an idea about where the dead beats are, you can Serve them. You can have your day in Court.

Game On!

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/PracticeAreas/Divorce.asp

So Many Questions - Family Law

2011-01-31T22:59:00.000-05:00

I've been enmeshed in my practice for so long I sometimes forget how intricate and complicated it can be. Some days, like today, I meet with a myriad of people who just need to get their questions answered. They know they are facing a complex situation that therefore feels rather daunting and rather than strike out on their own with the very real chance of striking out entirely, they seek advice from one who has been in the trenches for decades - me.

Sometimes their questions are straightforward, requiring no more than a simple, direct answer that can set their minds at ease and help them chart a clear and safe course for their new direction. Other times their questions are complex, requiring much give and take to ferret out the nuances that can alter the course of the right answer with the slightest subtlety.

Regardless of questions simple or complex, the questions, and the questioners, are welcome at my firm. I understand that some attorneys play hide the ball. "If you want an answer, you have to feed the monkey." I do understand that approach. My education and lengthy experience have value. But I perform no service to my community if I treat my knowledge and expertise like it's off limits to all but a select few with the green in their wallets to unhinge my jaw.

If I kept my knowledge a secret, how would a client ever know that I have any knowledge at all? I don't see a successful interview concluding, "I know exactly what I would do and if you hire me, I'll tell you." Suppose the poor client hires that counsel and counsel then spews something idiotic. I don't see how that works. Perhaps I'll get a few more decades down the road and decide that potential clients should pay me for their initial visit. Right now that just seems cheap.

So, if you have a question, come see me. While I cannot work for free since I'm not independently wealthy, I'll gladly, and I do mean gladly, answer your questions.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Firm-Overview.asp

Wicked

2011-01-26T23:55:00.001-05:00

I spend many words writing about soon-to-be ex-spouses working together for a common good: the peaceful dissolution of their marriage. On these pages I've often advocated moving beyond the emotional entanglements that routinely accompany a marital break up but so very much obstruct a mature approach to custody arrangements, potential support and property division. But I don't think I've spent much time dwelling on the most reprehensible spouses, the horrid, worst case scenario, the monster who shares your bed but rises each morning from the pits of hell. In other words, the wicked spouse.

I don't mean the angry spouse, the "hell hath no fury" spouse who seeks retribution for a past mis-deed. I'm talking about the evil spouse who wants to see you perish for the sheer delight of your demise. If you don't know this spouse, consider yourself among the extremely fortunate. You can somewhat imagine them, but only somewhat, for imagination is no substitute to living in the same house, supping over the same table and sharing the same bed with someone who daily, even hourly determinedly seeks your downfall. And the more horrific your downfall, the better.

This spouse has a strategy that is more depraved than you can reasonably contemplate, for reason doesn't enter into it. To understand this spouse's battle plan, you have to enter into the most cynical, black hearted space you can find within humankind's collective unconscious. This is the spouse who will summon the police with concocted stories of abuse. This is the spouse who will lay a trap for the unwary. This is the spouse who will lie in wait sometimes for years to build the abattoir in which you shall be sacrificed. This is the spouse who, like an onion, has layers upon layers, each more vile, fetid and diabolical than the last.

But, for those of you who have no knowledge of such a spouse, you need some meat on these bones.

Consider the spouse who decided one day to divorce her husband, only she didn't tell him. She didn't tell him for over a year. She used that year to collect her evidence of his purported transgressions. Behaviors she condoned, accepted, fostered, and even participate in, she secretly captured for posterity in those thousand words' worth 8x10's. And when she sprung the trap, she had her price. She would offer to sell him his soul for far more than 30 pieces of silver.

Consider the spouse who systematically deprived her spouse of his business, his home, even his children, Job style, just to watch him suffer like an ant under the magnifying glass in the brilliant sun of her conniving scheme. As each element of his security, his identity was stripped from him, she pleasured in his cries every much as if limbs were torn asunder. She would have watched him slowly die if she could figure out how to do it. In may ways, she did.

Consider the spouse who fathomed and then executed a plan to have her spouse carted off to jail, to be convicted and not seen again for decades, well long enough for her to secure the empire they had created. And his crime and the evidence to support it fabricated, every bit of it.

The judges are wary of any counsel's claim that the spouse is wicked, that the plot is hollow, that the method is the worst sort of chicanery because that charge is so abused. I've written about the aggressive lawyer. To her ever droning assertion, each opposing party is a scalawag, either a dead-beat dad or a malicious mom. We once had a well known counsel who had two, pat phrases to apply to opposing parties: whore and whore monger. The slanderous approach is now an empty rhetorical device which the judge's largely ignore. So when a spouse is indeed wicked it is a difficult fact to prove to a jaded judge.

But prove it you must. Prove it to someone. In the first case cited, It wasn't until I took to the Settlement Conference table top and delivered a rousing rendition of "Molasses to Rum to Slaves," that the matter resolved. My client was freed without the purchase price demanded by the wicked spouse. She decided that I was too crazy to allow in Court.

The second case ended with a trial which detailed copious evidence of her mis-deeds. You would have thought the matter had been tried in the World Court for the effort it took, the investigation required, the meticulous organization and crafting of the presentation of the trial. Years later and tens of thousands of dollars poorer, justice prevailed. The wicked spouse was sent out on a rail.

The last case cited ended in a surprising reversal of fortunes because, ultimately, criminals are not that smart. Indeed a crime had been committed, but my client hadn't done it. The wicked spouse left enough "fingerprints" on the evidence intended to damn her husband, that the prosecuting authorities began to see the flaws in the greater plan, turned the tables and indicted the master-mind wife.

Given the elaborate means to which these wicked spouses go, I often wonder why they don't cut to the chase and end the relationship Lynn Turner style. But of course, she got caught too.

So divorce is not a bed of roses. Sometimes it is a bed of nails. And if you are married to the wicked spouse, sometimes you have to fight for your freedom. Sometimes you even have to fight for your survival. Just know that justice will out, in the end, if you can make it that far.

Cheery post, huh.

Michael Manely

Listen to your lawyer!

2011-01-25T23:38:00.001-05:00

Of course I would write that. I'm a lawyer. But doesn't it make sense?

Most folks hire an attorney figuring that the attorney knows something they don't. Lawyering, after all, is a specialized field of knowledge with intricate rules and protocol, strategy and timing, so this body of knowledge and practice is not in the public realm any more than the ability to actually split an atom is.

But every now and then somebody is certain they know better than their lawyer. I once had a medical doctor who was quite sure he knew how to do my job better than me. So I attended our next meeting in scrubs and told him I was going to remove his appendix. It got my point across. The doctor got out of my way and wound up doing quite well.

Kids fresh out of law school know more law than most litigants. Add to that decades of seasoning and it ought to be hard to convince yourself that you could do better than the guy you've paid several thousand dollars to. But a few folks still don't get it.

This creates an ethical conundrum for me. I've argued for several hours with some clients about their decisions that conflict with my advice. I tell them I see the train wreck coming. I tell them I see their legal demise. I show them the better alternative, a successful strategy. But that strategy does not fit the client's emotional drive to seek and obtain retribution. "The Judge will set her straight," they might say. "The Judge won't set her straight. She will win and she will laugh at you for being such a fool. Will you feel better then?" I might say.

All lawyers face this problem from time to time. Some clients see us as a tool for their use to aid them in their on-going quest to vanquish the opposition. We aren't. We are problem solvers. We employ our craft in very creative ways sometimes but it is to accomplish a productive task, not a destructive one. (That's true for most of us, anyway.)

So the ethical conundrum is, after several hours of attempting to persuade the recalcitrant client to follow my well-paid advice, do I give up and watch the coming catastrophe?

Sometimes potential clients ask me if I have a winning track record. "Yes," I tell them immediately, but then I follow with, "but that's a trick question." If you can almost always accurately predict the outcome of a trial, why would you walk into Court with a losing case? You try your winning cases. You settle the losing ones. And in Family Law, you settle every case that you can. Why? Because it is far less expensive (usually that's a value to the client) and it is far less toxic and damaging to the family's relationship.

So, do I allow the train wreck? And could I sell tickets?

I don't allow the train wreck if I can at all possibly help it. I'll argue with a client right up until the moment that the Judge sounds for the case.

(Practice point: this is why, in Family Law, good offers should never be pulled. A good deal remains a good deal, regardless of when the other side finally figures that out.)

So, listen to your lawyer. You pay him enough. And he really does have your best, long term interest at heart. Besides, train wrecks aren't just the drama of flashy explosions. There is damage and long term pain that you have to live with afterward. Ultimately life is more complex than Gomez Adams' model railroad.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Firm-Overview.asp

Jack Lalanne

2011-01-24T22:34:00.000-05:00

Readers of this blog will know I do not cover celebrities. That is not my thing. I would much rather talk about real people with real issues.

Tonight I'm writing about a real person who was also a celebrity: Jack Lalanne. But I'm not going to write divorce gossip from celebrity rags. I'm just going to pay a quick tribute to someone who had a great influence on me.

Lalanne started his television fitness show the year I was born, 1959. Growing up somewhat in front of the tube, I have many recollections of watching his show and trying out the fitness activities he'd advocate. The man was in great shape. Who could argue with him? When he started his show, he was 45, only six years younger than I am now. His show ran for another 34 years. His life ran for another 51.

As I became a teenager I took to working out. At the time I credited it to Arnold and his book, "Education of a Body Builder." Arnold's movie, "Pumping Iron," didn't hurt either. But the health conscious stuff, the eating extremely healthy and positive body focus was all Lalanne.

Looking back over the videos posted on Youtube, I'm amazed to see the insight of his work. I had to absorb all that stuff when I was little. Somehow it is still hardwired in me. But as I look over at the Hershey's Bar waiting for me, I have to wonder just how deep this wisdom is buried.

We all want to live better. We all desperately want to make better decisions. It's right there, just for the taking. Jack Lalanne made it undeniable.

Thanks, Jack.

Michael Manely

Modification: Teaching your ex a lesson

2011-01-19T23:59:00.000-05:00

I recently spoke with a gentleman who was interviewing attorneys. He told me he had spoken with several other attorneys (always a good idea), and particularly liked one who, after hearing the facts of this fellow's case said, "We're going to get her. We'll teach her a lesson."

STOP

Family Law litigation is not about teaching anybody a lesson. Not only does that do nothing more than abuse the court process, it completely misses the point and it is the quickest way to lose. That's three excellent reasons to not choose this path.

Teaching your ex a lesson does nothing more than abuse the court process because the court process is designed to provide people with a forum to resolve their differences. The key word there is resolve. In Modification cases it is particularly appropriate, "re-solve." Teaching your ex a lesson is not about resolving anything. If you have a legitimate dispute and you can't get it sorted out with your ex without court, then litigate it, but litigate to get it resolved, not to satisfy vendettas or hum the legal equivalent of na-na-na-na-na. There are too many people genuinely needing access to justice to tie the court up with feuds.

Teaching your ex a lesson completely misses the point because family law is about moving families forward. It is results oriented. It isn't a forum for the redress of past wrongs. Even Contempt actions are really about the future. While part of the remedy is getting back what you should have had in the first place (support, visitation) it is principally about changing conduct so that the act does not happen in the future. That's why there are sanctions such as attorney fees or incarceration. Modifications are exclusively focused on the future: what will the new child support be or what will the new custody award involve or how will visitation change? To the extent that one party is caught up in past grievances, wanting to re-litigate old issues or "teach their ex a lesson" they've completely missed the reason for Modification.

And teaching your ex a lesson is the quickest way to lose. Judge's have precious little time to give each case. They have mere minutes before they assess the nature of the case and its probable outcomes. If a Judge senses that a party is not forward looking but is litigating ancient hostility or retribution against their ex, that party will lose, immediately, having barely passed go.

In short, getting aggressive to "get" your ex or teach her a lesson is a no win scenario and a horrid waste of money.

After hearing what I just wrote, the fellow I was speaking with assessed, "Perhaps that attorney was just telling me what I wanted to hear. Thank you for telling me what I needed to hear."

I'm glad I can help him. Can we help you?

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Firm-Overview.asp

Family Law: is it all for show?

2011-01-18T23:10:00.000-05:00

Reform has value. There is probably always a better way to do things. Family Law is no exception. I'll say that going in.

But some reform is ill conceived and ill informed. Every now and then there's a notion to streamline Family Law, which is to say, make it more of an administrative matter rather than a legal matter. I think that's a bad idea.

I need to digress here. By administrative matter I mean a resolution based upon a pre-set formula contrived to create a pre-designed result, a cookie cutter approach. For example, Worker's Compensation uses the administrative method to achieve its ends. By regulation your hand is worth a specific sum, your foot is worth a different specific sum. In the end, it largely boils down to math. There is no nuance. There is no subtlety. The very facts that should make a key difference do not, because Worker's Compensation has decided that it is a waste of time. Just lower the standard and lower the result.

On the other hand (no pun intended), you have the legal method which is much more open ended. Rather than formulas which dictate an outcome, the legal method provides a trier of fact, usually a judge, who has great discretion to do what is right. There are norms within "what is right" as established over time and within the collective of the judiciary. This is largely what is meant by "Common Law." But what is right is affected by nuance and subtlety. What is wrong in one context can become right in another. These facts matter greatly in real life, but they can't matter if they fit outside of the formula of an administrative method.

So the reform of Family Law sometimes comes down to requiring that everyone's case fit a pre-determined model, the cookie cutter approach. It comes down to deciding that a whole host of facts (elements of people's lives) just don't matter.

Many Family Law cases can almost be handled in a cookie cutter fashion. There is no doubt but that this approach is the least expensive. Uncontested Divorce cases are manageable and affordable precisely because of this approach. But not all cases can be forced into a pre-determined model to achieve a cookie cutter result. Divorcing parties would be ill served by such an approach, and, given the low level to which administrative cases are relegated, Family Law would be ill served by being just another aspect of life that has been relegated to the administrative remedy.

I can imagine the administrative divorce. "Next," the civil servant would call from her window. "So you want a divorce?" she would ask, reading from the form you had completed a few hours ago when you first entered the large room filled with scores of other applicants. "Yes," you'd say, hoping that she hadn't found some defect with your paperwork. "Fine," she might say, checking boxes on the form. "Your wife gets the kids. You get to see them on Saturdays from noon until three and Wednesdays from six until eight." "But I work on Saturdays," you might say. "I guess you won't see them, then," she'd reply.

And so on, and so on. It's not a pretty picture.

The legal approach is, at its core, flexible. It can be fraught with drama, with intrigue, with high level diplomacy and skulduggery. It can be inefficient. But it is also effective, thorough and to an incredible extent, tailor made to the circumstance. Given the enormity of the legal institution, it is amazing that the system can be as flexible as it is.

And few people feel that their lives, their circumstances, their wants and their needs are ordinary, are average or appropriate for cookie cutter solutions. Given the weight of issues that arise everyday in Family Law, few are.

So, the art, the practice of Family Law is not all for show, though there is a fair bit of show to it. But, as the drama of human life goes, it calls for the show to give it the attention it deserves and to get it right.

To me, then, the bottom line: leave Family Law flexible. Don't try to make a round peg fit into a square hole or vice versa. Individually crafted solutions work. Institutional, administrative orders that apply to no one, don't.

Michael Manely

It has been a month

2011-01-17T23:03:00.000-05:00

I'm not too terribly surprised that it has been over a month since I last blogged. So much has happened with getting the boys through another semester of school, then Christmas, then New Years, then one of the boys' birthdays then Snowcalypse (although with the unexpected break caused by Snowcalypse I would have thought I'd blog more, not less) and finally, a presentation I delivered on the United Nations Agreements reached in Cancun in December.

Still, all of that is a poor excuse for neglecting my nightly blog duties. A pox upon me for loafing.

The Firm continues to do exceptionally well. Looking back at 2010 we actually helped more people than in 2009 which was an astonishing accomplishment in this economy. Of course, you are familiar with our successful battles in Cyprus in getting little girls returned under the Hague convention and preventing the departure of a boy to non-Hague country, Nigeria with only 24 hours' notice, and the location and rescue of a boy who had been abducted by his estranged and violent father.

You no doubt recall reports of the trials, now too numerous to mention, but capping off with that $500,000 alimony award when the opposing counsel had asked the jury for $3.2 million.

All in all, while 2010 could have been better for our nation and our clients, it was not a bad year for The Firm.

So, now I'm back at the late night keyboard, typing out a line, reaching out into cyberspace, and dropping a few observations about this curious profession and the practice I've chosen and so dearly love - Family Law.

Stay tuned...

Michael Manely

Negotiation 101

2010-12-14T23:00:00.000-05:00

There has been a lot of press about the art of negotiation this week. A very good argument can be made that any deal which divides a pie with 16 pieces to one party and 1 to the other is not a good deal. Yet that is the result of a significant deal which the national press has extensively covered.

I think an argument can also be made that no one is that bad of a negotiator. This leads to the direct inference that the negotiator who accepted one for his side while conceding 16 to the other may not have actually been playing for his side.

So how is this relevant to family law? Only in that sometimes clients jump ship, they move from one attorney to another. When I am consulting with a potential client who has left his prior counsel, I sometimes hear that the former counsel was so bad at negotiation that he must have been bribed or at least favored the opposing party or opposing counsel to such an extent that he took a fall against the client's interest.

In my several decades long experience that doesn't happen. It is true that extremely poor results can be attribued to counsel. Attorneys, like people everywhere, fall somewhere along a continuum. Some are great. Some are awful. But poor results can also be attributed to other factors. If it is the potential client's facts, that is usually easy to spot. Harder to spot are issues related to the Judge such as immutable pet peeves.

However, if the deal is 16 to 1, you can probably figure that the fix was in. But how often has that happened? Except for the recent infamous deal, I've never seen such a bad deal. Usually negotiations work more like my recent experience where we tortured numbers over months of work, analysis, research, offer and counteroffer to finally arrive at a settlement that cut both ways to both parties and was about as fair and equitable as you could ask. After a very long term marriage which accumulated significant assets, the parties were finally able to let go the years of building vitriol to allow each other, and most importantly themselves, permission to move on. The parties maturation allowed counsel to cross the Rubicon to end the litigation and strike the deal.

So if you think your counsel is taking a dive, if the deal is something like 16 to 1, you are probably right. If the deal is much closer to equal, then something far less sinister is taking place. It is probably the nuance of law, particularities of your history and vagaries of circumstance operating directly on your experience.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Local-Knowledge-Local-Courts.asp

Addiction, your spouse's real partner.

2010-12-08T23:32:00.001-05:00

Marriages fail for a myriad of different reasons. Some fail because of addiction. Addiction can be to gambling, to shopping, to pornography. I have worked on divorces in 50 plus year marriages which are coming apart because of a recently surfaced sex addiction. But the most common addiction is drugs or alcohol. Tonight I'll talk about alcohol.

People are often isolated. They come to me with their own stories, their own experience. They know what they live through but they don't have the advantage of hearing thousands of stories. They can't see their story in the context of our larger culture. Almost always the client and I will consider the question of whether the spouse is just drinking or is addicted. "Does the drinking interfere with your relationship?" I'll ask. If the answer is yes, then there is a problem whether it is from addiction or from mores against alcohol. "Can your spouse put it aside at any time, not touch it for days or weeks?" If the answer is no, there is a problem. That may be simplistic but I think it boils down to that issue. If you can't leave the alcohol alone for a significant period of time, there's a problem, an addiction in some form. "If your spouse drinks sporadically when they drink, do they often get inebriated, affected?" A purely social drinker only drinks on social occassions and rarely drinks to excess. If your spouse often gets trashed when they drink, a binge drinker, there's a problem.

People who come to see me with this issue have often been living with a raging alcoholic for years but haven't really wanted to face it. Like Battered Women's Syndrome, there is an inherent denial in it. This is why groups like Al-Anon exist, to help you get out of that co-dependency. And alcoholics, like all people everywhere, are on a continuum. I have worked with folks who have been institutionalized for alcohol abuse and I have worked with folks who can't finish out the day without a couple of stiff drinks, though they don't slur their speech and they don't miss work because of it. Both, I think, are alcoholics. I don't know if the APA would support this, but in my practice it's a pretty safe charge.

Some people are violent when they drink. Some just fall asleep in their recliner by 7:00 p.m. All are removed, more distant than they would be without the drink. All are less engaged, less committed to their partners, because they are committed to their addiction.

Their addiction is not rational. This is the nature of addiction. It takes over rational thought. Rational thought is not a rational proposition in the face of addiction. Addiction is something else entirely. It can't be argued away. The addiction is the spouse's partner, not the person they are married to. And being the third wheel is very lonely. There is no intellectual adjustment that can be made. If your spouse won't get help, you will either live with it forever, in all of its forms, or you escape.

Addiction is not a fault in a moral sense. It is an illness. But at the same time, it is not a sinking ship with which you must perish. You can save yourself; that's fair. If you have kids, you must save them. Maybe leaving your addicted spouse will be the wakeup call they need, but that is irrelevant. You don't leave your spouse to get their attention, you leave your spouse to save yourself, to save your children.

I'm not being melodramatic here. It is a question of saving yourself and of saving your children. The life your children will live, growing up in the home of an alcoholic, is a brutish life in the best of circumstances. It's a short life in the worst. The abuse, even if it is purely psychological, is something no one should ever have to endure, certainly not the children. You don't want your children to grow up to be like your addicted spouse. But you make that outcome all the more certain by staying.

Addiction is a ground for divorce in Georgia, though most people still just claim "Irretrievably Broken" in their Complaint. You are permitted to end the marriage when your spouse is married to the bottle.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Firm-Overview.asp

Child Support: it's a matter of ethics and a matter of law.

2010-12-06T22:37:00.000-05:00

We were recently hired by a mother who needs child support from the father. The parents were never married so this is not a divorce case. The parties lived together until she was three months along, then he decided he really didn't want the commitment so he left, he moved on.

This is not an atypical story. We handle many, many cases like this. What makes it fairly atypical is that the father earns seven figures a year. Yes, seven figures.

Laws are written by rich legislators, most often to benefit rich people, or so my perception holds. Laws almost always seem drafted to protect those that have so that they can have more. Our child support laws fall into this category, too.

Until January 1, 2007, we had a very straightforward percentage basis for child support. Roughly put, if you were calculating child support for one child, you took 20% of the non-custodial parent's gross income as child support. Under the 2007 law, percentages no longer apply. The way the child support law is now applied is premised upon how much it costs to raise a child. What child? Apparently one that eats a lot of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese.

The law has become almost impossibly complex, but the gist of it is that a parent earning greater than $30,000.00 a month can now pay less than a parent earning $6,000.00 a month paid under the old guidelines. It's nice to have friends in legislative places, huh?

But the law does provide room for the judges to maneuver. The law does seek equity and fairness, in the best interest of the child.

In the old law, passed in 1984, the statute said that a judge could deviate from the percentage guidelines if the parent had unusually high income, which it defined as $75,000.00. That law, too, had wiggle room. Before too awfully long, about 10 years from its enactment, judges began to blow the doors off of that cap, finding that it bore no rational relation to how a child of a particular parent should be raised. Hence the new statute with the new effort to keep children in penury.

