Posted on April 23, 2015 in Divorce

A recent study by the ING U.S. Retirement Research Institute looked at the effect divorce has on individuals feeling financially prepared for retirement. The negative effects are, in part, due to mistakes people make while still married and subsequently during a divorce that may have an effect on their retirement funds, especially for women.

The study found that only 45 percent of divorced individuals felt prepared for their retirement compared to 54 percent of married persons. It also found that those who were married (or living as married) independently saved $40,000 more on average for their retirement compared to singles.

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 Posted on April 21, 2015 in Divorce

If you are considering filing for divorce, you are likely aware of the different approaches you can take to end your marriage. Not every dissolution of marriage is carried out in the courtroom – in fact, it can be much faster, easier, and less expensive to divorce outside of court.

Mediation is a popular way for couples to divorce. With mediation, the couple works through their issues in a calm, non-threatening environment with help from a licensed mediator.

Mediation is not the best approach for every divorcing couple. When there are accusations of domestic violence or other criminal activity cited as the reason for the divorce, uncontrollable rage or other negative emotions, or one spouse is battling a substance addiction, mediation is usually not the best choice. Talk to your attorney about the circumstances and details of your divorce and let him or her help you determine whether or not the mediation approach is right for you.

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 Posted on April 16, 2015 in Child Custody

Child custody struggles are often high stakes, emotional legal proceedings, and judges understand this. While judges see these sorts of disputes often, they are generalists and not necessarily experts on family dynamics and child development. Consequently, they may choose to order something known as a 604(b) evaluation, named for the portion of the Illinois Marriage and Dissolution of Marriage Act that allows it. These 604(b) evaluations involve an expert, usually someone like a psychologist or social worker, sitting down with the family members and conducting interviews to make a recommendation about child custody.

How Evaluations Work

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 Posted on April 14, 2015 in Child Custody

One of the most important pieces of any divorce proceeding is the child custody portion. During the child custody phase, the court determines how the parents will raise any children who resulted from the marriage. This can mean developing a custody arrangement where both parents share control of the children, or giving custody to one parent over the other. The high stakes of child custody decisions means that parents entering a divorce often look to divorce lawyers to make predictions about the outcome of child custody decisions. Unfortunately, Illinois law makes it difficult to predict how judges will rule when making custody decisions.

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 Posted on April 09, 2015 in Divorce

DuPage County Family Law Attorneys Look at National Divorce Rate Declines

Will DuPage County divorce lawyers see declining divorce rates in 2015?  According to a New York Times TheUpshot article, the U.S. divorce rate has been on the decline and no longer is it true that half of all marriages end in divorce. According to the article, the divorce rate peaked in the 1970s and early 1980s and has been decreasing for the last 30 years.

Marriages occurring in the 2000s are seeing far less divorce rates. If this current trend continues, nearly two-thirds of marriages will never result in a divorce, according to Justin Wolfers, contributor to The UpShot and a University of Michigan economist. The lowering divorce trend has been said to be in large part due to changing gender roles and the expectations of marriage from women. The article covers additional reasons for the national divorce decline including later marriages, birth control and the increase of marrying for love.

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 Posted on April 09, 2015 in Child Custody

Emancipation is often discussed like it is the severing of the parent/child relationship, something that the minor can do in cases where they would be better off striking out on their own. However, the actual effects of emancipation are more complicated and more narrow than a true severing of the relationship. Emancipation in Illinois is governed by the Emancipation of Minors Act of 1980, which allows for the emancipation of mature minors. Emancipation is a serious decision and should only be considered after people understand its effects, when it is available, and how to go about it.

The Effects of Emancipation

Emancipation is less like a severing of the relationship between a parent and a child and more like a child reaching adulthood. It severs a parent’s rights of control over the minor rather than the relationship as a whole, so things like inheritance would still function normally. Emancipation allows minors to enter into binding legal contracts, have financial and physical separation from their parents, and make medical decisions for themselves. It is also often used to allow homeless minors to take fuller advantage of government services than they could as part of their family.

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 Posted on April 07, 2015 in Child Custody

Although the vast majority of child custody disputes are settled without either party resorting to illegal or otherwise improper tactics, those sorts of events do happen. One of the most serious of these illegal tactics is a parental abduction, in which one parent absconds with the child without permission. This can be particularly difficult to deal with if the parent leaves the country because getting foreign courts to send a child back to their home country can be both expensive and time-consuming.

In order to help prevent those types of abductions, the federal government places restrictions on passport applications for minors. The law requires both parents to consent to the child's getting a passport, so that one parent cannot simply get the child a passport and then leave the country. However, there are important exceptions to this rule that single parents should be aware of.

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 Posted on April 02, 2015 in Child Support

Illinois law provides parents who are owed child support many different ways to collect on their debts. Most of these are civil penalties, such as wage garnishments, but for severe cases of unpaid child support, the state can bring criminal charges. Illinois law creates the crime of failure to support, also known as criminal nonsupport, which punishes parents for avoiding their support obligations. Parents who owe or are owed large amounts support should both understand what it takes to trigger a prosecution for criminal nonsupport, as well as the procedure for how they get initiated.

What Criminal Nonsupport Is

Criminal nonsupport is a crime that can be committed in several different ways. First, if a supporting parent has made no payments in more than six months or they have fallen behind on their payments by more than $5,000, then they may be guilty of criminal nonsupport. Second, if the supporting parent has failed to make any payments within a year or is more than $20,000 behind on their payments, they may also be guilty. Finally, a person can also commit criminal nonsupport by leaving the state with the goal of evading child support payments. However, to do that they must have a child support debt of over $10,000 or have made no payments in the last six months.

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 Posted on March 25, 2015 in Same Sex Marriage in Illinois

As of 2011, both same-sex and opposite-sex couples may enter civil unions. Civil unions are similar to marriages, but there are differences. Civil unions are granted by the county clerk's office. To legally enter a civil union, both partners must be 18 years old or older and they may not be blood relatives.

Before you enter a civil union with your partner, talk to an experienced family attorney about your rights and obligations following the union. These rights differ from those afforded to married couples. As of 2014, same sex couples have the right to marry in Illinois under the Illinois Religious Freedom Protection and Marriage Fairness Act. However, some couples continue to opt for a civil union instead.

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 Posted on March 23, 2015 in Divorce

There is more than one way for Illinois couples to effectively end their marriages. The most common method by far is divorce. When a couple gets a divorce, they go through the legal process of ending their marriage by dividing their property and arranging for their children's care and support. For some couples, an annulment is an option. If the couple can prove that their marriage is not valid, an annulment can quickly render their marriage void. Reasons for an annulment include one partner was too young to consent to marriage at the time of their wedding or one partner was married to another individual when the couple married. The final option is legal separation.

Legal separation is not the same as the type of separation that often precedes a divorce. This type of separation is discussed in the Illinois Marriage and Dissolution of Marriage Act. With a legal separation, the couple must file paperwork and submit it to the court as if they were going through the divorce process. They then go before a judge to have their case heard and settled, which may include the same provisions as a divorce, such as child custody arrangement, child support, spousal maintenance, and property division. Essentially, a legal separation is almost identical to a divorce. The only difference between a legal separation and a divorce is that a legally separated individual can not remarry unless he or she opts to get a divorce.

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