divorce after 12 yrs seperation

[vhenderson53]

What is the name of your state? kansas, this is for my daughter,
she married in 1991 after a year she left him ,he was abusive,she has no idea where he is at this time,about four years ago my sister received a phone call from a woman inquiring about if my daughter and husband had divorced my sister said no the lady went on to say that he had told her they was divorced ,she married him,my daughter is wondering if her husband had divorced the two women he was married to pryer to marring her,is there any way to find out if her so called husband was still married when she married him
virginia l. henderson.

 

[MaggieK]

Your daughter could hire an investigator to find out or she could check with every Vital Records office of every county/state he has ever resided in. Marriage/Divorce records are public record. Good Luck.

 

[djohnson]

It would probably be cheaper for her to just procure a divorce from him on her own then she will be ok/

 

[MaggieK]

Before filing for divorce it would be helpful for her to know if he has possibly divorced her already. In most states you can publish a statement in a local paper stating you are going to divorce your spouse. If he did this and she did not see the published notice, he could well have already divorced her and there would be no need for her to also file. This is reasonable notice and allows the other party to respond. In order to file for a divorce, you do need to either know where your spouse is, so he or she may be served or make a "diligent" search to locate the spouse.

 

[djohnson]

This is correct but considering the new 'wife' found her with no problem and not all the family information the husband had it is very unlikely. And still would be costly to research unless he wanted to provide her with the paperwork. Filing yourself with no attorney would still be a better option in my opinion.

 

[cyana]

I agree with both of you (djohnson and Maggiek)

However, since so much time has passed it would be cheaper for your daughter to go the route djohnson proposed, file a petition for divorce by publication. My mother did that after spending fortunes tracking my deadbeat father down. Finally, after twenty years she wanted to marry a wonderful man, and she did it this way. Because my biodad was not in the state and she had no idea of his whereabouts (but he did have family in the state) I think she paid under $100 15 years ago between the divorce filing fees and the required publications. Let your daughter get on with her life; for maybe $150 (I'm assuming the costs have gone up) your daughter can be free and who cares if the "X" has divorced her and remarried.

Good luck.