Here is a quick snapshot of what I am asking to do and if its possible. Over the summer my daughters father decided after 11 years to try and take placement custody of our daughter. We went to court and the first day the judge entered a temporary change in placement to her dad and then the fight began. We had to hire a GAL and do a home study. Long story short it took 5 months, the GAL's recommedation was in my favor as well as the Custody Evaluation was all in my favor that my daughter be returned to me ASAP. 4 days before court my ex's lawyer sent me an "offer" he was offering to give my daughter back to me and a few other things that are not significant. That day in court everything that we agreed to was put on record and the judge gave his attorney 30 days to write the order up for our signatures. Since that day which was 30 days ago, my ex and his attorney are playing games in getting this order written up. They are trying to change things and add things that were not put on record that day in court. Needless to say my attorney has had to go back and forth and this is costing me additional money because he is playing games. I heard through a mutual friend that he said he dragged out this entire thing because he knew I was not working and wanted to cause financial distress to me and my husband. He has now cost me an additional $1300.00 since court because they keep trying to change what has already been decided. This entire thing has cost me $10k so far. What I need to know is this, can I take him to court for all attorneys fees? He didn't even try to fight in the end he just gave up after he cost me all this money. Don't get me wrong I am glad that he did but still! So I need to find out if I can sue him and if so do I go to the family court and county where our custody case was? Or do I take him to small claims court? Do I take him in the county he lives in or me? Any info from anyone would be greatly appreciated. I feel that he did this maliciously to cause financial distress and he should pay for it.

If I were your attorney I would consider asking the judge hearing the custody case to sanction your ex, &/or his attorney for playing games like this. I don't believe a new lawsuit is necessary or proper.

You should have asked for court costs as part of the settlement. It may not be too late to do so. Ask your attorney to talk to the judge about that.

I actually did ask my attorney if I could ask for him to pay court costs. My attorney said that the judge wouldn't award it anyway so she wasn't going to ask for it. Now that him and his attorney are dragging this out and taking their sweet time to write up this order and trying to change things I asked her again, if he keeps dragging this out will we have to go back before the court commissioner and if so can I ask that he pay my attorneys fees. Her answer to me was that if he doesn't agree now and they won't write up the order correctly then I can take it back to mediation. Mediation?? What the heck good is that going to do? The judge set a review date for 2-14-2011 to make sure that the order had been written up. Well its now the 16th and I think my attorney should contact the commissioner and let her know what is going on. But instead she keeps playing "phone tag" as she calls it with my ex's attorney and its costing me a damn fortune. Since our court date 30 days ago, with all the faxing back and forth and phone calls between me and my attorney and my attorney and his attorney Ive racked up another $1500! I was hoping that there was some type of Wisconsin statute that this would fall under that would allow for attorney fee shifting, but so far I can't find one.

Um your attorney works for YOU, not the other way around. She can advise you but you can still insist. At worst the judge can refuse you. If your attorney still refuses tell her this may be the only way she gets paid.

Scott if I want to make the court commissioner aware of what my ex is doing can I tell my attorney to do so? Because personally I think this is the only way this is going to get resolved. He can't go back on what was put on record that day. His attorney has to write it up as it says on the court website period that its, no ifs ands or buts about it. I can't afford to drag this out any longer.

Yes you should have your attorney bring this to the attention of the court.

OK so his attorney beat us to the punch and wrote a letter to the commissioner but made it out like I am the one holding this up and trying to change things. So I had a conversation with my attorney and said why didn't we write a letter right away to the commissioner ourselves. So now she wrote one explaining the entire scenario and that it is not me doing the back pedaling. So that was over a week ago and I still have not heard anything, this is so ridiculous! And my attorney said that a commissioner can not take away the tax exemption or the right to claim it from one party or another. Like hell they cant! I know they can. My attorney is really starting to piss me off, pardon my french. I just want this done so I can file my dang taxes already!

