family & divorce law
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We specialize in the following areas of FAMILY & DIVORCE LAW:
01. Divorce
If you are currently going through a Utah divorce or a Utah child custody battle, whether it be contested or uncontested, you must hire a divorce attorney to make sure you are protecting what is rightfully yours.
02. Paternity
When two people who are not married have a child together and then later separate, they are faced with a very delicate situation. In this situation, there is no automatic presumption of paternity in the State of Utah, based on the fact that the child was born outside of a legal marriage. In order to ensure paternity, custody and all other parental rights to the child, the parties must go through a court process.
03. Custody
If you are currently going through a Utah child custody battle, whether it be contested or uncontested, you must hire a Custody Lawyer to make sure you are protecting what is rightfully yours.
04. Child Support
Child support in the state of Utah is very objective and gives little room for argument or dispute. Utah requires that both parties provide the court with actual pay stubs and tax return documents to verify what their actual monthly gross income is. These verified income amounts are then imputed into a state-created calculator. The calculator runs the numbers and gives the minimum amount of child support that must be paid each month by the obligated party.
05. Alimony
Unlike child support which is very objective and calculated with a state-created calculator, alimony is extremely subjective and the state does not use a calculator to determine how much alimony should be paid, if any. The obligated spouse will usually not have to pay alimony for a period of time longer than the time the marriage lasted. For example, if the parties were married for 5 years then the longest the obligated spouse would have to pay alimony for would be 5 years.
06. Separation
When two people separate from one another, even if only on a temporary basis, they have no real established legal rights regarding any aspect of their marital estate (assets, debts, real estate, personal property and children). This often causes confusion and increases the difficulties that already exist between the parties.
07. Modification of Divorce Decree
Often times individuals enter into agreements that make sense at the time but months or years later situations change in such away that make an agreement unfeasible, impractical or simply down right impossible. As life changes so should your agreement in some situations to reflect those changes.
08. Enforcing the Terms of the Decree
Too often one or both parties of a divorce decide not to follow the agreement they previously agreed to within their Decree of Divorce. If this happens, the other party is entitled to attend an “order to show cause” hearing with the court in an attempt to obtain compliance from the disobedient party.
09. Protective Order
In some situations obtaining a protective order is necessary in order to protect one spouse against another from physical abuse or the threat of physical abuse. Protective orders can also be obtained to protect children.
10. Stalking Injunction
Unlike a protective order, a stalking injunction is a legal mechanism that requires two “unmarried” or “unrelated” people to stay away from each other. Stalking injunctions may be issued to prevent people from threatening, harassing, intimidating, following or otherwise pestering one another.
11. Child Visitation / Parent Time
In most cases, the non custodial parent is awarded parent time with his/her children regardless of the custody arrangement. There are several different visitation schedules that a party may obtain through the court, each one being different and unique from the other.
12. Dividing Retirement Accounts
Several parties in a divorce are awarded a portion of their spouse’s retirement account whether it be a pension, 401k, IRA, etc. However, it is very difficult to actually divide the account and transfer it into the receiving spouse’s name. In order to divide the account the receiving party must go through a Qualified Domestic Relations Order process, also known as a QDRO.