Ventura, CA
Family Lawyer at Ventura, CA
Practice Areas: Family, Child Custody ... +3 more
OUTCOME: Father has sole legal and sole physical custody; Mother has only supervised telephone visitation.
Father hired us after Mother took the parties' two children and fled with them to another country. Working with the District Attorney's office under the Hague Convention, we recovered the children and ... had them returned to Father.
OUTCOME: After a contested trial, our client obtained a 5-year domestic violence restraining order against opposing party, and the Court granted her sole legal and sole physical custody of the minor children.
Our client had been in a relationship with opposing party for a few years, and had two small children with him. After the birth of the first child he started tormenting her, physically harming her in m ... any instances. She got the courage to leave him, and to hire an attorney to protect herself and her children.
OUTCOME: Pension plan preserved as separate property.
My client's divorce from his prior wife was finalized over 29 years ago. Judgment was entered at that time in accordance with then-current law, granting my client his entire federal pension as his sol ... e and separate property. Opposing party filed a motion for distribution of his pension plan in 2010, trying to get a distribution of the plan under current law. The law granting my client the plan as his sole property was overturned by Congress about a year later. At the same time, the California State Legislature passed a law that gave ex-spouses until January 1, 1986 to go back to court to set aside or redistribute the pensions under these final judgments. I argued that the deadline for redistribution was long past and that the Court now has no jurisdiction, under current law, to go back nearly 30 years to modify the judgment, when Wife had 5 years to do so and never took action. My client's pension plan was preserved as his sole and separate property.
OUTCOME: Sole legal, sole physical custody to Dad, with a NICE spousal and child support award payable by Mom to Dad.
Our client was a stay-at-home dad of three very young children whom Wife had nominated as Father of the Year the previous summer. When my client filed for divorce, opposing party engineered a domestic ... violence incident and accused our client of child molestation, which resulted in our client losing custody of these three children for several months. The trial over the restraining orders and custody issues occurred at the onset of this case, and took 8 days of court time spread over 7 months.
OUTCOME: Our client received her one-half share of the substantial community estate, which the Court found dated from 2000 as we argued; and our client has primary custody of the child. We also received an excellent support order.
This case involved a lengthy custodial dispute and an even longer dispute over the character of the community property estate. These parties had been together for 14 years, became domestic partners in ... 2000, and were married by civil union in another state. It was our contention that the law in the State of California provided that the property acquired from the date of the domestic partnership until the date of separation was community property, and that the child would be best served by remaining with our client, who had been the stay at home mom since the child's birth.
OUTCOME: Judgment with attached settlement agreement entered within 60 days of filing (though status not restored as single persons for another 4 months).
This case involved two people married many, many years, who had built a sizeable community property estate. There were no minor children, though spousal support was at issue.
OUTCOME: My clients have adopted the child and the period of appeal has passed.
A child was given to my clients for adoption. Biological mother later attempted to recover the child.
OUTCOME: My clients have adopted the child and the period of appeal has passed.
A child was given to my clients as guardians. After over two years of biological mother making no attempt to contact the child or support the child in any way, her parental rights were terminated and ... the child freed for adoption.