Sounds like you need a new attorney.

If your ex's attorney couldn't get the order right, your attorney should have written it up and submitted it to the judge for the judge's approval. Normally an order doesn't need to be signed by the parties.

OK this just keeps getting better and better. So I explained how his attorney wrote up the order for the judge and in her cover letter she told the judge that if "she" the judge agrees that he gets to keep her on his insurance which was not what was agreed upon in court then she should simple put a line through that item on the court papers and sign and stamp them. WHAT? So I talked to my attorney about it and she says don't worry about it the judge isn't going to put a line through and item like that. Well guess what? She did. I don't know who the heck this court commissioner thinks she is, this whole entire thing has been messed up from the word go and none of it is right or fair. So now my daughter is stuck on her dads insurance which there are copays and it doesn't cover as good as our insurance does. So I asked my attorney to ask that he then be responsible for all the copays since he didn't want her on the better insurance and she told me no. I don't have the money to hire a new attorney and already owe this attorney tons of money. So I am pretty much stuck! What really ticks me off the most about this attorney is the only reason they took my case is because I had information about an individual involved in another case of theirs. The information that I had would help their case against this person, so once they knew that they wrote up a statement and basically told me if I don't sign it they will supbeona me then. This was afer I told them that I was leary about giving them that info because this person is dangerous and I didn't want any retaliation, I have children to think about. They didn't care and made it sound as though if I gave them this info they would waive the large retainer fee and take on my case. So I needed an attorney desperately and didn't have the $5k retainer and agreed to it. Since then, its impossible to get a response from them on anything and they basically have done nothing this entire time but I owe them another $7k!! This whole thing when all said and done will have cost me $10k. The commissioner I feel has been unfair this entire time. Who do you complain to about a court commissioner? Who is their boss? I just don't know what to do, I need to take my ex back for contempt because he has never provided child support with copies of his taxes like the divorce decree stated but I can't have my attorney do it so Im filing it on my own. I will probably get my rear end handed to me in court but I have to try and recoup some of this money somehow. He has been witholding income info from the court too. He has rental income that he never disclosed. This is such a mess I feel like Im stuck in a bad soap opera!! Any advice, suggestions etc would be greatly appreciated at this time.

OK another angle now. Our original divorce decree states that my ex can claim our daughter on his taxes IF he is not behind or in arrears on child support. Ive had a few other people tell me that the IRS does not have to abide by a divorce decree. Then what is the sense of putting that in there? Anyway, he is severely behind on child support right now becaues him and his attorney dragged their feet getting this order written. So now he is in arrears $2145.00. They wrote in the new order that he will pay back the arreages at $10 per week. So if you do the math on that, it will take him 215 weeks, which turns out to be about 4 years. So per our decree I should be able to claim her every year he is still behind right? I would assume all I need to do is bring my divorce decree and the statement from child support showing his arreages. I would like to believe I would not be penalized for this, unless someone tells me otherwise.

If you file electronically first, then he will have to file manually and prove he's entitled to the deduction. And vice versa.

I see at least two new angles:

1. Originally Posted by kanicky73

   ... Our original divorce decree states that my ex can claim our daughter on his taxes IF he is not behind or in arrears on child support. Ive had a few other people tell me that the IRS does not have to abide by a divorce decree. ...
   So per our decree I should be able to claim her every year he is still behind right?? ...
   Yep. Looks like it to me. As ScottGem said, first to file the taxes requires the other to file manually, and then the IRS decides.
   
   
2. Originally Posted by kanicky73

   ... Anyway, he is severely behind on child support right now becaues him and his attorney dragged their feet getting this order written. So now he is in arrears $2145.00. They wrote in the new order that he will pay back the arreages at $10 per week. So if you do the math on that, it will take him 215 weeks, which turns out to be about 4 years. ...
   The judge signed this? I would have asked him to strike that language from the order. But if it's signed, that's the way it is I suppose.