Blog Posts in February, 2018

Changes to Records Available to Adopted Children

Adoption is a wonderful way for families to expand and provide love and support to a child or children in need of a home. In the vast majority of states, adoption records are sealed. This means that adopted children are not able to obtain copies of their original birth certificates and discover the identity of their birth parents. In 2014, the governor signed a new bill changing New Jersey from a ...

How Much Do I Have to Share? - Dealing with a Nosy Former Spouse

During a marriage or relationship, spouses tend to share most of the details of their respective days. A marriage requires sharing thoughts and experiences, but that flow of information clearly ends when the relationship ends in divorce. Especially where people share children, there needs to be continued exchange of information following a divorce. There are some situations, though, where your ...

Who Should I Call to Testify? - Teachers, Babysitters, Doctors

The vast majority of divorce and custody cases end in settlements. Mediation and arbitration allow divorce and custody parties to craft their own custody orders by working together. Unfortunately, this does not always work. Parties are not always able to come to an agreement about what is best for their children. In this situation, the parties will need to have a trial and present evidence to a ...

Fighting Parental Alienation

In a perfect world, parents would always work together for the best interest of their children, and custody issues could be civilly resolved in a calm manner. Custody battles can unfortunately sometimes deteriorate when the parents use the children as a way to get back at each other. Parental alienation is one way that parental anger and resentment may manifest itself during or after a custody ...

Helping Your Children in Divorce

Divorce is a stressful process for all involved. When the spouses share children, the process is also quite stressful for the parties’ children. The children have no control over the process, but are nevertheless impacted by it. This feeling of chaos and loss of control can be exceedingly emotionally difficult for children, whether they are toddlers or teenagers. There are some steps you can take ...

How to Protect Your Family Business

Business owners know that there are many variables that need to be watched for and accounted for when creating and building the business. Business owners need to make sure to do the right type of advertising, have an online presence, account for local competitors, and a variety of other issues when planning for the future of the business. In some situations, this type of planning will also need to ...

Modifying an Out-of-State Custody Order

When most people think about what is essential at the beginning of a divorce, custody, or other family law action, they think about property disputes or some type of marital wrong-doing. For lawyers, however, the first thing to be established is jurisdiction. Jurisdiction means that the court where you file actually has the ability to make a decision about the dispute. There are two types of ...

When Does the State Get Involved in Child Support Cases?

Any parent knows that raising a child is costly. Clothes, daycare, extracurricular activities, college funds, and all the other things that go along with having a child in your care add up quickly. Child support is meant to help balance and manage those costs when parents live apart. In optimal situations, parents cooperate even when they are no longer romantically involved with each other. In ...