But this is what the bard meant when he called for the killing of all the lawyers in King Lear: we have recourse, we have argument, we have rightness and righteousness on our side. For the child of Donald Trump should live no differently than a child of Donald Trump's should live, as Donald Trump's child. (Pardon me, Donald Trump for using you as an example.) What would The Donald do?

This is the standard the judges can and should employ when setting child support on non-custodial parents of significant means. Payment of Child Support should pinch. It's your child. It should not matter whether you are poor, of modest means or quite well off, your obligation to your children, financial and otherwise, should not be easily tossed off, like a nice night on the town.

Some non-custodial parents will read this and decide that mine is not the firm for them. So be it. If they so grossly put their pocket book before their progeny, I couldn't represent them anyway. After all, if there is no right answer in the caring for children, are there ever any?

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/PracticeAreas/Child-Support.asp

A Very Happy Thanksgiving

2010-11-30T22:59:00.002-05:00

Though Thanksgiving is now last week's news, I want to share events of that week with you as it relates to one 12 year old boy.

On the Friday before Thanksgiving, late in the afternoon, 4:31 to be precise, I was just starting to watch the premier of Harry Potter with my three boys when my cell phone buzzed. I usually will ignore such stimuli when engaged in family activities, but the movie hadn't yet grabbed me and I was out of the office early. So I pulled the phone from my pocket and checked.

An Opposing Counsel in a very contested divorce matter had emailed me an attachment. I opened the email then the attachment which was his letter. His letter informed me that his client, the opposing party in a divorce action, was high tailing it back to her homeland in Nigeria the next day, Saturday, with my client's and the opposing party's 12 year old son.

I immediately called The Firm. We sent a letter to Opposing Counsel; we called Opposing Counsel; I sent an email to Opposing Counsel, all to object in the strongest terms possible to the removal of this boy from the State of Georgia, not to mention the United States of America.

When you file a divorce, the Court grants an automatic Standing Order. The Standing Order sets some ground rules that all the Superior Court judges think are a good idea in every divorce. The first section of the Order says that children of the parties are not to be removed from the jurisdiction of the Court. This means you can't take kids out of the State of Georgia, absent approval from the opposite party or the Court itself.

And here the opposing party was taking off to Nigeria, which is quite outside the jurisdiction of the Court.

Further, Nigeria is not a signatory to the Hague Convention. This means that if the opposing party decided not to return, she could never be forced to return the child, even though he was born here, raised here and had never set foot in Nigeria.

The silence from Opposing Counsel was deafening. We had ample reason to worry that the opposing party was, in fact, running. My most excellent team sprung into action.

Associate Jeremy Abernathy drafted a quick Motion for an Emergency Hearing; Paralegal Robyn Midanaky checked every corner of the Courthouse for a judge at that late hour. Sadly, none could be found. All our judges had left for the day and would not return to the Courthouse until after the child had been successfuly spirited out of the country and into hostile territory, from the Hague's perspective. Opposing Counsel had timed his strike perfectly.

Next, paralegal Nora Stocks came on board. She, too had been spending a late afternoon/early evening with her family but left all of that aside and spent the next 18 hours working closely with the United States' State Department, Customs, Homeland Security, Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Atlanta Police Department coordinating everyone's activity and obtaining and providing them with the necessary documents to stop the opposing party from fleeing the country with the boy the next day.

After dozens of calls and hours upon hours on the telephone, at 11:00 on Saturday night, United States and local officials intercepted the opposing party at the gate and explained to her in no uncertain terms that she was not stepping onto that airplane with that boy. The boy was saved.

The opposing party decided to fly on to Nigeria that night. She left the boy behind in the care of her 22 year old daughter from a prior relationship, who had also been booked on that Nigeria bound flight.

By Monday we had filed our Motion. By Tuesday at 8:30 a.m., the Judge assigned to the divorce case heard the weekend's history and Ordered Opposing Counsel to turn over the boy to my client.

That Thursday, in the middle of the afternoon, my client bowed his head with his son to pray, thankful that his boy was with him, feasting at the table in this most American holiday.

I want to express my sincere and deep thanks to my most excellent staff, and particularly Nora. Their hard work and dedication to our purpose saved this boy and provided our client with a very happy Thanksgiving.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/PracticeAreas/International-Family-Law.asp

Physics in human form explained.

2010-11-17T23:06:00.001-05:00

"To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction." As best I recall, that is a principle in physics. I don't think it holds true in human relations.

It seems that an action often spurs an even larger reaction. Tit for tat frequently becomes tit squared. Retaliation is seldom in equal measure, no matter how much the Old Testament may call for an eye for an eye or the actor may proclaim adherance to a slightly more recent theology.

Consider the game of the one-upping spouses: I'll flirt and you'll kiss. I'll grope and you'll have sex. I'll disappear for the weekend and you'll get acquainted with the American Legion. And where does that lead?These are not idle threats, they're actions already taken. There's no game of chicken here. And oddest of all, these are people very much engrossed in continuing the relationship, however sick it has become and maybe, because of how sick it has become.

Occasionally I'll consult with these people. Their unresolved and unrepentant mutually assured destruction in full form, they rarely have any interest in actually ending the bloody battles, rather they seek amunition to one up their partner in a new element of the game. "I saw a lawyer today and I can take you for everything you've got." "Oh yeah, well I saw a lawyer today and I gave him pictures of you with that platoon." And so it goes; and so it goes.

Sometimes the one upmanship game has lead to the floor of the courtroom, each party more vitriolic than the other. And the conclusion of that phase of the game is the couple's divorce in an ugly, unremeditated form. Then, still wholly embroiled in the battle that is their lives, the wars continue, post divorce.

Often the battles are then conducted in text messages, back and forth, each more hateful than the last. Or they can take the form of literal sabotage such as defacing or destroying property. Frequently the couple periodically resumes relations as if granting their physical intimacy to their former spouse is the worst cruelty they could render. Perhaps it is.

This is long past time for an analyst's couch, but I suspect an analyst would be about as much at a loss as the legal profession. "Just what do you want me to do? Fix you? I don't think so."

While I express conduct here in the extreme, many people are on this continuum, just in somewhat milder form. The battles continue. The battles escalate, even if the measure is the length of silent hostility in the cold environment called home. The test of whether the relationship falls into this pattern is whether one is fantasizing or even acting in some variation of "I'm going to get him (or her)." The thirst for retribution is generally a bad sign in a marriage.

It seems to me that two alternatives are far more wholistic and therefore healthier for human life, contributing to human happiness: wishing the best always for your spouse with you in the picture and wishing the best always for your spouse with you no longer in the picture.

Time is a beautiful process. Sometimes a spouse is in the "I'm going to get him" mode, but works through that and evolves to the sentiment of "I wish you well in all your endeavors, without me." That is a much better place to be.

Of course, there are attorneys for the couple engrossed in retribution. They call themselves "aggressive" lawyers. They'll be happy to take your money, all of it, and hand you a few more nuclear bombs in the process.

If that's where you are at, good luck with that.

For me, I'll still look for the laws of physics as they apply to human form, particularly human relationships. For example: a couple in motion tend to remain in motion and a couple at rest tend to remain at rest. But perhaps that is all just rationalization looking for an orderly universe. Perhaps it is far more correct to view human relations from the Chaos theory.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/

Where have I been?

2010-11-16T22:24:00.002-05:00

It has been almost two weeks since I last visited these pages, now often a part of my nighttime ritual. You may well ask, where have you been?

I have been doing that rarest of rare things in family law, a jury trial. Our trial was conducted In Fulton County Superior Court (http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Fulton-County-Judges.asp) over three days: Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday last week. The jury came back with its verdict at 8:00 p.m. on Wednesday night.

It was a divorce case. Twenty-six year marriage. Three grown kids. My client is a medical doctor. Very nice guy. The opposing party is an attorney. She hasn't practiced since the second year of their marriage. The significant issue was alimony.

Opposing Counsel wanted to play it up for the jury. His case was full of drama complete with heroes and villains (my client was cast as the villain). Opposing Counsel's problem is that he had no facts to back up his theme. And his client, as I told the jury is a very nice lady, didn't have the best of stories nor the best of presentation. So, Opposing Counsel had no facts and his client had no presentation.

The Opposing side wanted the jury to award them 3.2 million. The jury awarded them less than one-sixth of that. We were prepared to offer them more than what the jury eventually awarded had Opposing Counsel's demand not been so extreme.

What is the moral to the story? If Opposing Counsel had ever taken the task of settlement seriously rather than be consumed by slaying the dragons of his imagination, he could have helped his client far more. Opposing Counsel wanted so desperately to play the hero. At the end of our tale, that was not the role he wound up playing.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/PracticeAreas/Divorce.asp

Familiarity has a value.

2010-11-04T17:26:00.000-04:00

Tonight is a post authored by our own, Jeremy Abernathy.

Recently, I made the trek northwest to Cherokee County Superior Court. Our firm had several cases on the Court’s calendar. At 9:17 a.m., the Judge called the uncontested cases first. Uncontested cases involve parties that have entered into an agreement on all issues. Typically, these matters are short and sweet- but not in Cherokee County!

My client and I sat on the wooden pews in the Courtroom, and witnessed the uncontested case immediately preceding our case. The lawyer firmly, but respectfully walked to the lectern, and his client gingerly and nervously approached the witness stand, seemingly dressed in his finest suit. After being given the nod from the Judge to begin, the lawyer swore his client in and began asking him very short leading questions while simultaneously presenting evidence for the Judge.

Out of nowhere, the Judge interrupted and exclaimed to the client, “Would you appreciate being shifted back and forth between two households as often as you are asking your child to do so in this settlement agreement?” The courtroom silenced.

In fact, the only thing you could hear was my client’s sheepish and nervous rhetorical question, “ Hopefully, the Judge won’t ask us all of that, will he?”

The lawyer and his client were frozen by the Judge’s barrage of questions. They emotions seemed to go from amazement, to disgruntled, to desperate. In fact, the client’s wife, who appeared for the uncontested divorce hearing was sworn in as a witness! (This rarely occurs at an uncontested divorce hearing because only one (1) party, or in some case, neither party (like in Paulding County), is required to appear!)

Despite the wife’s testimony, client’s testimony and lawyer’s argument regarding the appropriateness of the custody arrangement, Judge asserted, “I refuse to approve of this agreement without expert testimony regarding how this arrangement provides stability for this child” A disappointed client, opposing party and lawyer left the Cherokee County courtroom dismayed and utterly bewildered.

Perhaps if the lawyer on that case was familiar with Cherokee County uncontested cases, he would have known that they can become quite eventful. He would have known how to steer clear of that pitfall.

Our law firm, The Manely Firm P.C., provides the value of familiarity. We handle only family law cases all around metro-Atlanta. Our familiarity and specialized knowledge is the product of our commitment and focus to only family law cases.

Oh, by the way, the uncontested case that we had on the calendar that morning was done in 7 minutes.

Like I said, familiarity has a value.

Jeremy Abernathy
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/Bio/JeremyAbernathy.asp

It's a math question.

2010-11-03T21:53:00.000-04:00

There are many family law issues that involve soul searching, asking tough moral and ethical questions striving to find the right answer.

This is not one of them.

I will often consult with someone who has a money question. Much of family law is a money question. Quite often the subject is child support modification. Regardless of which parent is asking me, the analysis is the same: how much money do you stand to gain (either through an increase in child support you receive or decrease in the child support you pay)? You want to be as realistic as possible in your assessment because you want the math to be correct.

If the amount in controversy is less than, equal to or only somewhat greater than the attorney fees involved, for God's sakes don't do it. Don't spend good money after bad. Don't roll the dice on a slightly favorable verdict.

Modification only makes sense when you are necessarily going to make or save some significant money after the process if done. And if an attorney tells you that the attorney fees don't matter because you'll get them awarded by the court, ask them if they will give you a contract that provides that they will only get paid by the other side. See if that attorney will take the risk. If he or she won't, then what does that tell you?

Let me give you an example. Suppose a fellow wants to reduce his child support. He's making a little less money now so we feel comfortable that his child support would be approximately $100 less per month. This means that over the course of a year he will save $1,200.00. This means that over the course of two years he will save $2,400.00. I use a two year figure because parties can seek to re-adjust their child support after two years.

Now you need to factor in the attorney fees. Suppose the attorney fees are slightly greater than the two year savings. It makes no sense to spend that money to save less money. Again, it is possible that the judge could award you attorney fees, if you are the prevailing party, but you won't know until the money is spent and you've played your hand. That is a risk which better be worth taking. For example, if you were going to save $5,000.00 over two years you have more motivation to spend $2,500.00. Now we enter the realm of "what is it worth to you." Everyone has a different threshold here. Some folks feel that the probability of saving $5,000.00 makes is worthwhile to spend $2,500.00 with a hope of recovering even that. Some folks hold out for far more savings before they make that kind of investment.

Of course, no one expects you to know off the top of your head what child support would probably look like under a new scenario, that's why God gave us family law lawyers. So you should call one for a free consultation to find out the facts, gain knowledge.

After all, knowledge is power. And it's never a bad idea to have a little more power now and then.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/PracticeAreas/Modification.asp

"On Behalf Of"

2010-11-01T21:10:00.000-04:00

One of the last things I do at night before I turn in, is sit before my laptop and compose the post I want to write, what I would like for you to read. It is my message to the readers, followers, potential clients, existing clients, and old friends who just want to see what I'm thinking these days.

I hope my writing is fairly readable. I hope it is somewhat entertaining. I hope it is sufficiently informative. One thing I know, however, is that my writing is deeply personal. I write what I am thinking, what I am feeling, what I see happening in the world of family law. I write about the reality of a family law practice, the real world experience of real world people fully engaged in their personal family law stories.

In a family law practice the different firms are certainly distinct from one another. Each firm has its own personality, its own approach. Each firm sets its own tone. Our firm web site is built around illustrating our uniqueness. My blog is intended to convey that, as well.

That's why I write my blog, or the other attorneys at my firm sometimes write on my blog. It is always personal; it is always from us, it is always the real world stories that comprise our practice.

For that reason, I am not surprised by the recent increase in family law blogs. There is probably no better way, short of a one on one interview, to convey who we are and what makes us tick. But that's why I am suprised by the recent surge in family law blogs that are not written by anyone associated with the firm. You can instantly recognize them. The are written "on behalf of " the firm. They are incredibly sterile, even antiseptic. The topics cover celebrity divorces or fairly acrane or distant issues like, "what's New Jersey doing in divorce today?" Today they might be concerned about some NBA star's custody battle. Tomorrow they might address how many women in Los Angeles are seeking prenuptial agreements.

But how does that impact you? And what does that tell you about the firm? What does that tell you about how the firm will help you?

You might say that "on behalf of" doesn't tell you anything about the firm, that this anonymous ghost writer gives you no sense of the attorneys who handle that firm's family law matters on a daily basis. But unfortunately, I think it does. I think it speaks volumes.

So, I'll keep writing my blog, expressing myself, hopefully giving you a very good picture of who I am and how I go about this practice. And the other guys who keep their thoughts to themselves yet want to represent people at their most intimate and vulnerable moments? I guess they'll just stay anonymous, as they prefer.

As for me? I think it is better that you know quite well who I am. I think you deserve that.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

The Isle of Anguilla

2010-10-27T23:16:00.000-04:00

There is a little island out in the Caribbean called Anguilla. It lies just north of Saint Martin. It's about 16 miles long and a little over three miles wide at its widest point. Its total population is a little over 13,000. Its main industry is tourism followed closely by corporations which set up there to avoid taxes in their home countries. The natives speak predominantly English since the Island once belonged to Great Britain.

It was also home to a father who was divorced from a mother several years ago. Since the divorce he has wanted to take his daughter back to his homeland to visit his relatives. The mother is quite nervous about that.

When the parties divorced, they agreed that the father would not take the daughter to the Island until the Island adopted and implemented the Hague Convention on Civil Aspects of Child Abduction. (In International Family Law we just call it the Hague Convention.) The Hague Convention is a treaty between many nations about how its wrong to abduct children to another country and how the parent from the child's home state can go about getting the children back.

Readers here know we do an awful lot of International Family Law, Hague Convention work. We're quite good at it.
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/PracticeAreas/International-Family-Law.asp

In addition to adopting the Hague Convention, before the father could return to the Island with his daughter, Anguilla was also supposed to enact legislation that would require extradition of a parent who violates the Hague Convention.

With something just over 13,000 people, the father, by report, is a bit of a muckity-muck in Anguilla so, after the divorce, he set about getting that country to adopt the Hague Convention. Story has it, they did. The problem is that Anguilla doesn't seem to want to broadly publish this contention. Though the father argues that Anguilla adopted the Hague Convention in 2007, that adoption has yet to turn up on any international list of adopted and approved countries.

Further, the Hague Convention is fairly specific about the mechanism to carry out the country's obligations. It requires the creation of something called a Central Authority which administers all of the Hague requirements. Further, this operation is supposed to be swift. No procrastinating here.

But Anguilla hasn't done anything to implement the Hague. They don't have a Central Authority. Its as though they've created a store front with no insides. It is all window dressing.

And then there is the capper. Anguilla has done nothing to enact legislation to ensure extradition of a parent who violates the Hague Convention. So, we have a treaty in name only with no enforcement mechanism and no law guarranteeing extradition. No child, no perpetrator, all shell game.

Back during the divorce, the father was often quick to say he would steal the child away to Anguilla, never to be heard from again. On an Island of 13,000 I find that a little hard to believe. But short of landing Marines or some equivalent, there is no way to rescue this little girl from that Island, except for the guarrantees required by the Court in the parties' divorce and provided by the Hague Convention.

Now the father has asked the Court to find that Anguilla has adopted and enacted the Hague Convention. He's pretending the extradition part of the Order isn't there. Father hopes to be off across the sea in short order.

Mother? She's still quite nervous. And little girl? Since the divorce in 2005, Father has yet to spend more than three consecutive days with little girl without returning her to Mother. Little girl is not so keen on the idea of a Caribbean vacation either.

But frankly, if Anguilla is good with the Hague Convention and gets this extradition problem fixed, we all should be good with the proposal. Time marches on. Little girls grow up. Sometimes countries do too.

But also frankly, if Anguilla, or this father, is playing an elaborate shell game to spirit this child away to a country that will not return her, it will be a cold day in hell before she steps on that plane.

Michael Manely

If it's the last thing you do...

2010-10-26T21:26:00.000-04:00

I was recently speaking with a psychologist. In my line of work, I do that often. He and I were debating othe merits of divorce.

He was adamantly opposed to divorce. "Divorce should be the last option," he told me.

After more discussion/debate, he admitted that he, himself, was divorced and remarried. "I got it right the second time," he said. But he didn't take his divorce lightly. He worked through everything he could think of before he fiinally threw in the towel. "I wanted to tell my little girl I had tried everything."

He had tried everything? But he was divorced? If he had tried everything surely he would have tried suffering for the rest of his existence.

Saying that divorce should be the last option is very much like finding something in the last place you looked. Of course it's the last place you looked. Why would you go on looking elsewhere once you found it? And of course, divorce is the last option since it's the last option you choose. It was the last option the psychologist chose. You don't tend to choose other options to work out your marriage after your divorce.

But the point is, everyone has their own strategy for looking for things. And everyone has their own internal, perhaps undiscovered list of options to try before they choose divorce. For the psychologist to argue that divorce is bad, that it shouldn't happen and that he only divorced as his "last option," is only sanctimonious "holier than thou". Only the fellow who suffers for the rest of his existence can make this proclamation with righteousness.  Everyone else needs to eat some humble pie and stop the hypocrisy.

Some folks leave at the first sign of trouble. Maybe they aren't that committed or maybe they aren't that into suffering. Some folks stick it out a while longer. Maybe they have more faith, maybe they have more hope or maybe they have more tolerance.  Some folks hang in there even longer. Maybe they never say die or maybe they have a streak of martyrdom. Maybe they are a little into masochism, too. But everyone chooses their own level of endurance. It must be so.

And marriage involves a fair degree of endurance.  The test, it seems to me is, is the harmony better than the hassle? If it is, you make that music together. If it isn't, it's time to sing solo for awhile, maybe even start another duet. (Some folks are really out there and get a whole chorus going.)

And my personal experience is that the awareness that you can make daily choices makes your daily choice to remain committed that much more fresh and new or renewed. And if that isn't your choice, perhaps it's time to try to "get it right the second time," just like the psychologist. Or the third. Or the fourth...

The point is, you don't quit. You don't lay down and die. You live, fully, another day.

May you live fully each day. May your music be beautiful.

Michael Manely

What we don't do well.

2010-10-20T23:29:00.000-04:00

A client who is quite familiar with these ever growing pages recently expressed her sense of the accuracy of my posts and generally complimented the firm. She said, "you understand what I'm going through better than anyone else I talked to. You understand this area of law inside and out and, as I've seen, you can litigate anybody into the ground. Is there anything you don't do well?"

"I'm sure there must be," I told her. Though I couldn't think of anything at the time.

But her question stayed with me. Is there anything we don't do well? I finally came up with an answer.

We don't lie well. We don't make stuff up. Frankly, we don't do balderdash well at all.

If you've read my posts for any length of time you're aware that there are two types of family law attorneys. Short of saying the good guys and the not so good guys, I'll recast it this way: the majority of us are honest and straightforward. We look for common ground to achieve a fair settlement. Most of us practice in this same vein.

Some, however, feel that an honest, straightforward, affirmative practice is not what lawyering is all about. They argue that lawyers are not doing their job unless they are zealous advocates. (The Bar regulations actually use that term, zealous advocates.) But these folks mean something very specific by their interpretation of the Bar's rules. They mean that you win at all costs, including integrity, honesty, ethics, decency and morality. In short, to win, you make stuff up.

We have several cases moving forward right now where I can see a fair, just and equitable settlement. But the other side is represented by "winner take all" attorneys, doing the bidding of an unscrupulous spouse. In each case, they have no case, no facts, no law. So they conjure the facts and they bastardize the law in the hope of creating a case in which they will eventually vanquish us.

And we don't do that well.

I love my profession. I think it a noble business. I value the law too much to cheapen it by falsifying documents, purchasing witnesses and torturing time honored legal positions. I value my clients too much to allow them to perjure themselves or posit a position which is outside the bounds of decency.

I always say, "It is what it is." I don't make the facts. History has cemented the facts. Those are the facts we work with. Reality dictates the just result. A result not based upon reality is, by definition, unjust. And unjust results yield a destruction of the legal process, undermining the dignity of law and a whole host of unexpected and unwanted consequences.

Karma anyone?

So we don't lie, cheat or steal well. And we never will.

You want somebody to make up stuff? Check out those other guys. You want honesty and integrity in your family law case so that you can look your children in the face, or better still, look yourself in the face in the morning and hold your head up high always? Give us a call.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Firm-Overview.asp

Elephant at home.

