Can support case be reopened after it was closed?

[fitze]

hello,

here is my situation. it's complicated so get comfortable:

i live in new jersey. my xwife lives in arizona. i sent my child support payments to nj court, nj court sends to az court then on to my xwife.

in 1997 i filed for emancipation of child support, as my children were 19 and 21 and were not in school. nj court requires a notice to az court announcing the request to end child support in order to give my xwife a chance to contest. it was explained to me by nj court that if it was not contested, including any arrears owned, my support order would be closed and any arrears that may exist would be forfeited.

az did not respond and a second notice was sent with a returned receipt and again, no response. this process covered 4 months. finally after no responses from az, emancipation was granted. i have all documentation of the notices sent and of the failure of az to reply.

now, 4 years later i find out that there may have been arrears due at the time of emancipation and az wants to collect. after talking with them, it seems they did receive the notices that were sent, but cannot explain why no attempt was made to block the request to close my case in nj.

the issue to me is that az had the chance... twice, to step in and state their case. to me "closed" means "closed". i followed the rules in the emancipation process, az is making their own.

i say if there were arrears due at the time of emancipation, it's too late to come looking for it now.

lawyers... do i have a case?
thanks in advance.

Note:
my xwife has already received all child support as it was included in her welfare check. payback would be to az court.

when the child support order was signed by me, xwife and the judge, it was stated that she cannot leave the state of nj. well she did so anyway and moved the children to az without notification. for many years, i did not even know where they were until one day the oldest called me. so a good question is why is a spouse usually not held responsibile for that kind of action, but support is strickly enforced?


Ed

 

[LegalBeagle]

hello,

here is my situation. it's complicated so get comfortable:

i live in new jersey. my xwife lives in arizona. i sent my child support payments to nj court, nj court sends to az court then on to my xwife.

in 1997 i filed for emancipation of child support, as my children were 19 and 21 and were not in school. nj court requires a notice to az court announcing the request to end child support in order to give my xwife a chance to contest. it was explained to me by nj court that if it was not contested, including any arrears owned, my support order would be closed and any arrears that may exist would be forfeited.

az did not respond and a second notice was sent with a returned receipt and again, no response. this process covered 4 months. finally after no responses from az, emancipation was granted. i have all documentation of the notices sent and of the failure of az to reply.

now, 4 years later i find out that there may have been arrears due at the time of emancipation and az wants to collect. after talking with them, it seems they did receive the notices that were sent, but cannot explain why no attempt was made to block the request to close my case in nj.

the issue to me is that az had the chance... twice, to step in and state their case. to me "closed" means "closed". i followed the rules in the emancipation process, az is making their own.

i say if there were arrears due at the time of emancipation, it's too late to come looking for it now.

lawyers... do i have a case?
thanks in advance.

Note:
my xwife has already received all child support as it was included in her welfare check. payback would be to az court.

when the child support order was signed by me, xwife and the judge, it was stated that she cannot leave the state of nj. well she did so anyway and moved the children to az without notification. for many years, i did not even know where they were until one day the oldest called me. so a good question is why is a spouse usually not held responsibile for that kind of action, but support is strickly enforced?


Ed

First, as to the relocation. She would have been held responsible had you petition the court for her contempt in moving and not notifying you of your childrens wearabouts.

As the CS, I have to admit I am not 100% sure. It really depends on what AZ is going to do. If they try and file a case in NY then you should easily defeat that. However, what if they process this in AZ and then try and attach your future tax returns?

What has AZ done do far? You might end up retaining an attorney in AZ to sort out..