Author Archives: Steve Harton

About Steve Harton

I am an attorney licensed to practice in Wyoming, Utah and Florida. My wife and I have four grown kids. In my free time I travel, camp, fish and ride my '72 Moto Guzzi Ambassador.

Wyoming Divorce Lawyers – How to Choose One?

by Steve Harton

Choosing a divorce lawyer overwhelms many a person facing a divorce. You are already under a great deal of stress, and probably under financial pressure, and now you must select a lawyer to help you through some of the most difficult times of your life. Hiring a Wyoming divorce lawyer is made even more difficult because Wyoming does not recognize certified divorce lawyers or family law attorneys. Therefore, you must rely on your own research.

In choosing a divorce lawyer, you can:

Ask your friends and family for recommendations,
Search through the Wyoming State Bar’s directory,
Look at advertisements in the yellow pages,
View divorce lawyer listings in online lawyer directories, and
Visit attorneys’ web pages.

Whenever you are researching on any of these places, look for clues as to the lawyers’ experience, their style and approach to family law, their interest in divorce law, and their willingness to share information about divorce laws and procedures.

Friends and family

Friends and family are generally a great source of information. However, you must dig deeper, and find out why they may be recommending a particular divorce lawyer. Is it because they themselves used the lawyer, or did they have one of their own friends and relatives use that lawyer? Are they recommending the lawyer because they got what they wanted? Or because the lawyer was cheap, prompt, nice, aggressive, etc. You should find out if your values line up with their values. Did they like the lawyer because he was a “bulldog” and punished the other side? Or did the lawyer help them work through the divorce in a civil manner? Find out their reasons for recommending the lawyer, and then evaluate whether those same reasons resonate with you as well.

Wyoming State Bar Directory

The Wyoming State Bar offers an online directory of attorneys, and they also have a lawyer referral service. The directory provides contact information and perhaps a link to the lawyer’s website, and it will also tell you whether the lawyer has had any disciplinary issues with the bar. Unfortunately, the directory does not tell you whether that attorney is a divorce lawyer, or some other type of lawyer. The lawyer referral service will provide you with a list of attorneys in a specific practice area, in a specific city or county. However, not all Wyoming divorce lawyers are listed in the referral service, because it costs money to list, and because the attorney must carry professional liability insurance. This policy is quite expensive, and many lawyers do not have it. Finally, many attorneys do not wish to pay to have themselves listed in the service, even if they do carry insurance.

Yellow Pages advertizing

Yellow Pages advertizing was once the king of lawyer marketing, but with clients’ increasing use of the internet, the Yellow Pages are no longer the only place to find out about an attorney. The biggest problem with Yellow Pages advertizing is that the most prominent listings are simply purchased. Anyone can fork out a thousand dollars (or much more) per month, and have the biggest ad in the book. So, when researching in the yellow pages of your phone book, don’t just look at the size of the ad. Ask yourself the following questions:

Does the ad copy tell you that a particular attorney focuses on divorce law (and other family law topics), or does is tell you that the attorney will represent you in many different kinds of cases?
If the lawyer claims to take five, ten types of cases, are they really going to be good in all of them?

So, when looking for a Wyoming divorce lawyer in the yellow pages, look for ads that show you that the attorney is focused on divorce law.

Choosing a divorce lawyer is not easy

As you can see, finding information on divorce lawyers is not that easy, but with a little research, you can save yourself some time and money by only contacting attorneys that show their interest or focus on divorce law.

Another place you can search for a Wyoming divorce lawyer is in online lawyer directories, and then you should always visit a lawyer’s website. To learn more about those topics, read Part 2 of this post.

By Steve Harton

Wyoming divorce with children

by Steve Harton

A divorce in Wyoming gets considerably more complicated, and usually more expensive, if there are minor children involved. When a divorcing couple has minor children, the Complaint for Divorce must contain more information, the Stipulation and Agreement and the Divorce have more terms, and are therefore longer. Finally, there are additional documents that have to prepared.

Minor Child Defined

Initially, we must define who is a minor child, in the context of a divorce. Under Wyoming law, the following persons are minor children:

Children under the age of eighteen, who has never been married, and who are not in the active military service of the United States,
Children who are under the age of twenty (20) and attending high school or an equivalent program as full time participants
Children who are mentally or physically disabled and thereby incapable of supporting themselves.

Furthermore, natural or adopted children are treated the same in a divorce proceeding, even if one spouse is a natural parent, and the spouse adopted the child.

Divorce Complaint with Minor Children

Whenever minor children are involved, the divorce complaint must contain additional information. It must state the facts necessary to give the Court jurisdiction (or the power) to make a child custody decision. Generally, this means that the children have lived in Wyoming for the previous six months. There are other situations where the Court may not exercise its jurisdiction over the children, such as pending court cases in Wyoming or other states involving the children. Other situations like that may include cases where the children have guardians who are not their parents, or if there are current child neglect or child delinquency cases involving the children.

