Articles for Lawyers

The rules have always been different for family lawyers. We can't take mortgages.1 We can't pay referral fees.2 There are page limitations on our Certifications.3 Our billings and requests for counsel fees pendente lite must be scrupulously specific. Even so, we often collect far less than the value of our services and are compelled to carry large receivables. We are treated differently than other litigators since the funds spent on the litigation process reduce the income and assets available to help family members meet necessary expenses, both before and [...]

As the Legislature goes back into session, the Senate is about to take up consideration of a measure, unanimously passed by the Assembly last June, that constitutes an unprecedented intrusion into the intact family and may severely hamper the right of parents to make decisions in their children's best interest. The bill, A-979, allows grandparents and siblings of any child to apply for visitation without regard to whether the child's parents are living or dead, married or divorced. The proposed statute sets no criteria for the court to consider [...]

Annulment, like divorce, creates a statutory exit route from a marriage or civil union. However, that is where the similarity ends. A judgment for annulment creates the legal fiction that the marriage never existed and its record can be excised from the government registry. The focus, in annulment actions, is on establishing the cause of action, which, except under very limited circumstances, must be done by clear and convincing evidence. It is noteworthy that civil annulment and religious annulments are completely unrelated and it is not necessary to have [...]