Last month a San Diego resident fell to his death during a skydiving exercise when his parachute did not deploy. The man was an experienced sky diver, and his parachute was equipped with a device that would have automatically opened the chute if the user failed to trigger it manually. Although an official manner of…
What happens if a person sees domestic violence but, for the most part, doesn’t actually physically experience it? According to a decision of the Court of Appeal, it may still count as “abuse”, allowing the person who saw what happened to get a restraining order under California’s Domestic Violence Prevention Act (DVPA). In a 3-0 decision…
The public fight over the care and conservatorship of famed radio personality and voice-over actor Casey Kasem, who died last month, has brought to the fore the legal problems family members can face when there is an internecine feud over the care of a loved one. The case has in fact prompted legislation to be…
What does it take to get a domestic violence restraining order in California? According to a recent decision by the State’s Court of Appeal, there simply needs to be “an affidavit showing past abuse”. In other words, the person seeking the restraining order does not have to additionally prove that there is a probability…
San Diego is home to tens of thousands of military personnel, who get married, raise families, and on occasion get divorced like everyone else. While military servicemembers may encounter the same family law matters as everyone else, certain aspects of military life create challenges that require certain family law matters to be handled somewhat differently…
What happens if a divorcing husband’s parents are rich — very rich — and have a history of giving money to their son? Is the wife allowed to add up the money that her in-laws have given and use that to get higher child and spousal support? Not always, the California Court of Appeal said in…
“Oh, What a Night!” That’s the line from the famous song by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, and it is also the line that the winning party may want to be singing after last week’s major Family Law decision by the California Supreme Court. That’s because the winning party is Frank Valli, further made famous in the…
A San Diego police officer who has been arrested twice for domestic violence in the month and is currently under suspension from the police force has filed for divorce from his wife of four years. In the petition, the husband is asking for sole custody of the couple’s two young children, alleging this action is…
Just because it works on Law and Order or some other television show, doesn’t mean it works in California. The Commission on Judicial Performance has publicly admonished a California judge for being sarcastic. In one particularly, eggregious situation, the Hon. Ronald M. Sohigian overruled an attorney’s hearsay objection to a question. The attorney responded, “Your…
There is always a temptation to want to “tell all” in a divorce case. Well now, in a California divorce case, an appeals court has warned of the consequences of not telling all. The case is Marriage of Moore. The husband is a Chico Police officer. One of the benefits of his employment is a…