2010-10-19T22:24:00.001-04:00

It's late into the argument. You've been going at it for hours now and nothing seems to get resolved. It's the same argument you've had, time and time again. Sometimes you wonder if you argue just to have some connection, something to say, something to say instead of what you'd rather do at any given moment and that picture isn't too pretty. But, it's what you and your spouse have left together.

So what do you argue about? What is the substance of that dispute? Is it money? Is it a lack of passion? Is it too much passion spent in a different direction?

We have 13 grounds for divorce in Georgia. The grounds range from adultery to habitual intoxication to cruel treatment to you married your sister, to name just four. And, of course, the no fault ground, Irretrievably Broken, known absolutely everywhere else as Irreconcilable Differences.

Once upon a time you had to prove a ground to be entitled to a divorce. If you couldn't prove Joe committed adultery you had to stay married to him. So long as Joe knew how to hide it, you stayed wed. When both parties wanted the divorce, Joe had to confess adultery, even if it didn't happen to be true. Some archaic states still have this exclusively fault requirement on the books, causing their citizens to engage in legal hoodwinking to obtain freedom from their spouse with the State's blessing. I'm very pleased that Georgia is no longer so paternalistic.

But back to the story. What do you argue about?

After 21 years of litigating divorces and counseling parties in their most intimate moments as they sever their marital relationships, I've come to the opinion that what people argue about as they make their way to divorce is little more than window dressing. As one of our Judges once announced as the wife pleaded from the stand, "But Judge, he committed adultery," to which the Judge quipped, "I figured there was some reason you were getting a divorce."

The adultery doesn't cause the divorce. The drinking doesn't cause the divorce. The cruelty doesn't cause the divorce. The fact that she's your sister doesn't cause the divorce. You are getting a divorce because you want one, because you've come to the belief that you need one, because if you don't obtain one you firmly suspect you will soon go stark, raving mad. You are getting a divorce because you are over it.

The rest is just window dressing, rationalizations, all perfectly logical and right, but ultimately needless. Ultimately it is simple. You want out. You get out.

Wouldn't it be nice if it were that simple in practice, in the build up? No drama. As simple as the Paul Simon song. Just slip out the back, Jack.

But in real life we seem to have to argue. We seem to have to become bitter and angry. We seem to use these emotions as a catalyst, a form of dynamite to blast us out of our relationships and into the bright light of the freedom we then desire.

From a legal standpoint we don't need it. From an emotional standpoint (in the legal context) it gets in the way, it holds us back, it pushes us to make bad, destructive decisions.

We argue about much, but we argue about nothing. What we ignore is the elephant in the room, that elephant at home. That is, until it comes charging out and tramples everyone in its path. I think it is better to talk about the elephant before it goes on its rampage.

So, if you are ready to move on, own it. Don't argue about his infidelity. Don't argue about how drunk she is again. Don't argue about how your mother was right, your wife made for a bad daughter, too, just bring out the elephant, introduce it, and move on.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/PracticeAreas/Divorce.asp

I'll fight you 'till the day you die.

2010-10-18T22:05:00.001-04:00

In an exclusively family law practice, it is easy to focus on the divorce cases. They are parties' first bite at the apple. All the issues are in play. All the drama and all the strategies are brought to bear on resolution of these sometimes legally and always emotionally complex matters.

The other kinds of cases, usually modifications and contempts, cause less concern because they are usually more logic based. Something needs to change in the agreement because life has substantially changed: Modification; or the other party is not doing something important that they were supposed to do based upon the Court's Order: Contempt. Both are straightforward and, since they arise after the divorce, usually are far less vitriolic and emotional.

However, there is a kind of post divorce case that can take the cake. These contempt and modifications do not stem from logic but from need, some deep seated need to stay engaged, to stay embroiled. They come from the party who never lets go. In a sick sense, they come from the party who won't say goodbye. It's as if they carry "till death do us part," to a whole new level.

We can identify these cases because the Complaint provides nothing substantive to sink your teeth into. There is nothing hard and fast and objective, it is all innuendo, "hints and allegations." We find a lot of pettiness in these Complaints. It's a "she touched me first," kind of pleading.

And they usually come from just a few attorneys who are more than happy to stoke the eternal flame of post marital animus because they know that angry clients pay more.

There's a Don Henley song about this. (Isn't there about everything?) It's called, "Get over it." Lord knows the judges wish the parties would.

I was recently asked by a party defending yet another suit from an all too well funded ex-spouse, "Will it ever end?" I had to answer that I didn't think it would. So long as the Judge doesn't pop the Opposing Party, doesn't force them to some financial pain for continuing to inflict their anger on their ex-spouse, there is little hope that the offending party will ever stop. What would make them? Boredom? These people live to litigate. This is what life is all about for them, staying in controversy.

So, judges, if you see a party bringing an action against an ex-spouse, and there's no real teeth to it, stop the madness, stop the destructive behavior. Please charge the plaintiff with some fees for harassing their ex. Make them think at least twice before they venture down this road again.

And parties, if you are in this never ending relationship with an ex-spouse who could never love but can always litigate, I'm terribly sorry.

Michael Manely

Why Free Consultations Are Worth The Money

2010-10-13T21:29:00.003-04:00

Shelia Manely, Business Manager

Tonight's blog post is written by Shelia Manely, Business Manager for the Manely Firm, PC.

I’m not a lawyer . . . yet. But, I am a law student, mother of a blended family of five, business manager of our growing law firm and wife. (That’s the order my husband suggested.) I can’t give legal advice, but I can give lots and lots of advice. Just ask anyone who knows me. I just can’t help myself. I figure I’m being very helpful if I share everything I know with anyone who asks. I know you didn’t ask, but, you are reading, which sort of implies consent. So, here I go.

I had the chance to sit in on a presentation given to fellow law students by the founding attorney from a family law firm with their sole office in downtown Atlanta. To prove what a great attorney he is, he touted how many speaking engagements he’s had, how many TV appearances he’s made and how dependent upon him the local news channels are for his professional advice. He said he always makes himself available to the media, not just for paid appearances, but also for free consultation and advice. After all, he says, those guys are journalists, not attorneys. They want to know they are getting their story straight and using the right terminology. Sometimes, he says, I’m disappointed when I don’t get credited or I get edited out of the piece, but that’s OK. I still help. I want them to call me again. I want to keep those opportunities coming!

He also bragged about how much he charges an hour (over $500) and why he never, ever gives free client consultations. He advised over twenty-five future attorneys to never, ever give free client consultations. Here’s his reasoning:

If I charge for consultations, people will think I have enough business that I don’t have to give free consultations to get business. Free consultations say, “I’m desperate.”

If I charge for consultations, I won’t be giving away my time to some people while billing my time to others. Free consultations say, “I’m putting my paying clients aside to do free consultations.”

If I charge for consultations, people will feel really good about what I tell them because they’ve paid for it. Free consultations say, “my advice isn’t worth anything.”

And then there is the kicker:

If someone pays for my time and also gets a free consultation from another attorney, they’re not going to pick the do-gooder who gave them their time, because they’ve already invested over $500 bucks in me! Free consultations say, "pick me and you've wasted the money you paid the other guy."

Well, it’s hard to argue with him because he is very successful. He has lots of famous clients to show for his efforts. And rich, famous clients need a good attorney just like the rest of us. But, wait a second…don’t the rest of us need a good attorney just like those rich, famous people?

At The Manely Firm, PC, we've had our share of media attention and we do give free client consultations.

We are not desperate. We open over 200 cases a year and that number keeps climbing.

We do not put our paying clients aside to do free consultations. If we have more work than we can do while giving free consultations, we hire more attorneys.

If people thought our free advice wasn’t worth anything, they wouldn’t hire us by the hundreds. And finally,

If a person prefers to pay for advice they may never use, from an attorney they have yet to meet with a firm they may never hire, I say let ‘em. I prefer our clients be sane. They’re easier to represent.

At The Manely Firm, PC, we make ourselves available to potential clients, not just the media. And, not just for paid appearances, but also for free consultation and advice. After all, our potential clients are just people, not attorneys. They want to know they are getting their story straight and using the right terminology. Sometimes, we are disappointed when we don’t get hired, but that’s OK. We still help. We want them to call us again. We want to keep those opportunities coming!

So, the advice? If you need a successful, experienced family law attorney, visit us for a free consultation. If you need a celebrity, it'll cost ya'.

Why Not Expand the Pie?

2010-10-11T16:27:00.000-04:00

Tonight's blog post is courtesy of Kairi Smith Gure, who is our Associate in our Lawrenceville office.

http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

____________________________________________

I am in the process of earning a masters degree in the Science of Conflict Management. I am in my first semester of a four semester program and I have already begun to view most of life’s experiences as a series of negotiations, some simple, some complex.

In my negotiation's class we are learning about different types of negotiations. Before a couple of weeks ago I really didn’t think that there was more than one way to negotiate. I thought, like most, about negotiations as the classic exchange where both parties have competing interests and each gives up as little as possible and, in a best case scenario, each side walks away with 50% of what they wanted. Both parties are usually leave the negotiation disappointed that they didn’t get more. But, in some cases, if one party was more savvy (or conniving) than the other party, they are able to “win” and walk away from the negotiation with more than 50% (or maybe all) of what they wanted. This is what I have know come to know as Zero Sum negotiating.

Zero Sum negotiating works on the idea that one party has to get less of what they want (or need) for the other party to get more of what they want (or need). When you are zero sum negotiating you are working with a “fixed pie” meaning that you are focused on the idea that there is not enough to go around and, in order to “win,” the other party has to “lose”.

I propose that Zero Sum negotiating, while definitely the way to approach many negotiations, is not the best fit for resolving most of the conflicts that take place in realm of Family Law litigation. Integrative negotiating would provide parties with more satisfying, durable, and successful agreements, bringing them one step closer to resolving the family conflict that brought them to court in the first place.

Integrative negotiation is based upon the idea that if both of the parties approach the negotiation with the thought that they can both “win,” the focus of the negotiation will create an agreement that achieves the goals of both parties. Ideally this would happen because the parties could think outside of the box and come up with creative solutions to meet everyone's needs and/or goals. This process would in turn “expand the pie” so that there was enough for everyone.

I know that emotions run high for the parties when dealing with Family Law conflicts because the stakes are generally very high. As I work with my clients I do my best to facilitate an approach to their negotiations that “expand the pie,” so that long after the day the agreement was created and emotions are no longer raging, they are still satisfied with the outcome. To me this it what it means to “win”.

Kairi Smith Gure

Oh No You Didn't.

2010-10-07T21:15:00.000-04:00

Here is what we don't do.

Tonight, a taste of the trully sublime, trully silly and trully awful.

Attorney commercials. Fortunately in other states.

And finally:

Now, these guys are reputable.:

I hope you enjoyed the show.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/In-the-News.asp

Check, please.

2010-10-05T22:57:00.001-04:00

The old phrase, the straw that broke the camel's back, is exactly on point with tonight's post.

This may be like finding something in the last place you look. Of course you wouldn't look any farther after you found what you were looking for, so the last thing done that finally brought down the house of cards may be only that, the last thing done. There is not another "thing" to follow because by then the cards are already scattered.

But there seems merit to the expression, just the same.

I'm forever curious about that last straw. What was the final impetus? After years of acrimony, bitterness, loneliness, unhappiness, and perhaps abuse in subtle and not so subtle forms, what finally called the question? What finally caused a party to say, "Check, please?"

Perhaps it is one affair too many. Perhaps it is blowing the mortgage money again. Perhaps it is another drunken allnighter winding up half dressed and sleeping it off in the yard, someone else's yard. Perhaps it is another anniversary passed without so much as the time of day, or worse yet, flowers purchased for his mother. Perhaps it is running up the credit cards over the limit, again. Perhaps it is being de-friended on Facebook. Perhaps it is learning she's pregnant, and it couldn't possibly be yours.

It seems there is always something that convinces us, finally, that enough is enough. And that point is and always shall be the great internal debate. When do you know you have given it your all, made every effort and still, your marriage, and therefore your life, is going nowhere?

Everyone has their own compass, their own gauge of enough. Everyone probably shifts that compass as needs be, marks a new line in the sand, just to put off what they pray is not the inevitable. I have spoken with some people repeatedly over the course of years. They return as predictably as day lillies to revisit their options, maybe to let off some steam, to touch base on their escape valve. Some, after several or even many years, do finally pull the plug, do finally say, "check please." Their line in the sand was broached, finally, one too many times.

So why do people stick it out until they can't stick it out anymore? It seems a circular question. But I know that each seeks their own level; it must be so. And for everyone, that individual level has to be right; it must be so, otherwise it would be different. And no one can effectively tell another where that line in the sand truly lies.

But the line is there. It's somewhere. And each of us know for ourselves when that line has been irretrievably crossed.

Michael Manely
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/PracticeAreas/Divorce.asp

Cornered

2010-10-04T21:33:00.000-04:00

Tonight's Blog Post is authored by Attorney Jeremy Abernathy.

As a child, nothing compared to getting off the cheese (a/k/a/ the school bus), telling my mother I had no homework assignments, jumping on my bike, and signaling for Abby, my trusty chow dog, to accompany me as I meet up with my neighborhood pals. My friends and I, with dogs in tow, ventured through the woods searching for old coins and trail-blazing new bike paths.

One afternoon, my dog, Abby, cornered my friend Russell’s dog, Bandit. Bandit, a mixed breed of some sort and relatively small, was by far the least aggressive of all the neighborhood dogs. Bandit, however, did not back down from this challenge. He squared off and stood poised to totally obliterate Abby. Consequently, I stepped in to preempt witnessing a massacre.

In my profession, people “corner” people too, thus requiring the legal system to step in. During a recent free consultation, a mother discussed how her husband cornered her. She described his physical and verbal abuse. She explained how he blames her for the death of their son who died in an automobile accident two years ago. She also lamented how she fears he will leave the country and take their remaining minor son away from her.

The legal system can “step in” to provide temporary alimony for this mother to maintain the household bills and expenses. The legal system can step in to require the husband to pay child support to the mother. The legal system can step in to award the mother temporary attorney fees to properly present her case.

If you have been cornered, set up a free thirty (30) minute consultation so that we can discuss how the legal system can step in and stop you from being cornered.

Jeremy Abernathy
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/Bio/JeremyAbernathy.asp

The bane of our existence.

2010-09-30T23:15:00.001-04:00

I spoke with a young woman today who had an interesting, though not terribly uncommon tale to tell.

She is 26 years old. Her parents divorced when she was six. Her mother received primary custody of her. Her mother's favorite sport around the house was to bash dad: what a scum he was, what a deadbeat he was, what a horrible human being he was. To say that dad had no value in mom's house would grossly overstate the situation. You get the picture.

One day, it sounded like about seven years after the divorce, out of desperate need to retain some boy's attention, this young woman accused her father of a heinous act. Her accusation was private, to the departing beau. He, then, told his parents who told the young woman's mom who called the police.

Months later, tens of thousands of dollars on defense counsel later, district attorney investigations and polygraphs later, the charges were dismissed.

According to the police, the young woman made it up. And why not? It's not as if dad had value, anyway. This once little girl had learned that lesson well.

Though exonerated, the father langished. He let his business go. It was heading in the ditch anyway since it was a rather public operation and the public wanted nothing to do with him in light of the once pending accusations. He fell into despair and depression. He lost his house, his cars. He nearly lost his mind.

He saw nothing of his daughter.

Years passed. He worked at recovering. He started a new business, flegling at first, but used it as his vehicle to re-engage with his life. He threw himself into the business and it prospered. Still he remained haunted by the absence of his child who had turned his world upside down.

Years passed and the young woman grew. She graduated from high school. She left her mother's home. She attended and graduated college. She got her first real job. She moved into her first real apartment. She bought her own car. She even became invested in her spirituality on her own terms.

And, as the years passed, as her spirituality deepened, she began to mature. As she moved farther from her mother's world, she began to construct her own.

And she eventually came to realize just how she had wronged a man she once lovingly called Daddy.

So, after a painful series of starts and stops, she called him.

He took her call.

They met. They cried.

Now, not terribly long after their grand reunion, they dine about once a week. Usually Daddy buys. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Oh, the things we do to each other in families.

Practicing Desperation Law

2010-09-29T23:20:00.002-04:00

Last night I wrote about the attorneys who practice family law as though it was were a tenet of faith. Tonight I write about the attorneys who could care less.

On the opposite end of the spectrum from the zealot who imposes her convictions on you lies the "I just don't give a damn attorney." They have more important things to do, like anything else that comes through the door.

By and large, family law is considered a peculiar specialty, as if those who practice it exclusively have an affliction. As I wrote last night, who would sign on for this misery? So family law cases are considered a blight, though perhaps a necessary evil for the general practitioner who handles anything that comes through the door. They handle personal injury, bankruptcy, criminal law, commercial litigation and, yes, somewhere in there, family law. I contend that they practice "Desperation Law." They seem to state, "I just want a retainer. Any retainer."

Family law has its own rhythm, its own groove, certainly its own body of law, and its own bar (for those few of us who practice it exclusively). Whether we practice in the same frame of mind or approach the subject from quite different perspectives, the exclusively family law lawyer generally knows the other exclusively family law lawyer. We usually know each others strengths, weaknesses, quirks and pecadillos. We speak the same language. We understand the issues without a learning curve.

For those indecisive or disinterested souls who do anything for a buck, they are forever cast on the howling winds of rapid and irreconcilable change. One morning they are representing a criminal defendant, wrapped up in the Fourth Amendment. The next morning, they are knee deep in a contractual clause about non-competing burger stands, and the next morning they attempt to be immersed in a bitter custody dispute. Jack of all trades, master of none.

I know this scenario all too well. At one time I practiced this scenario. And family law drove me nuts. But I learned, it drove me nuts because I wasn't just practicing family law. I'd attend a criminal calendar call as disinterested as I could be. I was engaged in the sport, but the passion was non-existent. I'd attend a commercial litigation calendar call and everyone there still seemed asleep and wishing they were on the golf course. Not a happy crew. Then I'd attend a family law calendar call and everyone was animated, involved, deep in discussion, negotiation, maybe resolution. All of it meaningful. All of it vitally real.

Eventually I determined that I should only practice family law. I won't call it a calling, hence I would run afoul of the malady I cited last night. No, it was my passion, my skill and my drive that directed me. That, and family law attorneys are in court most often, second only to prosecutors. My attorneys and I are often in Court three to five times a week. A personal injury attorney is lucky to see the inside of a courtroom three times a year. As I've said often, I live in the Courtroom.

So family law is home. This is where I thrive. This is where I can do the most good.

I don't practice desperation law. I won't handle anything that comes through my door, except family law. So if you have a criminal case, you can call me because I know some great criminal lawyers to refer you to. But if you have a family law case, call me or anyone who practices exclusively in family law. Our passion and our practice shows.

Michael Manely

Is it a calling?

2010-09-28T22:50:00.000-04:00

I have an unusual job. I help people get divorced. I work in family crisis day in and day out. I am buried, nay smothered in daily drama.

Why would anyone sign on for this misery?

Some in my profession appear to posit that their's is a calling, that they are led to this line of work in the same way that preachers are. And like preachers, they claim passion and deeply held, fervent beliefs. They hold convictions and operate from dogma about how things must be. Their client's lives become testaments to the attorney's convictions. And the family drama plays out in moralistic terms, good versus evil and righteousness must prevail. There is the victor and there must be the vanquished.

I definitely like what I do. I don't want to do anything else, work wise. I'm drawn to the Courtroom, not because it is my life's mission but because I'm good at it. And I'm good at it because I like a good, serious legal contest. I'm good at it because I care to be. And I like what I do because I find meaning in helping real people obtain real solutions for real problems. What's not to like about that? Family law fits me.

I would hope that everyone should be able to make a living, doing what they enjoy. It makes life richer.

But I don't hold dogmatic positions. I don't pass judgment. I don't exact my principles on my client's lives. I do bring all my talents to bear on their issues. I make solutions.

I'm not a preacher. I'm not a saint. I'm not a voluteer. I'm a mercenary. I am well paid to be successful for my clients. I am paid to advocate for their interests and paid to tell them the truth.

So if you want someone to be a bishop over your life, to tilt at the windmills of their own past in your present, I'm not for you. If you want to fix a problem, come see me.

So, is family law my calling? No. It's my business.

Just drifting through.

2010-09-22T23:02:00.001-04:00

We do not finish all the cases we start. Sometimes the firm and the client parts company. Sometimes our strategies no longer appeal to the client. Sometimes the client cannot follow the firm's advice. Sometimes the client has other issues.

I once represented a client with attachment issues. He didn't care much who he was sleeping with. He was not loyal or connected to any particular woman. He thought his kids ought to live with him but he gave them no good reason to and wasn't particularly concerned if they didn't, and they didn't.

I learned that those attachment issues extended to every other facet of his life, including his ability to follow through on our advice when the going got rough. When the going got rough, he just got going.

Good bye. He wasn't that invested in the first place.

He was kind of the accidental tourist of the divorce world. He spent the next several months bouncing from pillar to post and, without rudder, without plan, without cohesive strategy that he could stay committed to, I understand that he got battered something awful. Opposing Counsel was pretty good to begin with. This now former client made Opposing Counsel's job that much easier.

As best I could tell, he wound up disappearing. He paid his child support somewhat timely, but he wandered off to the far corners of the world, kicking up the dust in some other lonesome hovel.

Sometimes I remember him, like now. I think of him blowing from place to place, unattached like a dust mite.

I'm really rooted to place. I haven't moved more than 12 miles from the place I grew up. So I really can't fathom having no attachments, no strings, no ties that bind the heart. That is my antithesis.

Sometimes we don't finish the cases we started. Far more often than not, we do. Course corrections, when necessary, can be a good thing.

But to say farewell to a client who can't commit, who can't follow through, whose shiftlessness rules his life, to this day remains unsettling.

Michael Manely

I Don't Get It.

2010-09-20T21:20:00.000-04:00

Last week we had the hearing to end all hearings.

Actually I'm being a bit melodramatic. It was a big hearing, potentially laying either party to waste. My opposing counsel hails from the highest paid family law firm in all Metropolitan Atlanta.

The hearing was a long time coming. There were many discussions about the case, the issues, and potentially how to settle it. Time after time I came back to the same recommendation on how to settle the case, if they wanted to settle the case.

But the opposing party, through his counsel, stonewalled. They did everything they could to put off the hearing, even at the last moment as the Court called the case. All along they offered nothing but platitudes, empty air containing nothing. Not one dollar, not one farthing, not one half penny was placed on the barrel head to put the issue to bed.

And my recommendation was quite modest. It was the most likely outcome to bridge the matter to a longer term solution. It took care of temporary issues and began to create a foundation from which the parties could work.

Still, no tangible offer ever came.

So, we had our hearing. And the opposing counsel pulled a 12th hour surprise expert accountant to support the opposing counsel's theory of the case. Of course the expert agreed with me that his analysis had to be flawed to get to opposing counsel's results and that the opposing party really didn't produce anything that the expert could use to verify the opposing party's contentions.

And in the end, the Judge ruled almost exactly like my recommendation expressed so long ago and oft repeated. The modest, logical proposal is how she decided, with a little gravy thrown on for my client.

