My husband filed for modification in California on 11/5/08. The paperwork started and as soon as the ex-wife received a letter to fill out her financial information she hired an attorney 12/5/08 to say he was in arrears with the child support. She lives in Missouri with her daughter and the divorce and child support originally happened in California. The case in Missouri was dismissed 12/09. Meanwhile there was a court case to finalize the modification in California 11/09. The support was modified and she filed an appeal in Missouri. The other judge granted her appeal on the basis that the original modification was only filed administratively not in the courts until 5/09. It seems that my husband is getting penalized for the long wait time of the court system in California. Is there anything that he could get from the courts or lawyer so our lawyer can use it in Missouri to show the process of filing a modification in California? He is paid up with the child support that was granted as the modification in November.

Generally jurisdiction remains in the original court (or state) until BOTH parties move from that state. Then jurisdiction can be changed to the state where the child resides.

If you already have an attorney, they should know that and they should be able to vacate the Missouri judges action on the grounds that he had no jurisdiction.

In the meantime your husband pays what the CA court ruled he should pay. Does he pay through an agency or directly to the mother?

Directly to user but we use checks and document everything. What I don't understand is why a ruling was made based on when the California courts could get it on a docket. The lawyer was asking him to go to the child support agency to get any paper work about this

The mother got a friendly MO judge to rule for her. Why I don't know. But that doesn't mean the ruling follows law. Its pretty clear that, since your husband has remained in the jurisdiction of the original court, that is where jurisdiction continue to reside. Therefore, no other court can make a ruling on the case. Ergo the order from that other court is invalid. That's the only tactic your attorney needs to take.

Thanks. This is helpful and encouraging.

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Originally Posted by ScottGem

The mother got a friendly MO judge to rule for her. Why I don't know. But that doesn't mean the ruling follows law. Its pretty clear that, since your husband has remained in the jurisdiction of the original court, that is where jurisdiction continue to reside. Therefore, no other court can make a ruling on the case. Ergo the order from that other court is invalid. That's the only tactic your attorney needs to take.

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I completely agree with what Scott has been saying. Questions of this nature have been posted many many times. And the laws he is referring to are federal laws.