Today we’re talking about reasons your judgment can get rejected when you submit your final order to the court.

And this is regards to spousal support. Well, let me give you, I guess the rule and I’m not a lawyer, not a law firm so we can’t tell you what the laws are. I’m just going to read off what the courts are telling us. I’m just kind of referring to their documents.

The courts look at long term marriage to be anything over ten years. If you have a long term marriage and you submit your final judgment, they only way you can have spousal support waived, and now we are talking about jurisdiction to terminate spousal support is by having an agreement with your spouse.

You’d have to submit a written stipulation to that. If you’re going to do a default judgment and default is where you file for divorce, you served your spouse, there is no response and they’re not involved in the case. If you file a default and you have a long term marriage, you cannot retain or you cannot terminate jurisdiction over spousal support. The courts will retain jurisdiction indefinitely.

We had a client come in and hired us to finish their case, they had tried to submit their documents to court and this is what the court told them. “Except on written agreement of the parties to the contrary (if they have a written agreement, they can do it) or court order terminating the spousal support, the court retains jurisdiction indefinitely in a proceeding for dissolution of marriage or for legal separation of the parties where the marriage is of long duration, ten years or more from the date of marriage to the date of separation. See family code 4336.

What that tells us is, if you file a default there’s not going to be a written agreement, so, you can’t terminate jurisdiction. In fact, we’ve seen several cases returned where they did not approved the judgment where the parties were asking to terminate jurisdiction on long term marriages.

Now, in under ten years or short term marriage if you will. They’re allowing you to terminate jurisdiction.

So, if you want to terminate jurisdiction, you don’t want to ever have to pay for spousal support and you and your spouse agreed. The only way you’re going to be able to do that is by a written agreement. A default case would not be appropriate for you in that matter.

Tim Blankenship, divorce661.com.

We specialize in California divorce. You can reach me direct at 661-281-0266.

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