Boston Divorce Lawyer – Boston Divorce & Family Law Attorney Blog

The video above is about a father in Texas that later discovers that the baby he thought was his, turned out to be someone else’s.  However, the family court in Texas still required him to pay child support for that child.

You think that can’t happen in a state like Massachusetts?  Well, you’re wrong.

In Massachusetts, if a “father” is in a situation where he assumed the role of father for a period of time that caused the child to know only him as the father, then despite the fact that he is not actually the biological father, may not matter.  Many factors play on a situation like this and it gets complicated from case to case, however, the important thing to take away is that if there is a child born out of wedlock, and that child is alleged to be yours, you should request a paternity test right away.

In a new book, Survived by Love, Jay Kent-Ferraro, a psychologist by training, talks about his marriage, how he cheated, got divorced and fell back in love with his wife.

I’m very much encouraged by these types of stories.  In my practice, I see couples come to me when their lives are falling apart.  I see my role as helping them rebuild from the rubbles of their failed marriage to build a new life.  Many people demonize divorce attorneys.  They think we create divorce and promote it.  In reality, couples come to us only after they’ve decided to divorce.  We did not cause the divorce itself.  Still, the stereotype persists.  Every once in a while though, I get calls from people who are really ready to divorce.  I’ll speak with them and they’ll reconsider.  Maybe they haven’t tried marriage counseling.  I’ll tell them to go try it.  Maybe they  haven’t taken a real deep look at themselves and their spouse to understand the problems and difficulties and try to fix them.  I ask them to be introspective.

When potential clients don’t call me back after I’ve had the talk with them, I like to think that maybe they decided that their marriage was worth the work.  It was worth a second chance.  I’ve also had clients who remarried their ex-spouse and I’ve had clients who stayed with their ex-spouse, though never got remarried to them.  It’s very encouraging.

Marriage isn’t forever.  Neither, apparently, is divorce.

Divorce, custody, support and probate cases in Massachusetts will go even slower than the past few years not only because of budget cuts, but due to an unprecedented number of judges retiring in 2011.  In total, 10 judges will be leaving the bench in 2011.  That amounts to about 20% of the judiciary.

In the past few years, cases in probate court has been administered slower, court dates has been assigned later, and motion hearings has been pushed back more and more due to budget cuts.  The court is severely understaffed by court personnel and clerks that take in the cases, dockets them, and puts them in front of judges to hear.  Judges have had to work overtime in order to push out cases in a fair manner up until this point.  However, with 20% of the judges leaving, we will start to see a significant slow-down in court procedures.

Uncontested cases, before 2007, used to take about 5 months from start to finish.  Now, they take about 7 months or longer from start to finish due to the court not being able to give final hearing dates as quickly.  Contested cases, though it depends on the complexity of the matter, will now mostly like take a lot longer than 9-months.