Therefore, a complaint for divorce must include a sworn statement that lists the following information:

Where (county and state), and with whom (name and relationship) the minor children have lived during the past five years
Whether there are any other court cases involving the minor children pending in any other state
Whether or not anyone other than the divorcing couple has, or claims to have, custody of the minor children

In addition, the complaint should state who has custody of the children now, who should have custody of the minor children after the divorce, and who should pay child support.

Stipulation and Agreement for Divorce with Minor Children

The Stipulation and Agreement for Divorce is a document that is filed with the Court setting out the divorcing parties’ agreements regarding child custody, support and visitation. Attorneys draft these so that the Divorce Decree does not have to include all the visitation (and detailed property division) terms. The Stipulation includes who has custody, and the other parent’s visitation rights. The standard terms in Wyoming are every other weekend, one weeknight each week from after school until about 8:00, alternating holidays (Christmas, New Year, Easter, Thanksgiving), and six weeks in the summer. Most stipulations also set out special visits like mother’s/father’s days, family reunions, etc. In addition, the Stipulation also specifies which parent will get the tax deductions. In divorce cases where parties reach agreement, these are usually split or alternated, but the IRS default is that the custodial parent gets them.

Divorce Decree with Minor Children

The Decree of Divorce with minor children will include the names and dates of birth of the minor children. It will also generally grant joint legal custody of the children to the parents, but will grant primary physical custody of the children to either the mother or father. The Decree will also specify the amount of child support to be paid, and award the tax credit to one of the parents. The Decree generally references the Stipulation for the visitation terms, and does not include the specifics.

Income Withholding Order

Whenever the Court orders one party to pay child support, an Income Withholding Order must be entered. This Order is signed by the Judge, and orders any employer of the non-custodial parent to withhold a portion of his/her income for child support.

Confidential Information Statement

Wyoming law requires that a proposed income withholding order be accompanied by a Confidential Information Statement. This document contains the name, date of birth, state of birth, social security number, address, employer, and employer’s address of each parent. In addition, it includes the name, date of birth, state of birth, social security number of each of the children. This information is used by the courts and child support enforcement agencies to keep track of child support payments.

Notice to Payor

A Notice to Payor is a document that informs the employer of the non-custodial parent how much child support to withhold, and where to send that child support. It will contain the address of the Clerk of District Court in which the divorce decree was entered, because under Wyoming law, all child support payments are required to be made through the Clerk of Court.

If you would like to see an additional topic covered here at Wyoming Divorce, please leave a question or comment here.

By Steve Harton

Filing for Divorce in Wyoming

Filing for divorce in Wyoming is relatively easy, especially if no minor children are involved, and you may be able to do it yourself. However, if you and your spouse have minor children, then you should seriously consider hiring a Wyoming divorce lawyer.

You need to draft a Complaint for Divorce, and complete a Civil Cover Sheet and a Vital Statistics Form, and you will also need to prepare a Summons for the Clerk of Court. You will then take these documents to the Clerk of District Court, along with the filing fee of $70.00, and your divorce will be filed, and a Summons will be issued.

Complaint for Divorce

The Complaint for Divorce sets out the names of the parties, states the jurisdictional facts, and requests the court to grant the divorce, divide the parties’ property, and sometimes to restore the wife’s maiden name. It is a simple document, and does not need to list the Parties’ property or debts. Here is an example of a Complaint for Divorce with No Children .

Civil Cover Sheet

The civil cover sheet is a form that must be filed with the initial divorce papers. You write in the names of the parties, the address of the Plaintiff, and you check whether or not this is a divorce with children or divorce without children, and then sign and date it. This is an example of a Civil Cover Sheet .

Vital Statistics Form

The Vital Statistics Form collects the information used by the office of Vital Statistics to track divorce information and to share it with similar offices in other states. Here is a sample Vital Statistics Form for a divorce with no children.

When completing this form, be sure to print clearly. In addition, be sure to write out dates completely, such July 4, 2011, and not 7/4/11.

Summons

Once you submit all these documents to the Clerk of District Court, along with your filing fee of $70.00, the Clerk will issue the Summons. The Summons informs the Defendant that a Complaint was filed against them. It also notifies the Defendant that he or she has twenty (20) days to file an answer to the Complaint, or thirty (30) days to answer, if they are served outside the State of Wyoming. Finally, the Summons also notifies the Defendant that if they do not file an answer within the twenty (or thirty) days, then default may be taken against them. This is an example of a sample Summons.

What else is needed to file for a divorce in Wyoming? Well no other documents are necessary. However, you should always make two copies (in addition to the original) of anything you file with the Court. The original is filed, and one copy is served on the other party, and one copy should be kept for your own records.