And now, in the circles that the couple used to run, comes the report that the opposing party is claiming victory. Victory for having his extremely dirty laundry exposed to the Court? Victory for paying thousands of dollars to an expert for nothing? Victory for paying thousands more to an opposing counsel when the funds could have much better been used for the parties, not their lawyers? Victory when the opposing party offered $0.00 and I proposed less than what the Judge now requires?

I don't get it.

I like trial better than the next guy, perhaps better than most lawyers, so I had a really good time impeaching the expert and this ridiculous opposing party, but I've still got to say it was a colossal waste of time and money, given that the other side could have done what I suggested in the first place.

"I told you so," just doesn't make me feel any better.

I just don't get it.

Divorced with Benefits

2010-08-30T23:55:00.001-04:00

In the long list of the myriad of methods in which people bond into family, a particularly interesting one is where the couple is no longer married yet continues to couple.

The joke about sleeping with your ex being like eating leftovers you rejected the first time notwithstanding, some couples do genuinely find it more difficult to break the bond of sex than of marriage and remain in an intimate relationship for years after divorce.

Some couples enjoy the release from the obligations of marriage and the new found casualness of being divorced with benefits. One former client's ex husband called it "coming over for coffee."

I'm not a psychologist so I'll not delve into the extensive why issues, but all the judges I know have been around the block more than a few times and very little surprises them. To learn that a couple remained intimate for years after a divorce and only recently have had a falling out resuling in that Contempt the ex-wife had been meaning to file for some time now, would not elicit expressions of shock, dismay, disgust or dismissal from a judge.

Nor does it make a whole lot of difference to a couple's legal status.

Back when Georgia acknowledged Common Law marriages, I represented a woman who wanted a divorce from her Common Law husband. The parties agreed they had gotten a divorce from their legal marriage some years before. The husband denied that he had ever resumed a relationship with his ex that rose to the level of Common Law marriage. Of course, if he hadn't listed her as wife on all of his insurance, real estate, loan and banking forms, hadn't told the whole world that his ex was again his wife and hadn't posed for umpteen pictures with the re-established family as he brandished the brand new, diamond encrusted wedding ring, he might have had a point.

But you get my point. If you have to work that hard to change your legal relationship, you can probably do a lot and preserve your divorced status. And Georgia doesn't even acknowledge any newly created Common Law marriages anymore.

Another situation arises when the couple resumes quasi habitation so that the child, who post divorce has a primary custodian and a secondary custodian, is somewhat living with both parents again. Months if not years pass before the camel's back again becomes so burdened that some inevitable straw renders it asunder when the primary custodian suddenly recalls the vast amounts of child support which have gone unpaid. Are there any writings which express that the primary custodian accepted the secondary custodian's financial assistance as satisfaction of the child support obligation? Of course not. These people were wooing each other, not writing contracts.

So we're off to the races with a large purse in play. And some potential for legal injustice to ensue.

And that gives new meaning to Divorced with Benefits.

Michael Manely

Running for Judge.

2010-08-24T23:22:00.005-04:00

Tonight I had the opportunity to participate in the perennial, time honored tradition of being part of the host committee for one of our local Judge's re-election campaigns. It was a very well attended affair by the usual who's who of the local bar. The Judge was in rare form, meeting and greeting as the occasion requires, quite a different persona from the one assumed on the bench as he metes out justice to the hopeful litigants.

I'm afraid I've been a bit out of the formal political loop recently, what with the practice providing much needed assistance to many parties desperate for access to justice, so I was surprised to hear that the Judge had competition in this election.

This competitor is well known to the bar, as well. She is a perennial runner, almost as certain to run as an election is to be held. I suspect she has long since given up hope of winning, or at least I hope she has. Rather, she constantly runs because it is the most inexpensive method of marketing that she has ever discovered.

To some potential clients, she hopes to many, running for Judge gives them the imprimatur of success, of authority, of position. Actually, running for Judge means you could scrape a few dollars together to get your name on the ballot and a few dollars more to print up signs. But compared to the cost of bill boards, election signs are a steal, and you aren't tarnished with the impression of chasing ambulances.

I've met many a client who thought, at first, that this candidate had credentials and clout just because of her judicial attempts. Through personal contact, not with the candidate, but as the practitioner, they were soon disabused of their notions.

The problem is not so much that the sitting, qualified, decent judges have to defend their seat. Campaigning is a stressor for them that they would certainly rather not endure but it is a part of their political reality and I would sorely disapprove of a system that didn't require a judge to be accountable to the electorate. Rather, it is the terrifying notion of what would happen if this candidate won. Without purpose, without plan, without competence, without scruples, the bench in that post would first become a laughing stock followed quickly by a disaster of jurisprudence not seen since a Fulton County courtroom got a similar dose back in the 90's and the Judicial Qualifications Commission had to intervene to save the public.

But there is little way to warn the public, who sees this candidate's name time after time, running against whomever, whenever. The public doesn't know the dangers that lurk in this candidate's election. The public doesn't know the loss that would be suffered by this particular Judge's defeat.

Judge's are central to keeping the peace in our communities. Judges provide a valve to the steam of anger and resentment that is borne from perceived injustice. A good judge won't make all people happy. Never. But a good judge will leave a litigant feeling heard and knowing that they had their day in court. A judge is a perfect leveler. Get a good judge, get a fair result. Get a bad judge and there can be no peace, only another layer of suffering.

So what if the candidate wins? The judicial system will suffer, sure enough. But the public will suffer so much more.

The moral to this story is that, come election time, investigate your judges. Find out what the bar has to say about the judge. See what the community says through the press and through the internet, though every judge has at least a couple of never happy litigants to defile them. Investigate the opposition. If the judge's campaign is doing its job, there should be some negative information about the opposition. Look into it. Determine as best you can whether it is valid.

Think about your values and priorities. Every so often the business community will get outraged at a judge enforcing the law that winds up resulting in a fair verdict for an injured party. The business community finds someone of reasonable stature to run against the offending judge. But those issues are usually laid bare in the political pieces put out by each campaign. How do you feel about businesses trying to gain an advantage by putting their own judge in office?

The issues that motivates the candidates present themselves, if you look for them.

Our judges impact our lives in significant enough ways that it merits us to know as much about them as we can, so that our judgments about them are as sound as we want their judgments about us to be.

Michael Manely

The Melting Pot

2010-08-23T23:39:00.001-04:00

There are so many fascinating aspects of Family Law that I think I could write about for ages, albeit sporadically. One of the fascinating aspects is the question of what is a family.

Families come in an almost infinite range of hues, attitudes, preferences and origins. Some families appear homogenous, but as I am increasingly discovering, there is no such thing. And homogeneity is a question of the definitions you impose.

"Our family is of European origin," is both limited and broadened by that geographic reference. Not that long ago the identifications would have been much more specific. "Our family is of Irish origin." Or, "our family is of German origin." Or, "our family is of Italian origin." Now it's "European" by convenient definition and often of necessity. It's "European" because the European countries of origin have melted into a broader, more inclusive base in America.

"Our family is if African origin," is also a convenient definition. Not only does it ignore the not so subtle differences from different regions in the African continent, but also ignores the apparently not so infrequent and often unwelcome intrusion of European ancestory. "African origin" is also a convenience because it may belie the centuries that the ancestors have been in America, far longer than many descendants of European ancestory.

"Our family is of Hispanic origin," is a similarly broad definition that spans many cultures and lattitudes. Mexico is distinct from the Dominican Republic which is distinct from Guatemala and is distinct from Argentina or Chile, which says nothing yet of Brazil, which does not consider itself Hispanic with its Portugese ancestory, but is often so defined by those of us less aware of the identities. But, for the sake of convenience, and for the American experience of the melding of cultures, "Hispanic" is the bandied about term.

"Our family is if Arab origin." Again, a conveniently broad definition disguising intricately distinct populations, rendered less so by their migration to America. And this doesn't yet include persons of Persian descent. And I haven't even touched on people of Asian descent or Polynesian descent, or Native American descent, the true originalists (especially the Iroquois).

And, of course, each of these identities, some self imposed, some imposed by others, all gross in their description and ever expanding in their fuzzy edges form, only begin to contemplate the function, purpose and great success which is America.

As a boy here in Georgia, I have witnessed anti-miscegenous indoctrination carried out with ruthless, bloody cruelty. And now, as a man, I watch couples not only walk hand in hand, but marry, have children, watch their children welcomed and embraced into our larger culture, whether the children come from parents of apparently similar backgrounds, or obviously diverse backgrounds. Our ancestoral identities change day by day, merge generation by generation.

I'm not suggesting that all is a bed of roses in America. I wouldn't be writing tonight's blog if that were the case. Today's version of the anti-miscegenist is the xenophobe. While racism in all its insipid forms still flourishes in quaint corners of American culture, the current cause celebre for the divisively inclined is to narrowly interpret what and who is American.

Without equivocation, the American family looks like America. We are black. We are brown. We are tan. We are pink. We are yellow. We are Christian. We are Muslim. We are Jewish. We are Unitarian. We are Atheist. We are hedonist. We are self absorbed. We are utilitarian. We are selfish. We are generous. We are having a teenage meltdown. We are having a mid life crisis. We are bounding for childhood joy. We are espousing the wisdom of sages. We are demagogic. We are all embracing.

With the exception of the Native Americans, we are a nation of immigrants. We can't help but be. We are and always have been a nation of immigrants melting in one giant, ceaseless pot. Ever shall it be.

And we are one, big happy family, whether we like each other today or not.

We, collectively are and rightfully shall be America. And like all families, we ought to have each other's backs. For united we stand. Need I say more?

Michael Manely

It's finally over.

2010-08-12T22:56:00.001-04:00

So, how does it feel to finally be divorced?

Imagine, you've suffered through years of increasing distance in your relationship, growing enmity, resulting in downright hostility, and you eventually muster the energy, the inititative to retain an attorney, to finally seek your freedom.

I just finished a tortuous divorce trial that extended over a month. Now, I didn't try this case every day for a month, but it started a month ago and, with a bit here and a bit there, the trial concluded today. Even more importantly, this divorce was filed by a former counsel quite some time ago and had not lingered but had been actively litigated from day one.

The opposing party in this divorce practiced Machiavellian parenting. She was (is) out there. She feels the children are her property and, if she could, she would keep them under lock and key, away from her husband who had the tamarity to leave her. The opposing party's mission in life was to make my client's life as miserable as possible. In that way, her attitude in the divorce was not terribly dissimilar to her attitude in the marriage.

She used the divorce to torture my client every step of the way, and did all that she could to keep the divorce from being final. She couldn't let him go. She wouldn't let him go. She was going to keep him forever.

So we bruisingly battled through each and every possible issue that the opposing party could concoct. No matter how easily the issue could have been settled, she wouldn't hear of it. Everything needed to be tried.

Throughout the ordeal I had the distinct impression that this woman was hunting my client. I can only imagine how trapped like a caged animal he felt. My firm was the only thing standing between this possessed woman and my client's annihilation. If she had her way, my client would have been crushed under her heal in eternity.

So, despite his worst fears that it might not ever happen, today my client got his divorce.

Now he is liberated.

His long nightmare is finally over. The woman who had her clutches, nails, whatever, dug into him for so many years, no longer has that hold on him.

Tonight he is popping the champagne, just beginning to sense his independence. His full blown knowledge of freedom will take a long time to set in. But for tonight, the first taste is so, so sweet.

Happy Divorce Day, buddy.

Michael Manely

Nowhere to hide.

2010-08-10T22:50:00.000-04:00

I've been pondering whether I want to comment on the California Federal Court's decision to hold Proposition 8 unconstitutional. I guess this blog means that I decided I would.

I followed the case somewhat closely. I read synopses of the trial on many days. Unless the Judge were an activist judge who wanted to rule based upon his bias, the result was a forgone conclusion, based upon the evidence at trial.

In a nut shell, the witnesses for Prop 8 had firmly held opinions about how everyone should live, but no facts. And one sect's demands for how everyone in our nation should live will often violate the constitution.

I had the same scenario in the Evolution trial. The School Board trotted out all manner of die hard opponents to evolution. Each one more fervent than the last that students should not be taught evolution because, they claimed, it was innacurate, it was against God's law, it was a liberal conspiracy... But to a one, the witnesses had their conclusions, but no facts.

And when you are on the witness stand, being grilled in cross examination, conclusions are a thread-bare blanket which provides no cover at all.

Our trial process is a great one for discovering truth. It is still the best method humankind has ever developed. Liars and blowhards are given no quarter on the stand. Their a priori conceptions, their biases, their prejudiced judgments are laid bare in the brilliant light of cross examination.

So in the Proposition 8 trial, like the Evolution trial, conclusions devoid of facts fell flat. Truth, not bias, won the day. And the country is a better place because it is fact based, not prejudiced based.

And like the country, the family has a chance to be a better place because under the brilliant light of cross examination, where there is nowhere to hide, truth, not fiction, not prejudice, not bias, wins out. And the brilliant light of truth is always a good thing.

Michael Manely

"What do you think I owe you?"

2010-08-09T21:27:00.001-04:00

When a marriage ends at one party's request, it is often hard to perceive how the party who wants to leave has any claim to the future work of the party who gets left.

Tonight's topic: alimony.

And alimony in that particular situation, where the party seeking alimony is the one who has left yet still wants to continue a relationship with her ex spouse. She wants that kind of relationship where she has no responsibilities but he will continue to support her. It seems the height of cynicism.

"I don't want to live with you anymore. I don't want to share meals with you anymore. I don't want to have Christmas with you anymore. Oh, but I still want you to take care of me."

I don't think that position works. I don't think you can sell that position. I think there is no market for that position.

If you want out, fine. But don't expect others to keep picking up your tab. It doesn't tend to work that way.

Put yourself in the juror's shoes, a relatively randomly chosen group of 12 regular folks, folks you might pass in the grocery store. Not your grocery store, but some other grocery store somewhere in your county. You're going to tell those jurors, those strangers, that you just want the allowance without the chores. You want the cake, you just don't want to have to bake it. You want the reward without the work. I can't think of a more spoiled meme.

And the jury never buys it.

Sure, you can think of circumstances where this scenario would work: spousal abuse, habitual adultery (on the non-leaving party's part), incurable alcohol addiction. But that doesn't happen often. That is not the norm. There's a reason why that's called the exception. And it is the exception that proves the rule. The rest of the time, the leaving party just wants out, wants to move on, wants to see other people, wants to have her own life.

She's more than entitled to have her own life. She just has to fund it.

But the jury will tell her that. Lord knows her attorney won't. There's too much money to be made until the verdict.

Michael Manely

Adolf Hitler Campbell

2010-08-05T22:53:00.001-04:00

A New Jersey couple have lost custody of their three children. The parents named their children Adolf Hitler, Aryan Nation and Honszlynn Himler. The authorities became aware of the couple when they asked a supermarket to inscribe a birthday cake with best wishes for their son, named above.

In its ruling the Court of Appeals did not reference the birthday cake, but did find that the couple had significant physical and psychological problems. The Court found that both parents had been victims of childhood abuse and neither "have received adequate treatment for their serious psychological conditions."

The father, age 37, cannot read. The mother only finished the 10th grade. The Court considered a letter the mother admitted to have written. The letter stated, in part, "Hes thrend to have me killed or kill me himself hes alread tried it a few times. I'm afread that he might hurt my children if they are keeped in his care."

It seems undisputed that the birthday cake incident is how the authorities, New Jersey's version of DFCS, learned of the Campbells. That the couple would saddle their three children with Nazi names is easily beyond what reasonable parents would do. But is that the issue? If DFCS disagrees with your political persuasion, no matter how reprehensible, is that grounds for seizing your children?

I have a distant cousin named Reagan. I have friends who've named their child Barak. Are we sliding down a slippery slope when DFCS becomes a political police?

I deal with this issue in my family law practice. For example, I represented a couple who lost their five children to DFCS a year before they hired me. Their little boy had been playing doctor with an older, little girl. Another family whose son had played the same game with the girl complained to the police. DFCS spoke to my clients in developing a case against the little girl. What DFCS found was that my clients had very odd familial behaviors which I won't go into here. Long story short, when DFCS learned of the family's behaviors, they seized the children and would not let them come home.

After a year of begging, pleading and following every single DFCS instruction, the children were still being kept away from their parents, a year of the children's lives, lost forever. Then the parents hired me. I realized that the parents' peculiar conduct was entirely cultural. Though it was not behavior that middle class white folks engage in, it was my culture's perjorative interpretation that determined that the conduct was harmful to the children. There was no universal condemnation of this conduct. Under a different value system, there was nothing harmful about it.

I immediately scheduled a meeting with the case officer, the DFCS supervisor and the Cassa. I would like to believe that I showed these folks the error of their cultural blinders and they became enlightened from my impassioned narrative, but I think the fact that my clients were Native Americans and that the treaty between the U.S. Government and their tribe required that all children seized had to be immediately returned to the tribal elders for determiniation and placement and that DFCS was therefore in violation of international law, probably had a lot more to do with DFCS surrendering the children back to the parents that very afternoon.

Our cultural and political norms define much of our comfort level. I find naming a child Adolf Hitler personally repulsive. I can probably correctly guess much about the stunted upbringing that child would have in his parent's care. But taking a child is a huge step. Our nation once took children just because they were Native American and wouldn't receive a proper Christian upbringing in their tribe. I'm not so sure that telling Nazi's that they can't raise their children isn't somewhat the same thing.

Obviously the letter from the mother takes today's case in a different direction, but discovery of the letter came later. Remember, what started it all was Adolf Hitler's name on a birthday cake.

Each case is wholly dependent on its facts. Maybe these parents are really wacked out. Maybe if anyone met them you'd get cold chills and agree with the Court that these parents were in no condition to raise their children. I'm not saying the New Jersey Court of Appeals is wrong. I don't know.

I'm just saying go slow. Be careful. Respect diversity. After all, I don't think diversity fits in the Nazi playbook anyway.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/05/adolf-hitler-campbells-pa_n_672045.html

Michael Manely

Long Term Consequences

2010-07-22T23:19:00.000-04:00

I've recently worked on a matter that highlights a critical difference in different firm's philosophies.

The matter was a modification action. A modification is a post divorce action where one ex spouse claims that there has been a "material change in circumstances," so much so that whatever was ordered in the divorce, should now be changed. A modification action is most often either a modification of child custody or a modification of child support.

This case was a modification of child support. The opposing party contended that the parties' incomes had materially changed so that he should now pay less child support.

As I worked through the basis of the opposing party's argument and evidence his case seemed piddly. He had nothing much to argue about with very little reason to bring an action and very little likelihood of success.

As I worked with the client, learned the history of the parties and got down to the core issues, I figured out the motivation of the suit, and it wasn't financial.

In her divorce, my client had hired a rather infamous attorney who practice what I call scorched earth litigation. No one survived his wrath in the courtroom. His litigation style felt like the Harry Potter characters describe the dementors. My client hired this fellow because she thought her soon to be ex was difficult and stubborn and needed an aggressive attorney to bring her divorce to a successful conclusion. What she wanted was a firm hand. What she got, apparently, was armegedon.

As my client expressed, you never knew what this attorney would say in the courtoom, but she quickly learned it wasn't going to be good. She found herself cringing for her in laws and husband's friends as they endured this counsel's harsh, cruel onslaught.

As she reports, her husband, now her ex, received a much worse result if he'd just been reasonable. I submit, so did she. For ever since the divorce, the ex has been constantly cantankerous, mean, vengeful, spiteful, and sometimes even wicked in his treatment of his ex wife, my client.

As I came to realize, the opposing party still felt brutalized by the divorce, by the scorched earth counsel. The opposing party was vengeful allright. He wanted my client's metaphoric blood and his thirst for vengeance seemed to grow stronger with each passing year.

This ex, this opposing party, was still battling through the beating he'd received in the courtroom. This man had become a bit of a monster, where as before the divorce he was just stupidly difficult.

Scorched earth can be a succesful strategy for attorneys. We look tough; we act tough; we beat up the opposition and then we walk away. At the end of the case whether its divorce, modifcation or contempt, we just walk away. But it's our clients who live with the aftermath. They can't walk away. They can't escape the harm we've caused. Good strategy for the attorney, bad strategy for the client.

Aggressive representation sounds serious; it sounds firm; it sounds like it commands respect. But I've found that far more often than not, aggressive representation yields negative consequences for the client for years to come. Parents, already torn assunder by the nature of divorce itself, become bitter enemies, ever more distrustful, never fully enjoying the moments with their children without looking over their shoulder with cynical eyes. With the additional pain inflicted by scorched earth, or aggressive representation, the pain endures and grows. The healing takes much, much longer, if it can ever occur at all.

Aggressive representation is unnecessary and counter productive. If your position is true, if your cause is just, the truth will out. Nastyness only clouds your merits.

In the matter I'm writing about, as his ex's new counsel, I worked toward getting the opposing party past that divorce trial and into the 21st Century. While he was successful at harassing his ex a little longer just by filing his modification action, he wasn't successful at lowering his child support. But, just as importantly, I helped moved this couple along a little bit further toward re-forming their relationship as good parents to their children.

Objectively and subjectively that's the right a result. Those are long term consequences that parents can live with. Those are long term consequences I can espouse.

Michael Manely

The Dog Days of Summer

2010-07-21T22:01:00.000-04:00

We are mere weeks away from the beginning of school and, thereby, the end of summer. But as I sit here tonight in the sweltering summer weather, here in the hottest summer ever in recorded history, school, and with it the promise of autumn and cooler temperatures, seem forever away.

Families will soon enough return to the fast paced life of packing the kids off to school, making PTSA meetings and Parent/Teacher meetings and class events. Soon enough parents will be back to reviewing home work and wondering how projects get lost before they get turned in. Soon enough children will be back to early bed times (initially before dark) and extremely early rise times (maybe initially still after dawn?) Soon enough we will make sure the uniform is washed or just the right outfit is ready to go for the next day.

But right now families are wrapping up their summer, taking their last vacations, winding down the week long camps for the children. Within mere days we will be "back to school" shopping, meeting teachers, and standing astonished as our young ones go out that door again into a new grade, another year behind them and another year closer to being gone from our loving grasp.

But now, it's hot and it's steamy and it's lazy. And it's summer. And it's great.

Michael Manely

"Spacebook"

2010-07-20T16:16:00.000-04:00

Tonight's installment comes courtesy of our own Elizabeth Marum.
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

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I am amazed at the wonder that is online social networking. Between the constant updates and reminders of friends near and far, new and old, it makes you feel connected and “caught up” with everyone. Until one day a nostalgic run through an old online photo album reminds you that you really aren’t “caught up” with your best friend from college but have been comforted into feeling in touch by regular “status” updates. In fact, you haven’t talked to her in two years!

Whether you are a Myspace, Facebook, Hi5, Twitter or whatever networker, there are inherent dangers to the use of these networks that aren’t advertised in the marketing materials. I think you know what I mean.

