sparky256DSL Posted April 18, 2008 Report Posted April 18, 2008 My wife was previously married and in their divorce decree it states her ex was to pay all of the past due medical bills for the children. There were about 12 unpaid accounts. When I first started dating her we arranged for about 8 of those account to be forgiven, due to her being single and not making enough money. She still has about 4 unpaid account on her reports.The collections are all in her name and, of course, will not take them out of her name no matter what. The CAs did agree to delete the accounts if she paid them because of the situation.We have tried working with her ex and he is the type of meth head that will lie about the color of his shirt in front of you. He said he would send money. We never received it. Then he said someone cashed the money order. So we asked for the MO information so we could verify. He of course can not find the stub now even though an hour later he had and "called" to check the status of it. It's all BS.It has been 4 years since the divorce was final and we are now to the point were we are going to file for a civil judgment against him. My question is should we ask him to pay the Hospital that "forgave" the other accounts? Can we have him pay court costs and legal fees? What about punative damages for making it difficult for her to obtain credit for the last 4 years? We plan on speaking with a lawyer but I wanted to know what you people thought of this first.Thank you.
swirlgirl Posted April 18, 2008 Report Posted April 18, 2008 If the debt was incurred prior to the divorce and the divorce decree clearly states that the bills are the ex's responsibility, then are these debts truly yours? I know that some state laws vary in marital issues. But, did you ever write a letter to the CA explainig this and sending along a copy of the divorce decree?
Debt Guy Posted April 18, 2008 Report Posted April 18, 2008 This is kinda confusing.First, the divorce decree is not binding on creditors. The creditor is free to go after whichever party is easiest. The situation you describe is very common where one ex-spouse creates financial problems for the other post-divorce.I'm no family law expert. Your spouse has the right to take ex back to court for failure to live up to his end of the decree. Logically, you have right to ask for damages if you have suffered financial damages. The burden to prove the damages will be on your spouse. For example, if ex' bad behavior caused trash on wife's credit report above and beyond what would have been their anyway AND said trash caused a higher interest rate on a loan AND you can document and support the cost of that financial damage, I think you would have a reasonable chance of the judge awarding a judgment in favor of your spouse. Collecting, of course, is a different problem.The judge can perhaps do some things to motivate the ex. Not sure what those tools are in your state. At the extreme, an orange jumpsuit is possible -- but, judges are generally loathe to do that since it generates no revenue that can go to creditors.The one thing the judge cannot do is order a creditor to release your spouse from the obligation. Likewise, the judge cannot order the CRAs to modify the way they report.Your family lawyer would know for sure what was and was not possible. But, yes. I think it makes sense. Not sure you will ever see any of the money.
flacorps Posted April 19, 2008 Report Posted April 19, 2008 The judge can perhaps do some things to motivate the ex. Not sure what those tools are in your state. At the extreme, an orange jumpsuit is possible -- but, judges are generally loathe to do that since it generates no revenue that can go to creditors.Already having a decree in hand, she simply needs to go to court to get it enforced. The orange jumpsuit may be more effective than one might think. In some localities, bail is set at the amount needed to solve the problem, and once it's posted they hand it right over to the party in need of the money and let the ex-spouse go.
merrybucks Posted April 19, 2008 Report Posted April 19, 2008 If he is a meth head as you say does he have the money to pay? If not, you are just going to waste your time and money.
sparky256DSL Posted April 19, 2008 Author Report Posted April 19, 2008 He does maintain a job 75% of the year. He seems to slip into long stages of addiction and then comes out and has it "under control" for a while. I assume like any debt in IA we could ask to garnish his wages to collect the money. I understand the CAs don't care about a divorce decree or anything but fortunantly we have been able to explain the situation and they have told us they will remove the accounts from her reports if they are paid in full. We plan on paying and taking care of the situation with the CAs but why should we let him NOT live up to his obligations? Do you think we can get attorney fees and court costs covered as well. The damages would probably be hard to prove because she had some other items on her credit that might have affected the creditors decisions in the past as well.
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