In addition, if you are filing a divorce with minor children, then you will, in addition to the documents listed above, need to file a redacted copy of the Complaint for divorce. A redacted copy contains only the initials and years of birth of the minor children. Finally, you must pay the filing fee, which is $70.00. Once you have your copies of the Complaint for Divorce, and the Summons, you can hire a process server to serve the documents on you spouse. This can be a sheriff’s deputy, or a private process server, and the service of process charge in Wyoming is usually around $35.00.

Legal Separation

Divorce or Legal Separation

People often wonder whether they could get a legal separation instead of a divorce. There is a mechanism for obtaining a legal separation in Wyoming, but the process is very similar to a divorce proceeding. The end result is generally a division and separation of the parties’ property, while keeping the parties legally married.

Advantages of Legal Separation

Although it is much like a divorce, a legal separation does provide some distinct advantages to couples in unique circumstances.

Maintain health insurance coverage

In many marriages, one of the spouses provides health insurance coverage through their employment to both parties. The legal separation can be used to split the parties’ property, but preserve the legal institution of marriage.

This arrangement could be useful for couples near “retirement” age, in order to maintain insurance coverage until medicare kicks in. This would normally be a temporary situation, and the parties would still need to get a divorce later.

Preserve marital assets

A legal separation could also help a couple where one of the spouses suffers from a disability that creates a potential financial liability. For instance, some people cannot control their spending, others have substance abuse issues. Some people have a diminished mental capacity, and are easily talked into signing unfair contracts. This could be a long term, or even permanent, arrangement.

Disadvantages of Legal Separation

The Parties are still married, so neither can marry another person.

photo credit: Imagens Evangélicas

Legal separation is controlled by W.S. Section 20-2-106. To read these statutes, click here. If you would like to see an additional topic covered here at Wyoming Divorce, please leave a question or comment here.

By Steve Harton

Wyoming Divorce Overview

Divorce or Annulment

People often wonder whether they can avoid a divorce, and have their marriage annulled instead. However, in Wyoming, annulment is only available for people who entered into a marriage that is either void or voidable, or on the grounds of physical incapacity. If none of the grounds are applicable, then the parties must divorce to end the marriage. Annulment will be discussed in more detail in another post.

Divorce or Legal Separation

People also wonder whether they could get a legal separation instead of a divorce. There is a mechanism for obtaining a legal separation in Wyoming, but the process is very similar to a divorce proceeding. The end result is generally a division and separation of the parties’ property, while keeping the parties legally married. Legal separation will be discussed in more detail in another post.

Residency requirement

The State of Wyoming, as all other states, has a residence requirement for persons filing for a divorce. In order to get a divorce in Wyoming, the person filing for divorce must have been a resident of Wyoming for sixty days immediately prior to filing the Complaint for Divorce.

Grounds for Divorce

The grounds for divorce in Wyoming are either irreconcilable differences or insanity. The grounds of insanity are rarely used, as most people can point to some irreconcilable differences. These are commonly things like infidelity, abandonment, abuse, non-support, or incompatibility. Although most judges are not particularly concerned about the actual differences, Wyoming is not a no-fault divorce state, and the judge must find one of the Parties at fault in order to grant the divorce to the other.

Alimony and Property Division

In all Wyoming divorces, the Court must deal with the issues of alimony and marital property division. Alimony is rarely awarded in Wyoming. If one of the spouses needs support and the other is able to pay it, then the Courts prefer to adjust the property division to make that compensation. That is one of the reasons that in Wyoming, the division of marital property is “equitable.” This is a legal term, and it does not necessarily mean equal. The Court considers such factors as the merits of the respective parties and the condition in which they be left after the divorce. Another important consideration is through whom the property was acquired, and the burdens each party is left with, including support of children.

Children of Divorce

In the event that the parties have minor children at the time of the divorce, the Court will also decide the issues of child custody, visitation and child support.

Custody and Visitation

In Wyoming, there is generally a distinction between legal custody and physical custody of the children. Legal custody concerns a parent’s decision-making rights, responsibilities and authority relating to the health, education and welfare of the child. Physical custody concerns the child’s residence, and is the basis of child support determinations. In general, parents are granted joint legal custody of their children. However, minor children are usually placed in the primary physical custody of one parent, and the other parent is granted reasonable visitation privileges and ordered to pay child support.

Child Support

Child support is based on the amount of time the child spends with each parent, and on the net income of the parties. Both parties must generally provide health insurance coverage for the minor children, and they must share the out of pocket medical expenses.

In summary, a Wyoming divorce is available to people who meet Wyoming’s residency requirement and also have the necessary grounds for divorce. The divorce process divides the couple’s property and provides for alimony in rare cases. If the divorcing couple are the parents of minor children, the divorce will provide for the legal and physical custody of the children, set out visitation terms, and set child support amounts. Most divorcing couples agree on the terms of their divorce, but if they cannot do so, then the Court will decide these important issues for them.

To see a specific topic covered here at Wyoming Divorce, please leave a question or comment here.

By Steve Harton