These dangers are becoming particularly apparent in the divorce cases we work in our offices. The obsession with digging into our partners, spouses, girlfriends, boyfriends and family member’s “secret” dealings are no longer limited to just searching phones, texts and emails, but our desire to find more now has a bounty of information and wasted time in the online social networks. The casual “friending” atmosphere has lead us to a world where we easily “friend” unknowns, barely knowns, friends of friends of friends of friends, or worse... the dreaded exes.

Ex-wifes, ex-husbands, ex-girlfriends, ex-girlfriends, ex-lovers or even, the ex-best friend (of whom your spouse has always had his/her suspicions!).

Why we think that we can somehow “friend” the exes who tore at our souls and left empty shells recovering for weeks, months or years is a phenomenon of the online world. While it is sometimes the case that exes become friends and actually speak or see each other in their new (real) worlds, it is even more frequent and much easier for us to “friend” our exes in the safe online arena where we don’t have to see them in real life. I argue that this comes with risk. Risk of getting “caught”.

By caught, I don’t just mean our current love interest, but “caught” by our own potential to obsess, frequently follow updates and even, yes, cyber stalk their pages for evidence of their lives outside the internet. Even in the most innocent of circumstances, if someone you love sees that you are “now friends with” your ex, there is bound to be fall out. Chances are, without the Spacebook medium we wouldn’t even know what we were missing, probably wouldn’t think about it and wouldn’t care that we didn’t think about it much at all.

We’ve all heard the warnings about the dangers of the internet social world and the downfall of good old telephone, or (shocker!) in-person, communication. We should probably all delete our online social networking sites or cutdown our “friends” list to people that you actually know and communicate with off the internet. There are plenty of “how to’s” on deleting your Facebook, Myspace, etc. out there.

But you probably won’t.

So if you are keeping your social networking account, here are a few pointers:

• If going through a divorce, separation or otherwise, don’t verbally attach, debase, or slander your spouse.
• Do keep your personal information personal. Surely, all 587 of your friends don’t NEED to know how much of a harpy your soon-to-be-ex-wife is.
• Don’t advertise that you are not at home or out of town (not just thieves are looking for you, but your estranged spouse may want revenge).
• Realize that everyone knows who and when you friend someone or when you comment, so you may want to be open and honest with your new wife about your recent “friending” of your ex-wife (with whom you do not speak).
• Do not admit that you participated in an otherwise unmentionable activity with your husband’s best friend in an angry wall post.

Because there is probably someone stalking your page and they WILL capture that screen, save and print the evidence before handing it to their divorce attorney.

Elizabeth Marum

Behavior Modification

2010-07-19T22:08:00.003-04:00

Dear Reader,

The judges don't dislike you. They don't want to punish you. They don't want to make you cry. They just want to change your behavior.

I don't know if I'll ever cease to be amazed by mere mortals' efforts to win the battle against a judge on the bench. The battle takes many forms. Some folks are down right antagonistic. They'll attempt to argue with the judge. "You can't do that to me," or some similar phrase will be cast out miliseconds before the judge asserts unrivaled control over the courtroom and, more importantly, over the miscreant who issued the ill conceived challenge. And you thought the fourth of July had fireworks.

A craftier sort is the gamesman. He thinks he's smooth. (I write "he" but this is equally applicable to "she.") He pretends he didn't understand what the judge told him to do, or his answer is far from unequivocal. He is certain he is smarter than all of us and certainly smarter than the judge. Of course, one could ask, "if he's so smart, why is he the one in jail on contempt?"

The gamesman often thinks he's cute. He likes to mince words. He feigns confusion over the clearest of orders. He's not oppositional, just obstinate. His antics meet with no more success than the antagonist.

A judge might get riled by the antagonist, but seldom is really riled at the gamesman, though you wouldn't know it from observation alone. In either event, the judge's chief and often sole aim is to modify behavior. The judge wants compliance with her order. She wants people to do what she told them to do. Any resistence is futile.

This is not to say that there are no legal remedies to right an error. But fighting with the judge or believing you can outwit her are not two successful strategies. They are strategies for a quick one way ticket to an 8 x 12 gray room with two bunks and a guy named Tiny who is anything but.

So, if your attorney advises you to pay the $2.00 and go home, pay the $2.00 and go home. Home is far more comfortable than the alternative. Unless, of course, you need a new best friend named Tiny.

Michael Manely

The folks I work with.

2010-07-14T20:57:00.000-04:00

I wanted to write tonight about the people in my firm.

The people I get to work with are excellent people. Everyday they labor for hours over our clients' trials and tribulations, sorting through the volumes of information, sifting down to the information we need to make strong cases, to accomplish justice.

The people I get to work with are compassionate. They care deeply about our clients. We rise and fall with our clients. We are invested in their successes. We are there to work through the trials and tribulations. We are a part of the community cheering their childrens' triumphs.

The people I get to work with are pros. They know their stuff. They can dig in, toe to toe with anybody, and ferret out the right information leading to the right result. They are legal eagles, par excellence.

So, tonight I wanted to send a shout out to Stephanie, Jeremy, Elizabeth, Nora, Alyssa, Robyn, Gale, Loven, Jessica, Bill and last, but definitely not least, Lucy. I wanted to take a moment in time to acknowledge their hard work, their compassion, their commitment to our clients.

And my thanks would be far from complete without expressing the greatest of appreciation for my wife, our business manager and future managing partner (once she finishes law school at Georgia State) Shelia, without whom, I think none of this would be possible.

Thank you all. It is one of life's greatest privileges to work with such an excellent group of talented people.

Michael Manely

In the cross hairs.

2010-07-13T22:29:00.002-04:00

It's one of the things that I love about this practice.

Recently, at a big, drawn out trial, I had battled my opposing counsel to the point where the judge told counsel that she did not have a case, that she had tried the case so poorly that she had presented nothing for the judge to rule on.

This is a significant difference between types of family law counsel. Some are pretty good at family law substantive issues but can't try their way out of box. Others of us realize that if you're going to be in court three to five times a week, you better be damned good at it.

So here was opposing counsel without a case, no way of winning, totally lost, destroyed, on the ropes with her client's life flashing before her eyes.

And that's when the magic happened. Up until that point opposing counsel and the opposing party had absolutely refused any meaningful discussion of settlement. But, now that they were in the cross hairs, my client proposed a perfectly fair settlement. With the judge's excellent help, the opposition finally realized they were in no position to refuse it.

And there, half way into the trial, the case settled, even when the opposing party would have been like a lamb to the slaughter.

I was proud of my client. He realized that being parents, being family, even post divorce, trumps victory.

We had them in the cross hairs, but he didn't pull the trigger. He lowered and holstered his arms.

Michael Manely

Child Appropriate Killing

2010-07-12T23:07:00.003-04:00

The other night, I was asking my 21 year old about whether he would recommend "Iron Man" for family viewing. Our family includes our seven year old. "Sure," he replied, "I mean, its got some violence but only child appropriate killing."

That phrase immediately struck me. What does that mean? It means what it says, "Child Appropriate Killing."

We didn't rent that movie.

A few days later, our seven year old was watching a movie we purchased for him some months before. He'd seen it several times. I stopped to watch a few minutes as I passed through the den. It was "Spy Next Door" with Jackie Chan. In the scenes I saw, some bad guy had Chan and some children tied up. He was pointing a gun at Chan's head threatening to kill them all. Chan got loose and beat up the bad guys. Just a few scenes later, another bad guy had a gun pointed a Chan's head telling him that the bad guy will do Chan a favor; the bad guy will kill Chan first so that Chan doesn't have to watch the bad guy killing the kids.

This is supposed to be a kids' movie. It was marketed as a kids' movie. And our kids are supposed to process bad guys killing them? Is that child appropriate killing?

Some folks will certainly argue that I'm getting all worked up over some harmless violence. (Now there's an oxymoron if every I heard one.) That a little dramatic killing or threats of killing doesn't harm anyone.

There's enough bad stuff in real life that I have no idea why we want to fantasize about more bad stuff. Is this thanatos at work? Is this our collective death wish? Certainly, all our exposure to fantasy violence over the years has not made the crime rate get any better. Maybe we ought to explore our seemingly constant flirtation with the dark side and give it a long rest, starting with the children.

I'm not asserting "the innocence of child hood." I'm not saying that the children have to be protected from bad things. As parents, we do our level best to protect our children from bad things happening to them. But I am not an advocate of sugar coating the world for the kiddies. The Gulf Oil Spill? Bad. War? Bad. Murder? Bad. Not nonexistent, but existent and bad. And kids have a need and a right to know about that.

I'm not even an advocate of sparing the children of the news of divorce and the particulars as it relates to them. Many children grow up under far worse conditions. And the divorce should actually make life better, no more fighting, or just about as brutal, deathly silence in the home.

I'm a straight out advocate for sharing reality.

But this fantasy we have, this license we allow to expose ourselves and our children to to mock violence borders on the pornographic. Our culture is saturated in fantasy violence and plenty to go around for the children, safely rated in the PG variety. For me, I cannot fathom anything that would constitute child appropriate killing.

Now, enough of tonight's rant. Me and the family have to get back to watching "Avatar."

Michael Manely

Kids

2010-07-01T23:18:00.002-04:00

I am painfully aware that I have taken an unacceptably long hiatus from this blog. As you can tell, in part from the last post, the events of the month and our trial schedule has kept me occupied and away from this nightly duty.

_____________

I once handled a matter that involved a teenage girl who was the bane of her parents' existence.

Of course, many of my cases involve kids. Usually the questions are who gets the kids, who spends time with the kids, who makes important decisions about the kids? Often enough the children are involved on some level. The kids almost always know about custody questions and, particularly if they are of age, often want to have a say. The gal I'm writing about tonight wanted to run the whole show. She caused great trouble in her parents' divorce and she was quite aware of it.

Somehow, somewhere, the parents had put her in charge. Everything had to be cleared by her. What she didn't like, didn't happen. "How would this be for you, dear?" "Mommy, I don't like it!" "Okay, then, we won't do it." You can imagine.

So here her parents were divorcing, I presume with her blessing, but she insisted on running that show, too. And, in little girl fashion, her interference was not marginal, not subtle, but had to be center stage, occupying all energies and manifesting huge crises.

It was a nightmare.

As time wore on, one parent began to get it, began to try to reign the child in. The other parent continued to carry out the child's bidding. Do you want to guess which parent that child wanted to live with? When a teenager is given a choice between rules and absolute freedom to do what she wants, it is the rare teenager who knows that rules are in her best interest.

But the law gives that teenager a choice. And judge's are somewhat loathe to deny a teenager's wishes, particularly as they get older.

So the parent who enforces boundaries loses and of course the child loses. And the parent who is laissez-faire prevails.

And yes, sometimes the legal outcome makes no sense.

I think maybe the judges think the child is so far along and too far gone, that telling the child "no" on that particular judgment day, has very little lasting value. Insofar as the judge, a stranger, can step in and change family dynamics with a solitary judgment is concerned, it would be an exercise in pure hubris for that the judge to believe he would really make a difference.

And so the child is lost, at least temporarily, until the day she is tested, weighed, measured and hopefully on that fateful day, not found wanting.

We never really know. Only time will tell.

I can only hope that time will be kind.

Michael Manely

Representing the Mistreat-ee!

2010-06-09T22:10:00.000-04:00

Tonight's blog entry comes to you from the "pen" of Jeremy Abernathy.
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

___________________________________________________

Needless to say, in family law, there are very few times where both parties agree to the same version of facts. There exists “his side,” her side, and, somewhere in there, the truth. Occasionally, however, we see facts where there is no denying that one party has terribly treated the other party. Representing the “mistreatee” presents unique dynamics.

Representing the mistreatee requires the lawyer to not overdo it. It is providential to argue less, and simply let the facts do their own talking. They reveal the monster for who he or she is.

If the mistreater has frustrated visitation rights, prop your feet up and enjoy the spectacle of opposing party trying to explain him or herself. If the mistreater has not followed a court order, stand back and let the Court “take the wheel” in enforcing its order.

Opposing counsels can take the wheel too. Opposing counsels are effective when they communicate to their clients why certain facts are ugly and unfavorable. This facilitates favorable settlement agreements for the mistreatee.

Does this mean that as lawyer for the mistreatee that you can shift gears into “easy mode.” Absolutely not.
It means you must prepare, and organize your case so it is readily apparent, with little embelishment by you, to Opposing Counsel and the Judge, that the mistreatee has been....mistreated.

As has oft been said, "The truth will out!"

Jeremy Abernathy

Saying Goodbye

2010-06-08T23:22:00.001-04:00

I've been putting off writing this post for a week now. I've been avoiding it because the topic is too painful to fully comprehend. It is not on a family law topic, but it so deeply affects our family, our whole, Earth bound family.

A week ago tonight, my family and I were wrapping up our stay in San Destin. We spent the week there as I attended the Family Law Bar's annual seminar on family law topics. It's kind of a who's who of family law in Georgia.

So, Tuesday night, we took our last walk on the beach before we left for home the next morning. We watched couples walking hand in hand. We watched families chase crabs on land and in sea, often catching them only to scream as the crabs did their crabby best. We must have walked a mile east along the shore before we turned around and headed back.

And all the time, I tried to be mindful of what I was experiencing, the sound of the waves crashing endlessly on shore. The smell of the salty sea air. The feel of the sugar white sand beneath my bare feet and squishing between my toes, the water as it rushed to shore, sweeping over my feet and ankles. I tried to be mindful and to bore the experience deep into my memory. For I knew that far more likely than not, this was the last time in perhaps my lifetime, I would walk along these shores in this manner.

Though these were the shores of my childhood, they were within hours of being obliterated, ruined by the greed of big business, corruptness of government bought and sold, and our own pathetic expediency.

I felt very much like the Native American on that old Public Service Announcement. As he watched the pollution roll on shore, a tear trickles down his cheek. The pain in my heart felt immeasurable.

And so, as we reached the place in the sand where we headed back to the condo, I turned and faced the great ocean one last time and said goodbye.

Volume

2010-05-18T22:47:00.001-04:00

I was consulting with a fellow today. Of course, we were talking about his case, the strategy we would employ and the strategy that he could expect from his opposing counsel. I told this fellow that we could probably settle this case tomorrow for very close to how it will settle in three to six months time, except for the opposing counsel, who won't let the case go that quietly, quickly or economically.

It is all about volume.

My firm handles around 200 cases each year. In family law that's really big. Some firms are not so fortunate. They handle maybe 30 - 40 cases a year. This means that they have to make more money off of each case just to keep their lights on, not to mention pay for their mortgages, cars and vacations.

Family law is complex and full of subtleties, but it needn't be expensive. As I have often written, cases could be settled quickly, accurately and affordably almost all of the time. But there is more at play than just the facts of the case. The opposing party might need time to adjust. The children might need time to settle in. Or opposing counsel might need to churn the file just to stay afloat.

Please keep in mind that I am not writing about most family law lawyers. As I have often written, most family law lawyers are not just good people, they are great people. They are honest, compassionate, scrupulous and abundantly fair. But, as I have also writtten, a minority of my peers are not so scrupulous, do not have the family in mind or at heart, and even work against their client's long term interests for the sake of short term gain.

An attorney who handles few cases might decry my firm's volume. They might say that they can dive deeply into a case, understand it forwards and backwards and give the case the case more attention that my firm can because we handle so many cases. First of all, who is paying for that deep diving? And our track record supports that we understand our cases backwards and forwards and provide just the right amount of affordable attention.

If you've studied my firm, you know that our talent runs deep. Not only am I available to work on cases but so is my Senior Associate, my other Associates and my paralegals. They are all supported by our excellent staff who keep our machine well oiled and running smoothly. We do family law the way I think it should be done: affordably, honestly, ethically, accurately.

I guess the bottom line is that some firms don't have enough business to keep themselves affordable. And that's a pity for everyone involved.

Michael Manely

Welcome home, girls.

2010-05-17T22:46:00.002-04:00

As you may have noticed, we handle many international cases and many of those cases are custody cases invoking the Hague Convention.

The Hague Convention I'm referring to pertains to international jurisdiction over children in custody disputes. It most often is used when a spouse flees with the children to another country. Nation states that are signatories to the Hague have treaty obligations to each other to accept pre-determined standards to confer jurisdiction.

My firm has a wonderful track record on Hague cases. We have excellent working relationships with other attorneys across the globe and probably more international family law experience than any other Atlanta firm.

The case I'm writing about tonight just had a major development today.

We represent the father, who is American born but his parents are originally from Greece. The mother is from Cyprus. The parties take an annual vacation to Cyprus to visit the mother's parents and siblings. In the summer of 2008, the parties had their second daughter. Their oldest daughter was then four. In September, as in year's past, the parties flew to Cyprus.

When it came time to return, the mother said that neither she nor the girls were coming home. The mother stated that it had nothing to do with the father, she just hated Georgia in general and Cherokee County in particular. The father tried to run with the girls a few days later, but was physically stopped by the mother's brothers at the airport.

When the father returned home, he hired us. We filed a divorce and Hague action in Cherokee County before the Honorable Jackson Harris. The mother went to ground in Cyprus and hid out for months. We pursued the Hague action internationally, getting the State Department on board and then getting the action moving in Cyprus. The mother was finally found and served in Cyprus about a year after she had fled.

Cyprus held its trial over the course of a month in March and April of this year. Our office was fortunate enough to be a part of the Cyprus trial team each day as the strategy was developed and the questions were prepared.

On May 4, Cyprus gave us her ruling. The mother must return with the children to Woodstock, Georgia, by Friday, May 7.

On May 7, the children arrived at Hartsfield and the father met the plane. The mother was still acting as though she could control the courts so she quickly hurried the children off. We soon got beyond that barrier and, after an afternoon long visitation yesterday, the father got to take the girls home today.

Fortunately for me, the father was kind enough to stop by my office so that the staff and I could see the girls and weep for joy at their safe return. Seeing those girls beem at their daddy was one of the most satisfying moments I have had in my career. And I'm here to tell you I've had many satisfying moments in my career.

There are still some battles to be fought in this matter, all safely here at home. But for now, all is right with the world.

Welcome home, girls.

Michael Manely

Paperwork

2010-05-12T22:28:00.000-04:00

The life of a family trial lawyer is not all glitz and glam, high stakes drama in the courtroom and high impact negotiations over latte's. Sometimes we family trial lawyers have to do paperwork.

And I'm not talking about brief writing paperwork. That can be gruelling and thrilling all at the same time. Making a written Motion, preparing a brief, researching the law can captivate your mind like little else. Your thoughts can narrowly focus as you craft your argument. The turn of a phrase, the exact case to make your decisive point can be exhillarating and keep you on the tip of your toes and edge of your seat. Your brief can feel like a work of fine art, to be appreciated by the known world, much like that kid in Christmas Story imagines his Red Rider theme will be appreciated by his teacher.

No, I'm not talking about anything so laudable. I'm talking about paperwork like catching up on reviewing discovery responses and writing letters in response to other letters and pouring over contracts for vendor services. All the stuff that you could appreciate as a needed respite in a quiet office, but after the fast pace of trial life, seems more like watching paint dry.

And that was my job today.

It's necessary work. The pillars of litigation must be placed before the contest of court begins. And it's productive work. As you know from reading this blog, more often than not cases do not go to trial, they get settled. I had one opposing counsel call me today to thank me for the very professional tone of my letter and trusted that it would prove a turning point in working toward a resolution for a divorcing family. Of course, she then asked for a continuance from the rapidly approaching trial.

The time spent in the office while working on such paperwork helps me reacquaint with the staff and touch all the matters that are not so close to resolution as to require my hours before a Judge. This time spent in the office allows me to remember how much I enjoy Amy's coffee and the camraderie of the paralegals and support staff. It allows me to admire the way the paralegals manage all of the matters, the clients with their day to day needs and opposing counsels who cannot gain my immediate attention because I'm off arguing something in court.

So, the paperwork can be drudgery, but it can also be a breather. A breather with a lot of coffee thrown in for good measure.

And tomorrow? High stakes mediation.

Michael Manely

Canton of Cherokee County

2010-05-11T22:59:00.001-04:00

I think I have lived in Cherokee County, particularly in Canton, more particularly in the Superior Court, for the better part of the past two weeks.

I like our quaint office there. It is a quiet space, just off the atrium in the Babcock building. No bustle, little noise, just perfect for diving in to complex issues as you do the final prep for your trial.

And I've "discovered" the R&M Sandwich Shop located cattycornered to the Courthouse entrance across the Square. I've discovered it, even though it has been there for something like 30 years or so. I truly enjoy the Prosciutto and Egg sandwich. What a treat.

Canton has a book store with a fair collection and a pharmacy with many things you could and probably would want in a pinch. They supplied me with safety pins when I was most unexpectedly in need. It even has a shoe repair shop. In short, this town has much of what every town ought to have in its center. It has stuff that residents need. It is a functioning downtown.

And, once you get there, it is very walkable.

But back to Court, which, as I say, is where I live.

The past two weeks I've been in front of all three Superior Court Judges and received quite favorable rulings from each. As you often read here, I make my living by accurately predicting what a judge is likely to do, not from any power of prognostication, but from many, many, many years of working through these issues with most of these same judges. Still, it is a treat to present a case and have the vindication of a ruling. As Judge recently said to an opposing counsel, "Well what objection do you have to Mr. Manely's solution. It seems very reasonable."

The thing about Cherokee County Superior Court is, when you come to Court, you better pack breakfast, lunch and dinner. Oh, yeah, for lunch you can scoot over to R&M Sandwich Shop for a Prosciutto and Egg sandwich.

The Court calendar call starts around 9:00. Everyone has to be there then, and the Judge's could quite possibly keep you all day. Twice last week I concluded my case in the evening. Today I was blissfully done by lunch time, just in time to stop in a R&M Sandwich Shop for a Prosciutto and Egg sandwich. Yum.

But seriously folks, once you get a ruling from one of the Judges, I predict that with the right advice and competent representation you'll be pleased, but getting to that point can be an endurance test.

Michael Manely

(Mr. Manely was not paid or otherwise enriched by his ringing endorsement of the Prosciutto and Egg sandwich at R&M Sandwich Shop, except by his sheer pleasure of enjoying the sandwich itself)

Continuing Legal Education - in oil.

2010-05-05T23:46:00.001-04:00

The who's who of Family Law attorneys shall again convene on the sunny shores of Florida's beaches over Memorial Day weekend. We will deepen our relationships, strengthen our bonds, perhaps get past old transgressions and even further our knowledge of family law and improve our professional skills.

We gather every year in Florida. On even years we gather in San Destin. In addition to our work, we family lawyers and our familes do what people in San Destin do in late May: we soak up the rays, play on the sugar white sand and bathe in the soothing waters of the Gulf of Mexico.

But from what I'm reading, this year may be quite different.

BP has blown an oil rig sitting some 40 miles off the Louisianna coast. The deep water well is gushing five thousand barrels a day. BP admits that the spill could increase to 60,000 barrels a day. Oil is expected along Pensacola beaches within five days of this post. It is expected all along Florida's gulf coast all the way down to the Keys within 15 days. As of today, this spill is only one million gallons less than the Exxon Valdez spill, and it probably has weeks to go before it is shut down. From many sources I've read, this is likely the worst man made environmental catastrophe to date.

Some say we've killed the Gulf of Mexico for decades to come.

Today, I've watched a few videos of Prince William Sound, the place where the Exxon Valdez ran aground some 21 years ago. If you turn over a rock or dig down two inches, the oil is still there. Reporters talked about the smell that permeates the ground.

As I think about my family walking along the beaches we have known since my childhood, I find it impossible to wrap my mind around the possibilty that all that may be gone.

And for what? For greed. BP's greed, to be sure, fighting to avoid a law requiring a remote switch to cut off the well head. The switch apparently costs $500,000.00. But now BP says they are spending $6,000,000.00 a day in clean up and repair efforts. I'll bet that half million dollars looks like a bargain now.

But not just BP's greed. Our greed. We demand the oil. We want more for less. And just like there's no free lunch, you can't get more for less. Our grandparents tried to teach us that.

So, like druggies, we've sacrificed our future for a quick fix.

I pray the oil won't reach the beaches. I pray they'll find a way to cap the well fast. I'm emotionally in denial about the predicted and reported probabilities from this disaster. I just want it all to go away, so we can do what we have always done and not worry about any consequences. But apparently, that isn't going to happen.

At some point, don't we have to grow up?

Michael Manely

If you would only listen to me.

2010-05-04T23:07:00.002-04:00

Tonight I write to my opposing counsels.

I always play straight with ya'll. No line, no going off the deep end (okay, that time singing on the table during mediation was a bit out there but it made my point), no hostilities, no being so entrenched that I can never hear your position. I'm not going to tell you that my client walks on water. I haven't been that way and I'm not going to be that way.

So when I tell you what I think is the right answer, listen to me.

I know this is not your first rodeo either, but without histrionics and without error I can call it down the line almost every single time. If I were a sailor, I could tack to any wind. If I played pool, I could bank any shot. If I played ball like my eldest, I could drop a ball through the second base hole for a hit any day. So, Opposing Counsel, don't doubt it, don't fear it, use it.

And don't stretch it out. The other day, an Opposing Counsel told me that she couldn't settle on an issue because she couldn't show any concession to her client. She couldn't show any concession to her client? She was playing this drama for her own moxie? Oh good Lord. If the opposing counsel's image needs to be protected from the opposing party, just how good do you think it's going to go down when the judge cites chapter and verse of how I said the case was going to resolve? Just how good will Opposing Counsel's image be then? "I couldn't settle for you and keep you out of court because I would look weak. So I sent you into Court with all the stress and anguish, so that you could hear the judgment from the Judge exactly as Mr. Manely predicted. Now don't I look cute?"

No, you look nuts.

And I don't have any "in" with the Judge. I know them. It's my job. But there is no special deal here. There is just 21 years of working this street day in and day out and developing an extremely deep feel for how it's going to go down. I just know justice. I can predict it. There's a right answer, and that's the answer I'm going to go for every time. Straight. Period.

I won't take advantage of your client. As my client said today, that's not kosher. I'll tell you how it all plays out with all my case's bumps and bruises, warts and all, and I'll even sing your client's song when it is warranted. So, stop the falderal and cut to the chase. Make the deal. Sign the docs and tell your client they had a good day, because they have. Because, if I'm involved, there's enough justice to go around. And nobody deserves anything more than justice.

But everybody deserves justice.

Just listen to me and settle. That's all I'm asking. Cause I'll tell you, while I really enjoy basking in the warm glow of the Judge ruling exactly the way I predicted, I far more enjoy getting justice done by settlement. It is better for everyone, particularly the parties.

And its the parties that matter.

So, can we talk?

Michael Manely

Denying the obvious

2010-04-28T22:23:00.001-04:00

What makes some people so stupid as to deny the obvious?

I swear to God this happens. A guy will take the stand and swear to me he has never visited a strip club, while he knows that I am holding a stack of bank records showing his weekly visits to the Pink Pony to the tune of around $250.00 per libidinous visit.

Or a woman will testify that she and that fellow her husband is so worked up about are just good friends, despite their cell phone records showing daily calls in ridiculous quantities totalling hours upon hours well into the night. Add to that their texting records with, "this afternoon was great; I think we could do it all night long, " and, "I hunger until we are together again." Calculate next the charge receipt from a couple of months ago at Victoria's Secret for that lace teddy that the husband has never seen. "We're just good friends." And she says it with such a sweet face, too.

And its not confined to witnesses. I recently I had an opposing counsel tell the Judge that my client was a danger to his children therefore a Guardian ad Litem needed to be appointed to protect the children even though counsel knew I had his client's deposition in which she swore that she had no concerns about my client around his children whatsoever. For Opposing Counsel it made for a great story. For the Judge it made for a great lie. The judge was not amused.

So what makes people so stupid as to deny the obvious, when the refutation of their balderdash is staring them right in the face?

Why is committment to the truth such a rare commodity rather than a nearly universal trait? It is as though some folks are so wedded to their position that they've never attached a value to truth. Truth to them must be relative; it is what they say it is, not what any document or fact would demonstrate. Truth is within their mind and may it never be disturbed.

Suppose you asked someone for the sum of 2 + 3. And suppose they gave you the answer of 6. Now suppose that this person could never be moved from their position that 2 + 3 = 6. No amount of demonstration, investigation or education could sway them from their position. What would you think about that person? What would you say about that person? Are they stupid? Are they denying the obvious? Or both?

It sounds as though I'm oversimplifying but this blatant denial of the obvious happens all the time and perhaps is even increasing. As I said, it happened quite recently.

You wouldn't think people would need to shift their paradigms to value truth nor obtain some education on how to determine truth, but it would seem some basic course might be in order for all these compassless souls. Some basic logic: if A equals B and B equals C, then A equals C. Go figure.

But after almost 21 years of trying family law cases and even longer of watching the politics of human interaction I realize that some folks will deny the obvious until the end of time.

By the way, did you hear? It rained in the Arctic this weekend.
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE63Q47820100427

Michael Manely

Parents are people, too

2010-04-26T23:10:00.001-04:00

Perhaps you've heard the story of Abbie Dorn, mother of triplets born to her in 2006. Abbie and her husband Daniel wanted children and were tickled to learn that they were expecting. Oh, man were they expecting. All was going swimmingly in their lives.

Then it was time for delivery and something went terribly, terribly wrong. A medical mistake during delivery left Abbie severely mentally incapacitated.   One year after the triplets were born, Daniel sought a divorce.

Abbie has been cared for by her parents in South Carolina while Daniel raises the triplets in Los Angeles. Daniel has denied all visitation between Abbie and the children contending that he wants to be the one parent for the children and will consider telling the children what happened to their mother when the children get older and are able to understand. Some years in the future, he might even let the children visit if he receives medical evidence that Abbie can communicate with her children. Abbie's parents contend that she can communicate, albeit quite sparingly.

The children turn four in June. Daniel thinks the children can handle their mother's situation better when they are older, apparently when they can grasp their mother's medical condition and its limited and perhaps non-existent prognosis for improvement. But I disagree. I vehemently disagree.

The key to assessing this matter is Daniel's "one parent" line. Granted, this phrase was spoken by Daniel's attorney, but attorneys do not get too far afield of their client's expressions and further, the attorney's assertion is whollly supported by Daniel's actions. He wants to be the "one parent."

But children have two parents. Daniel's frail ego cannot change reality. These three children have a mother whether she is exemplary or impaired. The children have a right to see her, have a right to develop a relationship with her. Daniel's actions are an infringement of that right.

The relationship will undoubtedly be incredibly different from the relationship most children develop with their mothers, but these children are entitled to the relationship they will develop with their mother, whether she can sing an aria or whether she is in a nearly vegetative state.

And Daniel's argument about waiting until they are older is disengenuous at best. If the children had seen their mother from the beginning, they would have grown up with a mother in that condition. It would have been a part of life, their natural order of things.  With each passing month that the children are denied access to their mother, the children's increasing cognizance cannot help but create drama. Daniel is creating the children's trauma. Perhaps his next step will be to claim it is too late, "now they will be traumatized."

Daniel operates from the paradigm that he owns the children. Unfortunately, I see this often.

For Daniel, the children are his and only his.  He will determine all facets of their lives right down to whether they ever get to so much as gaze upon their mother's face.

In my cases in which parental ownership is an issue, while I don't often address circumstances with brain injured parents, I do work with many mentally and emotionally impaired parents. But even when there is no medical or psychological component, even when there is no claim of such an issue, the parent who claims ownership operates the same way. "I am the one parent."

The owner parent acts unilaterally, denigrates the other parent, often does not include the other parent in activities, perhaps even refuses to provide the other parent with notice of school events. By the time I see them, there may have been so much history that the non-owning parent needs an opportunity to readjust his paradigms and prepare to re-enter the relationship on much healthier terms.   I feel for these parents. They have been excluded from their children's lives.

And the children need these parents included. The children seem to feel a real void without the presence of that missing parent, even if the void is just psychological from a physically present but emotionally neutered parent. I am writing in male terms, but this condition sometimes also occurs with women, when the men gain primary custody.

And this situation is atrocious.

So you can guess how I feel about the plight of the Dorn children, and how I feel about their father's arrogant attitude.

For a child to be wholly separated from one of their parents there better be an exceptionally good reason. And that reason better not be because dad is Hispanic, or dad doesn't earn enough money, or mom has bi-polar disorder or because mom became brain damaged during delivery. That is a new definition for "sucks".

Michael Manely

http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/04/22/california.triplets.visitation.lawsuits/index.html?hpt=C2

Play it again, Sam.

2010-04-22T21:47:00.002-04:00

Tonight's entry is written by Jeremy Abernathy, an Associate of The Manely Firm, P.C on weekdays and jammin' musician on the weekends.
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

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On Saturdays, I rehearse with my church band. All musicians are required to bring suggested songs for Sunday service. Typically, the songs suggested exhibit all of the various musical instruments in the band. This approach allows all to contribute in some fashion to the total production.

My role is to play the drums and set the tone. I serve as the “heartbeat” of the song.

Drums, however, can overpower a song and disrupt its harmony and balance. I must stay cognizant of balance and my duty to “glue together” the moving parts of the band. This helps yield the songwriter’s intended effect.

Practicing family law is analogous to playing the drums. When dealing with the moving parts and fluidity incident to litigation, I must listen for the rhythm of a case. My role then shifts to “feeling” the perfect moment to subtly inject a “new rhythm.”

“Injecting a new rhythm” means adding an additional fact for the Court to consider before making its ruling. It means kindly interrupting opposing counsel and holding their feet to the fire to produce a statute or case that supports their view of the facts. It also means respectfully contending with a zealous mediator.

At The Manely Firm P.C., we take pride in setting the tone for our clients. Even when hired at the “eleventh hour” we smooth out disconcerting family law conundrums.

We look forward to helping you achieve a balanced “life rhythm.”

Jeremy Abernathy

Gophers and Prairie Dogs

2010-04-20T22:59:00.000-04:00

Tonight's installment is authored by Stephanie Steele, Senior Associate and Supervising Attorney for The Manely Firm, P.C.
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

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If you’ve ever seen a nature show about gophers or prairie dogs, you have probably noticed that they pop up from dens and burrows in the ground and peer about anxiously. They look as though they are searching for something. The gopher or prairie dog will often disappear down the hole again, not to be seen for some time. Then, quite suddenly, reappear with the same anxious look.

I think people are like that sometimes.

Too often, I stop and suddenly realize that I have been so absorbed in my daily routine of going to work, coming home and doing chores, sleeping and repeating that I’ve lost track of time. I haven’t talked to my friends in a couple weeks. I haven’t taken time to look around and enjoy the beautiful spring weather. I haven’t allowed myself to – just for a few minutes – shrug off the stress and responsibilities that weigh me down.

It is important to stay connected to people in our support systems – in our civic clubs, sports leagues, churches and other social organizations to which we belong. Especially during stressful times, such as a divorce or custody case, staying connected and involved in your regular activities is a great way to maintain a sense of stability and reassurance that there are many people who care about and support you. Making time to be with friends can energize and renew us. It’s an opportunity to strengthen our relationships with our children, our neighbors and our family in a way that also strengthens us.

I recently popped out of my gopher hole of routine and looked around when I received an email from our Gwinnett property manager. She sent a flyer reminding me of upcoming local events. It reminded me to pop up out of gopher hole, into the light of day and re-involve myself in the activities I enjoy and the lives of people I love.

For those in the Gwinnett area, I encourage you to take a look at the Visitors’ Bureau website for ongoing and upcoming events: http://www.gcvb.org/calendar/ .

Stephanie Steele

How to talk to a lunatic.

2010-04-19T21:10:00.002-04:00

Sometimes I write this blog for therapy. This may be one of those times.

Every now and then I've got an opposing counsel that is beyond the pale. They are either hostile just for the sake of being hostile (I usually figure they have a very unhappy life), or just stupid beyond belief.  I always wonder how they passed the bar.

Right now I've got an opposing counsel who qualifies in both departments. She's mean and dumb.

Let me be clear.  Most opposing counsel are good people, empathetic, intelligent and competent, but all opposing counsel are not cut from the same cloth. This one seems to be cut from cheese cloth.

So I'm trying to figure out how best to deal with her.

She likes to blast us with letters full of hyperbole and bile. Sometimes I'm tempted to respond, but I know too well where that leads. Since lawyers bill by the hour, we should be exceptionally conscious that every moment advances our client's cause, not our own.  I've observed many episodes of hostile letter being met by hostile letter until letter after letter is descending to little more than flame throwing and name calling, then the attorney bills the client $3,000.00 for the joy of it all. My firm doesn't do that, but some lawyers do. This one does it in triplicate.

You can't talk to her.  There is nothing new under the sun that you will ever tell her because she already knows it all. And what's amazing is that she has a direct line to the deity or she is the deity because she knows fact from fiction, truth from falsity, bonafides from (here's the part where I cursed)! There is no objective information you could share with her because if it doesn't fit her pre-existing paradigm, the information becomes like water off a duck's back or quicksilver to its source. She can't learn. She can't improve. She really can't advance her cause because she's so damn dense.

She is physically incapable of coming to an agreement. She argues for the sake of argument, her client be damned. Where most people would begin a conversation with a pleasantry, she starts off with invective. If you found a nice bone in her body, she would have it surgically removed!

Perhaps you know someone like that.

So I stay below the radar, taking it all in stride, biding my time, until it is show time.

So, how do you talk to a lunatic? In my business, I talk to them in court, when it matters.

Yeah, that was therapy.

Let the games begin.

Michael Manely

She took my husband.

2010-04-15T22:14:00.002-04:00

As if he were a trout.

A North Carolina jury awarded an ex wife $9 million for alienation of affection against her ex husband's mistress. Now that's something. And I suppose it could take the sting out of betrayal. Maybe?

Here's the catch, the mistress didn't show for trial. That means that the ex wife was all alone, telling her side only. The mistress claimed she didn't know about the jury trial. All of that will be sorted out in Motions and Appeals.

And of course the mistress doesn't have $9 million and probably won't have it any time soon. The ex wife said she's using the lawsuit to send a message about extramarital affairs. "You don't go after married men and break up families, " the ex-wife said.

Georgia, like North Carolina, recognizes a tort of alienation of affection.

Even though the law is on the books, it is seldom pursued. I'm surprised at the North Carolina jury, even in the mistress' absence. Juries in Georgia tend to lend a cynical eye to most matters matrimonial. Georgia juries tend to take a rather realistic view that the husband is not a trout that can be snatched, unknowingly and unwillingly from the swift waters of marital bliss. A mistress doesn't break up a family. A wandering spouse does.

"She didn't take what was yours and it probably wasn't worth much anyway," seems to be the jury's attitude.

This is not to say that under the right circumstances and with the right jury and with a complete absence of opposition, a Georgia jury couldn't return a similar verdict. I just wouldn't hold my breath.

The financial damage done to the ex-wife is sought in the divorce itself, though not from a tort standpoint where you get damages from pain and suffering. (If divorcing spouses could get pain and suffering endured in a marriage it would be a very different world.) The model is more contractual or business related. You get a portion, usually a good portion, of what the marriage is worth, the holdings of the partnership. Under the right circumstances, you can get alimony to make up for the lost income to the household. (See other blog entries for more explanation on this.)

Every so often I am asked the alienation of affection question. It can't help but come up in an adulterous setting. But I focus back on the marriage, its dissolution, its assets, and the client looking for happiness that probably had been long gone from the relationship anyway. I discourage tilting at windmills.

Still, I must confess, if $9 million is out there somewhere from some paramour, I'm open to it.

Michael Manely

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/woman-sued-affair-9m-verdict-thrown/story?id=10209682

Do you have anything in crimson?

2010-04-14T22:41:00.001-04:00

What is it? The time on task, the integrity of the work, the "taking it to a whole new level" thing?

I'm talking about nuance. Everywhere I look these days its is all about nuance. And I am totally okay with it. I like it. I work within nuance. I am nuance's main man. I dig that space. (Okay, maybe that last statement was a bit extreme.)

So much of my work is neck deep in nuance. There are subtleties to each turn, each eddy, each choice taken, each phrase uttered, each proposition proposed. It is an intesive diplomatic exercise. The State Department would be proud.

How do you work a case? How do you further the client's objectives? Do you ram in like a steamroller, flattening everything in your path? Is Blitzkrieg the best approach in a family setting? I don't think so, not normally and hardly ever. It's all in the approach, the subtle approach, the nuance.

In litigation you have to dot your i's and cross your t's. This is also exceptionally true in family law. But family law is far, far more than just litigation. True, you better know how to litigate with the best of them, up to the task of trying a case in the Old Bailey, but you also better know how to avert disaster at the Suez Canal. You've got to talk them off the ledge, coax them to the negotiating table and leave them happy that they ever met you. You've got to create the solution that moves everyone forward. No small feat.

So, is it the time I've been on this task, the integrity of my work or my taking it to a whole new level? Like surfing, I think it is all of the above. Like fine wine, it just gets better with age. Like... oh, you get the point.
In short, nuance is my life.
It's hard work. It is certainly tricky work. But it is exceptionally rewarding work. No nuance there.

Michael Manely

The Gwinnett Mediation Process - Behind Closed Doors.

2010-04-13T22:20:00.000-04:00

Tonight's entry is brought to us by Senior Associate, Stephanie Steele.
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

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Earlier this month, I wrote about the steps leading up to mediation. Today, let’s take a look inside the mediation room...

Once both parties and their attorneys sit down with the mediator, the first order of business is to go over the guidelines for mediation. Some of the guidelines are:

a. Information shared during mediation is confidential and privileged to foster open and honest communication and negotiation.

b. Your mediator will not disclose any information learned during the mediation without the express permission of the parties. Confidential information you share in a private meeting (caucus) with your attorney and the mediator will not be divulged to the other party or attorney without your consent.

c. The exception to this rule is that mediator is obligated to report crimes that occur during mediation, imminent threats of bodily injury or abuse to a child or a party and any such other matters the law requires the mediator to report.

d. You cannot call the mediator as a witness in your case, if the case goes to trial. You cannot subpoena any written materials developed for or in the course of mediation.

e. The mediator’s role is to assist the parties in reaching an agreement, not to give legal advice. Your attorney is there to provide legal advice.

f. In order for the mediation process to be successful, all parties need to participate in good faith and work toward resolution of the issues.

g. Payment of the mediator is due at the close of the mediation session. Prior to mediation, your attorney should inform you of the mediator’s hourly rate. Usually, the parties evenly divide the mediator’s fees. However, alternative arrangements may be made in certain circumstances.

Usually, after the mediator and parties review the guidelines for mediation, each attorney will give an opening statement outlining the issues in the case. The attorneys may make an opening settlement offer. Alternatively, the mediator may meet with only one side and then with only the other side to get an understanding of what the issues are and what each side is willing to offer in settlement.

Mediators typically relay offers of compromise to the other party in the case, offer ideas regarding possible counteroffers, and assist you and your attorney in analyzing the settlement offers and counteroffers. When the mediator or one of the parties believes there is nothing further to be gained by the process, the mediation will be ended. The time spent in mediation varies, but generally lasts from two to five hours.

At the conclusion of mediation, the mediator has both parties sign a document stating the mediation ended in an impasse (no agreement), there was a partial agreement or there was a full agreement reached.

Sometimes we reach a full agreement, sometimes a partial agreement and sometimes we need the Court to decide the issues. If an agreement is reached at mediation, the mediator will often hand write the main areas of agreement. One of the attorneys will then draft a formal agreement for both parties to sign.

You should expect the formal Settlement Agreement to include more than just what was agreed to at mediation. There are a number of standard legal provisions in common use by attorneys that will be included in the formal Agreement, even though not specifically addressed at mediation.

If there is a provision you don’t understand, ask you attorney to explain it. The Agreement binds you and you should fully understand its impact on you and your case.

Mediation is an informal process that very often results in full resolution of cases. You should think of it as a great opportunity to resolve your case without further court intervention, higher attorney fees and more energy and time invested. Even if you don’t reach an agreement, you and your attorney will gain valuable insight into the goals, strategy and evidence of the other side. This will enable you and your attorney to better prepare for the final hearing.

I have often heard judges say that the parties know their case best. An agreement you reach with the opposing party will be more tailored to your specific situation and will be more satisfying to all parties involved than any Order the court could devise.

Hopefully, demystifying the process will help you focus on working through the issues to reach a mutual agreement tailored to fit you.

Stephanie Steele

Life During Divorce

2010-04-12T22:36:00.000-04:00

Tonight's entry is authored by Elizabeth Marum.
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

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It is tempting to throw your hands in the air and give up on yourself when going through a divorce. It is easy to get overwhelmed and let your divorce become your life.

But your divorce is not your life. You still have control over your immediate world. You have a job. You have a car. You have the day-to-day chores and responsibilities that can help keep you feeling sane. It is Springtime in Atlanta and the weather begs for you to go for a hike, bike ride, or neighborhood festival. Try to keep up with the activities that used to be habit.

It is important to keep hold of these controllable elements of your world during divorce proceedings. Don’t walk away from your job. Don’t give up on the job search. Don’t forget you have family and friends who care about you. Do keep up with your bills. Go out and enjoy some time with friends.

Not only is there likely to be a Standing Order issued by the Court that requires you to keep the status quo (by not shutting off the power in the marital home or cancelling insurance), but keeping up with those things that make you who you are will help you keep a line between your divorcing world and the you that must exist at the end of it. If you don’t, the “divorcing” you will linger long after the judge grants the Final Decree.

Elizabeth Marum

Out with the Old, In with the New

2010-04-07T19:57:00.002-04:00

Tonight's Blog Post is by Associate, Jeremy Abernathy. Click Here to learn more about Jeremy.

Our firm is located in the heart of the Marietta Square. Our office has great views. I see the hustle and bustle of city life. I see Glover Park and witness the flowers blooming in Spring.

I also hear the racket from the Marietta City construction taking place. The noise is loud, pounding, and continuous. Recently, however, the usual banging that I hear had a different ring to it. The noise was high- pitched and screeching- comparable to a cat slowing etching their claws into a chalkboard.

I got up and peered out the window. I noticed long sharp rails being yanked from about four feet below the surface (my measuring point was a 6 foot tall man whose head was about two feet above the pavement).

I called my fellow associate, Elizabeth Marum, to take a look. She, immediately suspected that the objects were trolley rails. (Elizabeth has vast miscellaneous knowledge!)

Mr. Manely, nearby as we were briefing and updating him on cases and hearings, confirmed Elizabeth’s suspicion and even provided the history of the trolley rails. (In the early 1900's the Atlanta trolley system extended to Marietta and the trolley turned around by circling the park.)

This journey back in time reminded me of horror stories I have heard about the history of Marietta regarding racial and religious intolerance. I must say that it is gratifying to see Marietta in it’s current state. I see all races and nationalities entering in different restaurants, movie theaters, and other establishments. I see diversity embraced. I see change welcomed.

It’s now one week later and I notice that the large hole from which the trolley lines were being pulled has been patched up. Cars pass over the hard, re-surfaced planes covering the holes.

Family law is like Marietta construction and Marietta history in this respect. The old wounds between opposing parties are deep and bruising (sometimes literally). The parties have contentious histories. The sundry horror stories outnumber the words in a Harry Potter or New Moon novel. Thus, construction (or reconstruction) is necessary.

As counsel for our clients, we must “do construction” in our clients’ lives. After the excavation of past wounds (the post-filing, pre-trial discovery process), we must lay the road for productive, fruitful travel (a successful settlement agreement or judicial decision).

At The Manely Firm P.C. we take pride in getting our clients off to the best start possible on their new life journeys. We care about the strategic, intelligent “re-paving” we do for our clients’ futures. We welcome re-constructing the “messy family law issues.”

Gwinnett Mediation Process – What is it? How do we get there?

2010-04-06T19:19:00.001-04:00

Tonight'g blog post is authored by Stephanie Steele, Associate and Supervising Attorney for Gwinnett County. Click here to
learn more about Stephanie.

You may have heard the phrase “Alternative Dispute Resolution” or “ADR”. This simply refers to a variety of methods used to resolve legal cases without a Judge hearing and deciding the case.

As the Gwinnett Superior Court ADR’s website aptly explains, “There are three primary processes [of alternative dispute resolution] available. Mediation, the most requested method of ADR in Gwinnett County, is a process in which a neutral third party facilitates settlement discussions between parties in conflict. Case evaluation is a process in which an experienced attorney gives advice on the strengths and weaknesses of each party's position and may make an assessment as to how a judge or jury might react in the case. Arbitration is more similar to a trial. The arbitrator issues a decision on the case following an abbreviated hearing under informal rules of evidence.”

In family law, we use mediation almost exclusively as an alternative way of resolving cases. In some Metro-Atlanta counties, you are required to attend mediation before the court will allow you to schedule a hearing. In other counties, it is an optional process. In still other counties, such as Gwinnett, the Judge decides whether domestic cases assigned to him/her must go to mediation prior to a hearing.

Once you know your case will go to mediation, the next step is to select a mediator. Every Metro-Atlanta county has a list of approved domestic mediators. These mediators are often, but not always, attorneys with at least 5 years practice in domestic cases. They are all trained extensively in conflict resolution. Don’t be fooled, though, as with most professionals, not all mediators are created equal!

In selecting a mediator, rely on your attorney’s advice. She or he knows you, your case, the opposing attorney, possibly the opposing party and the mediator. When choosing a mediator, it is important to keep in mind the personalities and proclivities of each person who will be involved.

For example, if you are a father seeking primary custody of your children, you probably would not want to use a mediator who advocates mothers obtaining primary custody. Another example would be if you are a shy person, it may be difficult to work with a mediator who has a very strong personality. Again, though, it depends on the individuals involved.

If the parties cannot agree on a mediator, the Judge will assign one.

When you arrive for mediation, check in with the friendly folks in the ADR office and let them know you’re there. They will wait for both attorneys, both parties and the mediator to arrive and then lead everyone to a private room for the mediation.

Later this week, I’ll post another blog explaining what exactly goes on behind the closed doors of mediation.

For more information on Gwinnett County’s ADR processes, visit their website at Gwinnet County ADR

Here are a few other helpful ADR websites:
Cobb County ADR
Fulton County ADR
DeKalb County ADR

Teach your children well.

2010-04-05T23:45:00.001-04:00

I'm going to get a little preachy tonight, but at least I'll be brief.

We all know we are modeling for our children. How we behave is how we best express that we want them to behave. "Do as I say and not as I do," doesn't work as well as follow the leader.

Because our children model us, think about your life. Are you living the life you want your children to live? Why would you expect them to live any other way? It was good enough for you.

Have a lot of drama? Expect drama centered kids. Hate your spouse? Expect your daugher to find a man just like the one who married dear old mom. Tolerate your spouse at best? Expect your son to find a woman he can passibly live with. No love lost there.

I find it much more fulfilling, rewarding and positively enabling, to live the life you want your kids to emulate. They're going to use you as a standard anyway. You might as well make sure it is a good one.

Michael Manely

Summer Camp

2010-03-31T21:52:00.001-04:00

In the midst of divorce, in the height of crisis and turmoil day after day, locked in the throes of litigation and courtroom battles, one right after the other, you might wonder how my small army of elite litigators keep their heads straight.

They don't.

No, really, they do. I was just making that up.

We try to lead normal lives even though we take home with us the experiences that our clients share and the knowledge we glean from day after day courtroom battles.

For example, this week, when I get the chance, I'm looking at summer camps. I have three children, all boys. The two oldest are a long way from the days of summer camps, but my youngest is definitely down for some cool summer experiences. And I am knee deep in assessing our summer options for his bright and inquiring mind.

We have our usual standbys that I wouldn't think of leaving out, a week of sports camp, a week of nature camp, even a week of art camp which he has taken to, but what about the remaining weeks of the summer? Sure, vacation will occupy a week, maybe two if we're real lucky, but since my wife and I both work, we want to provide him with enhanced learning opportunities, though I wouldn't begrudge him a few weeks just lazing around being bored during the hazy days of summer.

And how about you? Summer comes whether we are ready or not. Summer comes and we've got to get organized for our kids. Our kids look to us to carry on as usual, no matter the trials, tribulations or ordeals we may be privately facing.

And, in a sense, that's a very good thing. Our kids help us stay centered, focused on the long term, focused on the good things. I think we need them every bit as much as they need us.

Bless our kids in every way and may their summers be wonderful.

Michael Manely

Legal Time

2010-03-30T21:52:00.000-04:00

Clients almost always ask me how long their case will take. Of course, each case is somewhat unique and will have its own timetable, but many cases fall into somewhat predictable schedules. The overall determinant is how long does the opposition want to fight?

I'll explain that.

I believe I have written before and will probably write again that a Cobb County Judge says a good family lawyer can tell you how a judge will rule 95% of the time. I agree with this Judge wholeheartedly.

Given that reality, I always cut to the chase, predict the outcome and work expeditiously toward that end. Consequently, we could often settle a case for the right result extremely quickly and would but for a myriad of factors that do not have to do with our time frame, but those of the parties, opposing counsel or the judge. Most often it is the opposing party's timeframe that delays the resolution of the case.

Sometimes the case is too fresh to settle. By that I mean that the end result is known to the attorneys but the parties need time to adjust to the new scenario, to life under the new reality. That time needs to be honored because forcing an end will cause more heartbreak and disruption, will add salt to wounds.

But as I wrote, oftentimes it is the opposing party who is delaying the agenda. Usually it is because they just aren't done fighting yet, or they think that if they delay it just one more month, they'll get a different outcome.

Every now and then a case is so convoluted and mired in years of documents and well entrenched enmity, that it takes some time and a lot of effort to sort it all out. I once represented a fellow who just finished explaining to me how his case took 12 years to develop into the rather bad situation he now faced. Then he asked why we hadn't finished his case in the month and a half since he hired us. If 12 years of history have built up, it may take us a little while to sort out the issues and fix the morass.

Without additional complication, time frames run as follows:

The shortest time in which you can obtain a divorce is 31 days after your spouse is served with the Complaint and Summons or your spouse's Acknowledgment of Service is filed. Georgia is very non paternalistic in this matter. My hat's off to our fair state for that enlightened view.

Contested divorces will often last between four and six months.

Custody cases will often last between six months to a year.

Modification of child support cases will often conclude within three months.

Contempt cases can often conclude within two months.

Again, this is with all going according to plan. While you can appear on most judge's calendars within about 30 days, there are a few judges who cannot schedule a hearing within 90 days. If the opposing party wants to frustrate discovery, which is a losing battle in itself, a case can take longer. If the opposing counsel has a leave of absense the case can take longer. Still, this timeline is roughly accurate and provides a benchmark for most cases.

Still, with all this said, legal time feels like it takes forever. There is little that is quick in law. But, given time, the result can be quite good.

Michael Manely

The Hypocritical Oath

2010-03-29T22:49:00.005-04:00

Family life is a microcosm of the larger world. What suffices for politics at home plays out in the public arena as well. John Edwards, for example.

And so it goes with hypocrisy. Is it cynical to say you should doubt anyone who holds themselves out as virtuous? But, rather than eschew the virtuous, I'd like to see us get beyond claimed virtue and into virtuous conduct. This is an example of walk the walk. Talk the talk is a terrible waste of time and probably a huge red flag of hypocrisy in action. It's likely that he who claims virtue hasn't any.

Rather than express concern for our children, we should care for our children. Our actions should be readily discerned as being in their best interests. I, for one, like the idea of children having health insurance that cannot be denied. I like the safety to the children and to the families that that coverage affords.

Rather than lie prostrate in piety seeking salvation for young souls, I'd rather have clergy not brutalizing their young charges. I'd rather see the denominational leaders act swiftly and decisively ostracizing and even excommunicating clergy who clearly don't believe in an afterlife, given the content of their conduct. Rather than spending meager family fortunes on religious icons as emblematic of the bread of life, I'd like to see parents provide real bread and milk for their hungry children.

Rather than claiming you are all in favor of our children's futures, I'd rather have you take aggressive steps to provide air that doesn't choke children's lungs and water that is more than just a medium for moving manufacturing chemicals downstream. Rather than decry that the spouse you once proclaimed you'd spend the rest of your life with is now the devil in disguise, hell bent on sending your children to ruin, I'd like to see you turn off your tv, so the marketers who perceive your children as consumers rather than children, no longer have access to them.

I also don't like spending the family's money on strip clubs while you are claiming that your children are the most important thing in the world to you.

Call me crazy.

Hypocrisy reigns in the halls of congress and in the pulpits across America. But hypocrisy reigns in softer tones in living rooms, kitchens and bedrooms each and every day. I know that the quality of life improves with each degree of hypocrisy exposed and rooted out, regardless of its source.

I pray we all root out hypocrisy in our hearts, in our homes and in our homeland.

Michael Manely

Parenting Classes

2010-03-25T22:27:00.000-04:00

Most of our counties now require divorcing parents to take parenting classes. Thes classes are usually taught in a seminar format that lasts up to eight hours. During the seminars, the instructors teach the parents about the issues that children usually face in a divorce and how to best manage them.  The class also provides some skills on co-parenting.

Sometimes a client will express some degree of outrage or at least exasperation at having to take the class. "Who is this big brother telling me how to raise my kids. I've been doing it just fine for years now."

I want to stay with that thought for a moment.

Unless you settle your case, the judge will make a decision about your kids. While judges prefer not to, they will make custody decisions when called upon to do so. And when they make custody decisions, judges have to apply some rubric for determining the best interest of the child, the better parent for custody. You wouldn't want the judge to be arbitrary. Judges tend to have fairly common standards though some have strong pet peeves.

If you don't settle your case, you are asking big brother to make the decision.  Don't you want to know how the judge sees the world? Don't you want to know what the judge thinks is normal? You are far more realistic to expect the judge to rule a consistent way than expect the judge to conform to your particular and perhaps unique view of the world.

Before you go throwing down the gauntlet on custody, you want all the parenting classes you can get. You want access to the instruction manual. You even want plenty of individualized instruction to ensure that your methods of parenting conform to the norm with which the judge is most comfortable. You want to be able to speak the judge's language.

Of course, you do have an option. You can learn how to prevail or you can tilt at windmills to convince the judge of the error of her ways, and good luck with that.  That choice is competely yours.

Me, I like to prevail.

Michael Manely

Revenge is a dish which is best served cold.

2010-03-23T23:23:00.001-04:00

Last night I wrote about plotting spouses having a special place in hell reserved. Tonight I write about how plotting can be your best strategy.

As with all of life, whether it is ethical or moral to plot is a judgment call. In tonight's scenario, you get the notion that your spouse is seeing someone else. Maybe they're hyper sensitive about you being in proximity to their cell phone. Maybe they have unaccounted for hours. But you have a hunch. What do you do?

First you need to decide if you care to confirm your suspicions. Does it matter if they are definitely committing adultery? Do you really want out anyway? Even if you are leaving, are you the kind of person who needs to know just for your sense of balance? If so, then you should confirm.

Don't expect your spouse to come clean when you ask them. They don't. They usually don't confess when you confront them. They will often have an excuse, no matter how paltry, even if you have an 8x12 glossy of them deep in the throes. They won't confirm. You need another strategy.

You need to catch them.

Private Investigators are the time honored method of catching cheating spouses. I swear by them. If you can tailor their work to specific times when your spouse is most likely to be stepping out, private investigators can be reasonably affordable. But that isn't your only recourse.

Back to my point: you've decided you want or need to confirm. Perhaps your need stems from your legal situation. Perhaps your spouse will likely seek alimony from the divorce and you feel that your spouse shouldn't feed off of you while dining at someone else's table.

Adultery is a bar to receiving alimony.

If your spouse is cheating, they cannot prosper. You don't have to pay alimony to an unfaithful spouse.

This is the occasion to plot, to plan, to marshal your evidence before you announce your intentions. This strategy is fair game. Why? Because your spouse has plotted against you to engage in her relationship with her paramour and expects an unjust reward based upon her deceipt.

You can right that wrong. It's ethical, moral and legal.

The title to tonight's installment may be a bit strong. It's a James Bond reference. But it speaks volumes for having patience to accomplish your objectives. It speaks to the fortitude you have to have while you are collecting the evidence you need to ensure that justice prevails. Your revenge, the cessation of your gravy train, is best and most certainly delivered, long after your blood has ceased to boil, but has chilled in your veins.

Okay, that's a bit strong, too. But this is a serious business. And it is no less serious than the situation you face, if this is your situation. Serious times call for serious measures. I won't excuse it. I don't have to justify it. I just have to prove it. But then, that's what I do.

Michael Manely

The spouse who lies in waiting.

2010-03-22T22:40:00.000-04:00

When you finish contemplating your divorce, you do one of two things: you hire a family law lawyer to begin the process immediately, or you get yourself organized in preparation for hiring a family law lawyer to begin the process.

Many people need to plan somewhat. They might need to put a little money aside. They might need to organize their next place of abode. They might need to prepare the children in whatever form feels right to them.

Many people need to plan somewhat, but there is a special place in hell for the spouse who lies in waiting.

Most of what I have written thus far can be chalked up to "peoples will be peoples," kind of a forgiving look at the exploits of married people. People make mistakes, they don't handle their actions as well as their better angels might advocate. But the people I'm talking about are the spouses who decide to divorce and then spend months, and in some cases years, plotting the downfall of their impending ex before they pull the trigger.

The plotting spouse is a real enemy under your roof. The plotting spouse creates opportunities by creating a false sense of trust in the relationship. You don't see it coming because your spouse doesn't want you to. You get blind sided because that's the battle plan. Often, you even get set up, literally, and you don't realize the trap until it has long been sprung. Not infrequently I have to explain the trap to my client because of how sucked in my client has gotten to the false trust in the relationship with the plotting spouse. When the realization sets in the effects can be emotionally devastating.

This plotting is the worst form of treachery.

It is also devastating because the client is in shock for a long time afterward, unable to mobilize an effective defense and already so far behind in a fair presentation of their evidence that justice may seem insurmountable.

But, like I said, there is a special place in hell reserved for these plotters. And not only will karma catch up with them and make them rue the day, I will too.

Michael Manely

Different clients, different needs.

2010-03-21T21:25:00.000-04:00

Tonight's Blog entry comes from Elizabeth Marum, Associate Attorney with The Manely Firm, P.C.
http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

The Family Law attorney is part advisor, part counselor and part bodyguard. There is no question that divorces are difficult. Even the seemingly amicable uncontested divorces are bound to cause stresses, emotional anguish and financial hardship on all the parties involved. No matter which way you look at it, whether you are getting freedom from a situation you wanted out of or whether you feel you are being abandoned; in the end, you have lost someone that played a significant role in your life. It is even more difficult when children are involved and will suffer the fallout.

With each case, there comes a different client with different needs, different styles and different expectations. It is our job to learn how to work with each person that walks through the “Family Law Firm” door because no two are alike.

There are those clients who decide they want a specific result and place the whole “baby” in their attorney’s hands. These clients are responsive and interactive in the process, but may have difficulty when it comes time to make a decision. Overwhelmed in the process and stresses, they turn to their attorney asking the attorney to do “whatever you think is best.” In this case, we attorneys must remind our clients that this is their life, their world and their decision. We can advise the client of the different paths they can take and try to predict the outcome, but ultimately it is the client’s decision and the client’s decisions only. We cannot make a choice for them.

Then there are those who want to control all the tiny, little details of their case. While we encourage clients to take an active role in such a pivotal change in their life, there is a reason they have hired an attorney. This is when the attorney must remind the client that we are here not only to advise of legal rights, but to buffer the client from the day-to-day, stressful minutia of domestic litigation. We cannot completely erase the effects of such a tumultuous period of life, but we can do our best to keep many of these stresses off your radar.

Our role as your attorneys is to help you through these difficult times. We navigate the complex procedural processes that often seem convoluted and unnecessary. We are here to protect your legal interests. We are here to be your bodyguard and remove as much anxiety from your life as possible.

Elizabeth Marum

http://www.allfamilylaw.com/PracticeAreas/Divorce.asp

"We've grown apart."

2010-03-18T23:25:00.001-04:00

I've been thinking through the machinations of the pre-divorce process, all of the dance that leads up to parting ways and making it legal.

There are many roads that people take to get to a divorce. Few of them are open and above board, but they are still pathways to accomplish the objective of separation. I have been told that most people get divorced because of financial difficulties. After over 20 years of working with people about their reasons for getting a divorce, I don't think that's true.

Couples may have different ways of handling their finances. Financial difficulties are certainly stressful and can put a strain on a marriage, but, in the early days of a relationship, I think our experience tells us that some spark is in the relationship that makes the financial difficulties manageable, something that makes them shared. That something is what leaves a relationship. The lack of that something is what causes divorce.

Consider some of the other reasons people get divorced. Perhaps it is adultery. Are the couple getting divorced because of adultery, the act of sleeping with another person? I think that is putting the cart before the horse, if you'll pardon the imagery. For the "adulterer" its as if the relationship was peachy and then, whoops, I committed adultery. That just doesn't ring true. Accidental adultery rarely happens. People fall out of love and become interested in playing the field again, then adultery happens. By the time adultery happens, the adulterer is already long gone from the marriage.

And for the aggrieved spouse, would you say that you would have your spouse back but for her adultery? Imagine your spouse the moment before the adultery, the hour before the adultery, perhaps the week before the adultery. In all these times, steps were taken, wittingly or unwittingly, to have sex outside the marriage. Is that what you want back? If you knew your spouse's heart a minute, an hour and a week before the act, wouldn't you say that you don't want to be married to someone who is as unattached to your marriage as your spouse was?

How about addictions? I'm certainly not such a moralist as to assert that if the addicted spouse were really committed to the relationship they would stop their addictive behavior. But, from the addicted spouse's perspective, there is something more important to them than their relationship: their addiction. Whether the addiction is a choice or not, it is how the addicted spouse is living their life, committed to something more significant than their spouse.

From the other spouse's perspective, do you want to remain married to someone who is more committed to their addiction than to you? Perhaps you thought you signed on "...in sickness and in health...," but does that mean "in enabling" too?

In short, people sometimes, offtimes, grow apart. As the phrase goes, the spark is gone and love dies.

I wonder and often assert that if spouses could take themselves back in time, before the act that brought the house of cards down, if they could say at that moment to their spouse, "I release you," then I suspect some of the anguish and anger could be removed from the process. The pain would remain, but it would be more melancholy than harsh and raw.

After a period of time, unique to each person, the perceived cause of the divorce dies away and the couple often relate as though they had grown apart anyway.

"We've grown apart" feels a lot less accusatory. If severing the relationship is inevitable, isn't a lot less accusatory a preferable way to go?

Michael Manely

Other tasks

2010-03-17T22:10:00.000-04:00

It has been a while since I ventured here to leave a reflection or two.

Since my last entry, I've spent the better part of a week in Continuing Legal Education classes studying general trial techniques. Considering that successful family law attorneys are in court second only to prosecutors, averaging four to five hearings a week, I knew this was an excellent CLE to attend, and the General Practice and Trial Section of the State Bar did not disapoint.

After that, I have been researching and writing a paper I delivered today on International Custody for the Family Law bar. I was quite privileged to be asked to deliver this paper. It is always an honor to speak before such distinguished attorneys.

I lectured on what we call the Hague Convention, also known as the International Convention on Child Abduction. I have handled perhaps more cases than most other attorneys so I have become fairly fluent in Hague actions, procedures and strategies. It was a great pleasure to bring my skills to the service of the Family Law bar.

I'll get back in the throws tomorrow. I already look forward to it.

Like Client, Like Counsel

2010-03-09T21:56:00.000-05:00

I always advise potential clients to speak to as many attorneys as they need to, until they find one with whom they are comfortable. "Shop around," I advise them.

Here's the fundamental reason to talk to several lawyers: there will come at least one time in your case when much is on the line and a decision has to be made. You will feel like this is an earth shaking decision, with the right decision leading to your goals being realized and the wrong decision leading to ruin. In that moment, you need your attorney's best judgment, his most sound advice. And when he gives that advice, you want to trust that his advice is correct.

If you have retained the attorney with whom you have the greatest rapport, you will most likely hear and follow his advice. You will most likely feel comfortable and secure with the decision you make. This simpatico keeps your legal team together and helps you stay focused. This "being on the same page" moves you toward accomplishing your goals.

Often, I see this maxim play out in court. Like client, like counsel. If the party is brash, harsh and rude, she will likely find an attorney that shares those traits. If a party can't tell the truth to save their lives, often his counsel is similarly challenged. Not to get too offensive but it reminds me of those studies about the similar appearance of dogs and their owners.

I find that most of my clients are honest, sincere people who truly want the best for their families, but they have the wisdom to not want the worst for themselves. Perhaps that good judgment is why they pick me. But I would say that, wouldn't I?

Bottom line? Shop around until you feel secure.

Georgia Bar Guide on Selecting Counsel

It's nice to have an army.

2010-03-03T21:36:00.000-05:00

I was watching the office hum today, all hands on deck, when I thought, "it's nice to have an army."

Like most family law lawyers, I spent years in the wilderness of sole practitionership. That's a hard life and my hat is off to the multitudes who still attempt it. The bottom line is you are on your own. Whatever comes down the pike comes down on you and you alone. And all the fire power you can give is equally, just your own.

So as I was watching everyone busy, helping all of our clients, working toward each client's resolution day in a most constructive way, I was so thankful to be surrounded by so many talented and dedicated people.

Our neighbors down the hall in the Marietta office asked it well, "how do you get so many good people to work with you?"

Just lucky, I guess.

Michael Manely

Suffer the little children

2010-03-02T22:26:00.000-05:00

Our culture famously testifies to its concern for the children, but I wonder how different our culture would be if we actually acted with consideration for our children's futures.

It seems that we would fund education. It seems we would eliminate pollution. It seems we would not spend our children's future. It seems we would preserve the planet to leave the Earth better than it was when we inherited it.

It seems that we would provide for the children, not only so that they could be sheltered and be fed, but so that they could grow in happier, more productive homes.

Children are exposed to a lot. Children pretty much are exposed to everything. From the toxic waste we belch into the air to the toxic waste we broadcast on all channels, children are the repositories of all bad things. It is our true gift to them.

And children are exposed to the toxic waste at home as well.

At home, children are exposed to family conflict. It is inevitable that families have conflict. But does the conflict resolve? Does the conflict resolve positively? Do the parties kiss and make up? Do they expressly agree to disagree but live together in loving community?

Does the conflict resolve negatively? Do the parties resolve that their differences are too great to remain in close community? Or does one party resolve that they will no longer suffer the outrages of the other?

Under both scenarios, children learn conflict resolution. They learn productive choices. They learn that they can impact their lives, choose better and therefore live better.

Or does the conflict not resolve? Does the conflict remain to be battled day after day? Whether the conflict is heated or the house is engaged in a never ending cold war, the children live this endless drama of anger and of loneliness, of despair and hopelessness. This life they learn is the life they will live.

It seems that if we cared about the children, we'd make their lives better. And leaving them in an endless state of war isn't better for anyone.

Showing our children that we can make positive choices which improves our lives enables them to make positive choices for themselves, and one day, their children.

Isn't that what we want?

Michael Manely

When the blood boils

2010-03-01T22:23:00.000-05:00

Few relationships move from passion to disolution without tempers flaring at several points along the way. Saying hurtful things, doing hurtful things is par for the course of that journey and perhaps how we ease the separation from each other. Hurtful acts certainly provide proof for the argument of ending it all.

But what about those spouses that really do seek to "end it all," and usually with their spouse in tow? Trying to decipher the mind of the lunatic taking his wife's life and then his own is probably like trying to decipher the mind of a jihadi. There's no sense to it. It's wicked.

Domestic violence is a common occurrence. Typical court domestic violence calendars are packed each week with partner on partner violence.

Far more often than not, partners want to forgive a blow in anger from someone they love. People lose their tempers. People can do terrible things to each other. Each person has to decide how many terrible things they are willing to endure. Will you tolerate getting shoved? Will you tolerate getting slapped? Will you tolerate getting punched once? Twice? Three times?

Whenever I can, I try to help people take the subjective to an objective level. In this case, it means setting a benchmark, a line in the sand that you commit to yourself cannot be breached without permanent consequences. When not in the heat of the moment, when the blood is most cool, determine your level of tolerance. Set a clear boundary. "I'll only let him hit me twice." "I'll only let her scratch me three times." After that, there can be no recovery, no going back, no next opportunity to repeat the crime. And once you've set that benchmark, promise yourself that you will adhere to it. Promise yourself that if that threshold ever gets breached, you will follow through, leave and never come back.

From all that I have observed, the murderous lunatic has seldom suddenly gone over the cliff. He's been skirting the edge of it for a long time. His conduct, particularly to those closest to him, was fairly predictable for quite a while. The partners who are those victims are usually the partners who didn't get away.

It sounds too simple: set benchmarks, follow through. But I've found this approach to be an ironclad way to finally end the abuse and to live to see another day.

Michael Manely

He's Home

2010-02-27T00:54:00.002-05:00

On Thursday I shared that one of my clients was desperately seeking the return of her grandson. Many thanks to all who held our client and her grandson in your thoughts and prayers. The boy has been returned to the safety of his grandmother's home. We can rest a bit easier tonight.

11 Alive News Link

The Personal Side of Law

2010-02-26T14:08:00.001-05:00

Please welcome guest blogger, Stephanie Steele. Stephanie is Supervising Attorney for The Manely Firm, PC in Gwinnett County. Her office is located in Lawrenceville, Georgia. Stephanie handles all aspects of family law and has developed special expertise in adoption law.
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Recently, someone came to my office and wanted to understand his options about adopting a little girl from his relative. I explained the overall legal process, detailed what we must show the court to be successful and discussed the financial aspects of such a case.

We explored the possibility of the mother consenting to the adoption. At that point, the man looked at me and earnestly asked, “How do I approach her about giving up all her rights to this beautiful child? What do I say?”

Being an attorney is not just about knowing the law and how it applies. Being an attorney is also about knowing and understanding people.

There were a number of strategies that came to mind, but in that moment, what I saw and felt most was the desire of this man to take care of a child who needs someone to care for her.

Although some think of law as a cold, unfeeling set of rules, I see the law as a tool for helping people in a very real way. I see my job as much more than explaining or using rules in a dispassionate manner. I see each case as a unique opportunity to help make the world a better place, one child and one family at a time.

Sometimes what is ‘right’ and ‘just’ and ‘better’ is unclear, but thinking about transitioning from here and now to where you want you and your family to be clarifies things. Caring about your family, expeditiously cutting to the core of the matter and resolving your case in a way the helps you and your family move through the here and now to the next part of your lives is the guiding principle for how we handle cases.

The media and one little boy

2010-02-25T23:34:00.004-05:00

11 Alive News Link

It's late. It's very late. And I'm fairly exhausted.

I've spent the better part of the day working on a case that, thankfully, the news stations have picked up.

A father lied to the Court to get custody of his son. When the Court found out, it revoked his custody, reverting custody to the Grandmother, my client.

The father is now running with the boy. Given the father's past, he is considered armed and dangerous.

Lying to the Court is not the father's only issue, as you can well imagine.

So, three television stations have picked up the story for their news. Tonight, 11 Alive interviewed the Grandmother and me for the nightly news.

The more publicity this case can get, the longer it will stay in the public eye. The longer in the public eye, the sooner the father is caught and the boy is returned to the Grandmother's home where, for the first time in a very long time, he was begining to feel safe before being seized by the father.

Hold this little, seven year old boy close in your hearts. He needs your well wishes now. He's going to need a lot of his Grandmother's love when we get him home.

Michael Manely

It's all about the Judge

2010-02-24T22:52:00.000-05:00

I guess this is a rant.

It is imperative to know that for all the pain, strife, suffering, indignity, humiliation and general bad times you have experienced in your now concluding marriage, your experience ranks second in importance in divorce court.

And no, your spouse's experience does not rank first.

The judge ranks first.

One of the hardest paradigm shifts for clients is moving from a subjective perception to an objective one. The objective one is simple though: how will the judge look at this?

Absent a settlement (always a good idea if one is possible), the judge makes the decisions in divorce. It is possible to ask that a jury make some decisions but that is a distraction from this point for now. Because the judge makes the decision, how the judge perceives events is all that matters in divorce court.

Judge's won't do what you want. That's not their job. Their job is to listen as long as they have allowed to the salient issues necessary to separate assets and debts. When necessary they make decisions about alimony, still mostly a financial consideration, and custody, which is a bit more keyed to custodial issues than whether your spouse refused to carry out the trash or have dinner ready when you got home.

My job is to translate all that is personal and painful, helpful and hopeful from your life into almost soundbites that boil down your situation into information the judge needs to hear. It is a hard paradigm shift to make, but it has to be made before expectations yield demands to the bench which alienate the judge and greatly prejudice the case. Translated: don't tell the judge what they have to do because it will make them angry and hurt your case.

The good family lawyer is an excellent translator. Know that we care and care deeply. Know that we get it. But know also that we know the judge and know that the judge has a thousand other cases with no end in sight, so their focus is different than yours.

Yep, it's a rant.

Let us help you to help yourself.

Hearing Voices

2010-02-23T22:39:00.001-05:00

Joe Stack is the latest husband gone mad. He's the guy who flew his plane into an IRS building in Austin, Texas. Apparently he burned down his house first. Reports have it that his wife took her daughter to a motel the night before so that they could be safe.

Stack lost control. He's not the first; he won't be the last. His loss of control was particularly newsworthy, but many spouses lose control in less spectacular ways.

From time to time, a client will tell me that their spouse is crazed. My first job is to determine the accuracy of that characterization. Is this just an angry spouse talking or is there some substance there. If my client tells me, "he's crazy because he doesn't discipline our child," I'm thinking he's not crazy, he just has a different standard. If my client tells me, "he's crazy because he hears voices and calls me up from work in the middle of the day, crying on the phone when he doesn't know why," I'm thinking there's probably something there.

I'll try to get as many specifics as possible. Not just, does he suffer from mood swings, but are they dramatic? What does he do when he goes through mood swings?    How do you know that he hears voices? What voices does he hear? What do those voices tell him?

When I'm satisfied that there's something there, my job is to get my client ready to explain it to the judge, who is always skeptical.

Testimony about specific conduct is essential. Conclusions will never work.  Everyone contends their spouse is crazy. Even more valuable than the client's testimony is independent evidence of conduct such as eye witnesses or the spouse's writings. Audio or video recordings of the extreme behavior are excellent so long as they don't run afoul of any prohibitions against making the recordings.

A history of psychiatric treatment is beneficial though, often people who need help don't seek it. Psychiatric records are well protected but a party can always waive the protection. The party is then faced with a grave choice, waive the record and air the issues fully and candidly, or maintain the protection and let the judge assume the worst.

When the matter involves custody or visitation, I want a psychological evaluation. The process of establishing the sanity or insanity of the party should be about getting an objective view, not a subjective view. Too many experts want to testify to what the paying party wants to hear.  I feel strongly that objective data is essential from an expert. I've known experts to spin normal behavior to suit their benefactor's purposes. I've had one psychological expert testify that he saw himself as nothing more than a Washington spin doctor. I've even known experts to make stuff up. I want the truth, not what an expert thinks I want to hear. And I can trust objective data much more than subjective opinion.

Cases involving emotionally impaired spouses are the exception. That is why so much additional work needs to go into getting the judge's attention and assistance in gathering the information necessary to establish the truth of the matter.

Bottom line: when you are trying to protect yourself and your children from an emotionally impaired spouse you need witnesses, you need evidence, you need fairly specific instances of conduct that bear out your claim before the judge will understand that your claim is something more than sour grapes or an attempt to gain an advantage.

When you are trying to escape from an emotionally impaired spouse, you need help.

...and my children live in Canada.

2010-02-22T22:54:00.000-05:00

What do you do when your ex, or even your ex soon to be, wants to move, and doesn't just want to move to Lilburn, but wants to move to another country? Maybe that doesn't sound bad at all, but how about if your ex wants to take your kids?

Your first thought? "Fight for custody!" And you'd be technically right, but infrequently, practically right. Before you launch into such a war, you need a thorough evaluation of whether you are going to win such a war. I'm a firm advocate of only starting fights you can finish. I reason that you aren't much good to your kids when you're dead, and losing a custody battle can be a similar fate.

But I don't mean for tonight's entry to be about the intracacies of custody battles. That tome can be saved for another day or series of days or even weeks. Tonight I'm writing about your ex moving the children to foreign lands.

Almost always when the ex says it's time to move to a foreign country, the country is not foreign to the ex. The ex is from there. And almost always, the American spouse knew that before the marriage. Usually the American spouse has visited the homeplace on at least one occasion. So this announcement is seldom a surprise.

The American spouse often thinks that the foreign spouse will run off with the kids, never to be seen again. However, that is seldom the case. There are certainly great examples of bad moms running away to the far reaches of the Earth, but that is not the common experience. The Hague Convention renders that option a fools choice. Foreign parents don't get far by running home. The foreign courts will enforce United States' Orders under the Hague Convention. If the foreign court gets a bit sluggish, the State Department will remind them of their legal obligation.

Getting your kids home can take more time than you want it to take (doesn't almost everything?). But when the children are shipped home, your ex is likely to only see them in extremely limited circumstances for years to come.

That's why foreign born parents rarely run. They take the good situation they have and make it far worse.

In this day of international travel and relocation, Courts increasingly look upon foreign relocation as they might long distance United States relocation, such as moving to Oregon or even Alaska. Courts are not overwhelmed by the thoughts of the children living in Germany or France or Malaysia but they are interested in maintaining the relationship between the children and the non-custodial parent.

Not only do the children come home as often as possible, the non-custodial parent develops a new holiday spot.

I don't mean to make this sound peachy. It isn't. But it isn't much different than your kids moving to Vermont or San Fransisco. Moving to a different country isn't the issue. The distance is.

I'll write more on that issue soon.

Moving On

2010-02-20T09:36:00.001-05:00

Today's entry is written by Jeremy Abernathy, an Associate with The Manely Firm, P.C. http://www.allfamilylaw.com/CM/Custom/Attorneys.asp

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It is mentioned quite often that humans are creatures of habit. In this fluid world, expectancy is cherished and appreciated. Humans seek comfort in routines and the value of predictability.

In family law, however, change is imminent. There exists the prospect of new custodial arrangements between parents. Potential shifts in marital assets loom ahead. An individual, after residing in a home for several years becomes vulnerable to living at a new address. Variations of retirement plans and goals may lie ahead. New relationships happen. Individuals that have been together for almost half of their lives begin courting new love interests. Parties that have grown accustomed to hanging out at the same sports bar or “dining- out spot” may now feel compelled to go elsewhere. New church memberships occur. Certainly, change is intertwined with many domestic law issues.

Too often, however, change is synonymous with “loss,” when indeed, change presents the opportunity for growth. French author, Andre Gide, commented, that “one does not discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time."

As lawyers for clients facing change, we must encourage them to “discover new lands.” We must help our clients place a premium on setting new goals and facing the challenges of change head- on. After hearings, status conferences, and mediations, our clients shake our hands, and are faced with the daunting task of putting their life on track and mapping out the direction they shall proceed in.

As their counsel, we must endeavor to empathize with our clients, and while in the fray with them, encourage them that “this moment too shall pass.”

Letting go of old ways of doing things does not involve giving up...it involves moving on.

Jeremy J. Abernathy

Happy Endings

2010-02-18T23:12:00.001-05:00

I'm in the liberation business.

In the divorce portion of my practice, people come to see me for one of two reasons. They either want to divorce their spouse or their spouse wants to divorce them. Either way, at the end of the process, the couple goes their seperate ways. One of the parties has shed their spouse and the other party has been shed.

The party who sought the divorce obviously feels they are in a better place. But even the party who didn't initiate the divorce is in a better place. I have a bias here that you are better off not being married to someone who doesn't want to be married to you. It's painful, but I think it is self evident. Bonnie Raitt's song, "I can't make you love me," comes to mind.

The decision to divorce and the discovery that you are being divorced is painful. There's a lot of anguish there. The process of divorce can also be hurtful, though good divorce lawyers try to minimize that. The process of divorce can be a time for self discovery and reflection as you ready yourself to move into the next phase of your life. The final product, the divorce, is a better end for both parties. It can be bitter-sweet. Sometimes there are moments of self doubt, wishes that things could have turned out better, but by the end of the process, usually all of that has been dealt with and the bright light at the end of what felt like a very dark tunnel is immediately before you, beckoning you on.

Maybe it seems strange to read this, but divorce is about freedom. If you've gone through a divorce already, you know the truth of that statement. Whether you are choosing to be free, or are being forced to become free from a spouse who no longer wants to be married to you, in the end you get your freedom. You are either no longer burdened by a relationship you have deemed dysfunctional or even destructive or no longer burdened by someone who doesn't love you as you have a right to be loved.

When I boil it all down, it means a happy ending. And almost always, my clients think so too.

Michael Manely

Just Waiting to Die

2010-02-17T21:46:00.000-05:00

In my profession I get to hear many, many very sad stories. The one I want to talk about tonight is one of the saddest I ever heard.

A female client once told me, I've been married 26 years, and I knew in the first week that I wanted a divorce. That floored me.

This woman was approaching 50, now had two grown children and had been mostly miserable every one of those 26 years. She waited until her youngest was off at college before she came to see me. When her youngest found out about her now pending divorce he asked, "why did you wait until I was gone to get some peace in the house?"

Contrast that with another client, married five weeks. She, too, knew in the first week that she wanted a divorce. Her husband's antics in the remaining four only reinforced her judgment.

Five weeks versus 26 years.

Clients will often want to revisit their history, to recover monies paid for spouse's activities such as paid off credit cards or expensive hobbies, that, hindsight being 20/20, have proven pure folly. I always tell them the sums spent is water under the bridge. That money is gone.

In divorce, parties are rewarded for making a quick decision about whether they want to end or endure the misery they share with their spouse. While arguably laudable that you stay with a spouse long after they've "flipped your switch," the law does not reimburse you for it. Cutting your losses, whenever you've lost enough (money, time, self respect), is always the better course insofar as the law is concerned.

For years, my lengthy marriage client thought she was just waiting to die. My short marriage client wasted no time in getting back to living.

Where are you?

Michael Manely

"Am I Jewish, or what?"

2010-02-16T22:58:00.005-05:00

Perhaps you've seen the news about Joseph Reyes, the Chicago divorced father who baptized his three year old daughter as Catholic. As a family law lawyer, that raises a red flag. In a divorce, usually one parent is designated to make religious decisions for the child.

Apparently, in this case, it was the Mother.

Mom is Jewish. At one time, Dad was apparently Catholic. When the parties married, Dad converted to Judaism and agreed to raise the child in the Jewish tradition. When the parties divorced, Mom received custody of the daughter and apparently obtained the authority to make religious decisions for their daughter.

There are four categories of "major decisions" which comprise legal custody: medical, educational, extracurricular, and religion. These distinctions are ever evolving, as is the nature of law, as is the nature of society. For example, the extracurricular category didn't exist 10 years ago.

In the religion category, one parent, usually the primary physical custodian, makes decisions about in which, if any, religion the child will be indoctrinated. Even so, there is no requirement that the non-custodial parent take the child to the custodial parent's church or even to a church of the custodial parent's denomination. There is no prohibition against the non-custodial parent taking the child to his own church on Sunday morning or Saturday afternoon or even during the Solstice. The prohibition is against overt acts which would create identity, such as baptism. Which is where we re-join our story.

Mr. Reyes not only took his daughter to Mass but he had her baptized Catholic, asserting, then, a Catholic identity. Mom hit the roof and obtained a restraining order against Dad from exposing the daughter to any religion but Judaism. Dad, not content with the negative spotlight already upon him, next notified the local television station that he was taking his daughter to Mass again, this time in living color on every Chicagoan's evening news. Now, Dad is looking at six months in lock up for contempt. I suspect that not only will daughter not be attending Mass in those six months, she probably won't be seeing a lot of Dad during that time, either. And she probably still won't be seeing a lot of Dad after his release.

This case is not about religious freedom. It is entirely possible that the Judge's Order prohibiting Dad from exposing his daughter to any religion but Judaism is unconstitutional. But there was no emergency need to rush the daughter to Mass. Dad did not have to violate the Judge's Order. Dad could have revisited the Judge's Order in many ways, Appeal, Motion to Reconsider, Motion for New Trial. And Dad could have been successful. But Dad took daughter to Mass, in wilful contempt for the Judge's Order, with the television cameras rolling, just to make it personal for the Judge. And I suspect he did.

This case is about power, Dad's power. First, Dad's effort to assert power over Mom. Now, Dad's effort to assert power over the Judge. And truly, Dad has power over neither.

Dad will quite possibly go to jail. I can imagine an outcry from an ill informed religous cabal that Dad's incarceration would be discriminatory, that he would be a martyr, but Dad was clearly in wilful contempt and jail would be appropriate. Further, Dad will have his access to his daughter significantly curtailed. He might be looking at supervised visits next fall, when he is released from jail.

Finally, and this tells you a lot about the story, Dad is a law student. Law students are supposed to show respect, not contempt for the law. It is quite possible that Dad will not be allowed to sit for the Bar, to become a lawyer. It is also possible that his stunt is an Honor Code violation for law students at his law school, which will result in his expulsion.

Given the brief 15 minutes of fame that will flow from Mr. Reyes' infamy, I'm reminded of Dr. Phil's famous question, "So, Dad, how's that working out for you?"

It is certainly not working out well for his daughter.

Michael Manely

The Great Recession and the American family

2010-02-15T23:24:00.000-05:00

I work in the core of what makes families tick, sometimes like a bomb. Day in and day out I hear the brutally real life stories of how American families are living, are attempting to survive in this economy. And I'm here to tell you, by and large we are not doing well.

What we hear on the news I hear in my office several times each week: "we're struggling to keep our home." Or, "we lost our home." Or, "we can't afford shoes for our children anymore. Or, "the church has been helping us out with food." And these folks, until very recently, were middle class folks, working in regular jobs, living in regular neighborhoods, sending their kids to regular schools. But now, they are losing everything.

And the house values have plummetted. Borrowing against equity was probably always a bad idea, but even folks who hadn't used their homes like a piggy bank are watching their houses appraise at tens of thousands dollars less than they thought, and often tens of thousands of dollars less than they owe. What do you do with a home that nobody wants and nobody can afford? "I don't want it, you take it," doesn't work well in mediation.

Financial stress is one of the great catalysts toward dissolving a family. How much worse it is when the couple weren't liking each other very much even before these hard economic times?

I have heard many judges contemplate a time when divorce became so expensive and complex that couples just walked away from each other, not bothering to divorce any more. The legislature has made getting a divorce ridiculously complicated. Some judges have thrown up additional barriers for unknown reasons. Legal representation can get quite expensive and the complexity of the law often makes a mockery of anyone who tries to handle it on their own.

For many people, the day when they just walk away has already come. For some, that day came some time ago. I often meet with people who have put off doing things officially (legally). It's kind of like waiting for a tooth ache to get better or a breathing problem to self-resolve. It might get better, it might resolve, but odds are, it won't. Odds are, waiting will just make it worse.

In the practice, waiting will always make it worse because the client doesn't hire me while the times are good, only when something awful has happened, like the mother has moved away with the baby. "But our private agreement on custody worked out so well for several years. Now's she's in Michigan and I can't see my baby." Or another example, "I need a divorce quick because I need to get remarried real soon." Now it's complicated. Now its expensive. Before it would have been relatively simple and manageable.

There is no great answer. There's only the best answer. And you can't know the answer if you don't ask. Ask your questions. Talk is cheap. Not asking? That can get costly.

And costly doesn't help anyone in a recession.

Michael Manely