How Am I Doing, Mexican Divorces, Soooie and the Really Expensive Yacht

“Divorce is born of perverted morals and leads to vicious habits.” Pope Leo XIII (1878 to 1903)
“She cried, and the judge wiped her tears with my checkbook." Tommy Manville
“We were happily married for eight months. Unfortunately, we were married for four and a half years.” Nick Faldo, Golfer

Happy Pro Bono week folks. Get out there and help a poor person if you get a chance. The news for us matrimonial wonks is getting stranger and stranger, and I’m not just talking OCA here for a change. Did you see the fuss in Mexico City over temporary marriages? There is a proposal in the city assembly to make marriages a two year contract, renewable of course but if things don’t work out, adiós muchacho. It seems that half of Mexican marriages end in divorce, usually in the first two years, so why not?
And then there is the latest from our census bureau, finding that people in New York divorce at a slower rate than any state in the nation except New Jersey. For me, I’m headed to Alaska where the women divorce at the highest rate in the country. If you like representing men, try Arkansas. Woo pig sooie.
As our legislature struggles with a lack of money and leadership, our neighbors in Massachusetts have passed alimony standards for divorces, something our legislature is supposed to take up after a final report from the Law Revision Commission this year. It seems Bosox Nation divides alimony (maintenance to you DRL fans) into three categories: transitional, rehabilitative and reimbursement. The length of the alimony is generally no more than a percentage of the length of the marriage, running from 50% (5 years or less) to 80% (20 years or less). Cohabitation for 3 months ends things, whether one holds one out as a spouse. General alimony ends at the general retirement age, even if one does not retire. The amount? It shall not exceed the recipient’s actual need or 30% to 35% of the difference in the parties’ incomes. Just like our DRL, clear as mud. The early word is that this is a victory for the payor spouses, unlike New York’s recent temporary maintenance law aka the High Wage Earner Instant Depression Act of 2010.
The Third Department continues its post summer malaise without so much as a footnote on the matrimonial front, but the First Department gave us a cautionary tale in the form of a multimillion dollar yacht. This case is interesting in that it calls the husband and wife by their first names, Lucy and David, supposedly because their last name (Mimran) couldn’t be written without a chuckle. In any event, David and Lucy had a lovely yacht that they sold for a tad more than $9 million. Being in the throes of divorce litigation, they agreed to put the money in escrow even though their post nuptial provides Lucy with half the funds plus $2 million upon divorce. That wily David then defaulted on a loan for $11.8 million to Hallsville Capital, L.P. and they promptly tried to attach all of the yacht money in the escrow account. The Second Department in Hallsville v. Dobrish gave all of the money to the Hallsville partners because Lucy’s right to the money vested only on the parties’ divorce under the agreement. Avast, matey.
In honor of National Pro Bono Week (October 23 to October 29) I was asked to fashion the top ten reasons to do pro bono work. Here, in ascending order, are mine:
10. If you do not do it, no one else will. Rule 6.1 of the New York Rules of Professional Conduct calls pro bono participation "aspirational." You may aspire to play second base for the Red Sox, but you won't. If we only aspire, then we never accomplish anything.
9. It’s easy. The clients have very little at stake, but it means the world to them.
8. Judges appreciate that you perform free legal services for the poor, and they (a) remember and (b) talk among themselves. Hey, you never know when you'll need that adjournment or a few more days to respond to something.
7. They will write about you in the bar association newsletter and your mother will think you are really special.
6. No one is more grateful than the poor. They see very little of the milk of human kindness, and when they receive it you are everything to them. You will never receive such positive feedback among those who pay for your services.
5. Practicing law is a precious gift, and if you do not use it to give to others then you shouldn't be a lawyer. Try animal husbandry or stock brokerage.
4. You learn something. Where else do they divorce by reason of imprisonment for three consecutive years or skate on the rent because of the warranty of habitability, whatever that is?
3. If you do not know what you are doing, there are lots of nice people to help you. The best of the best in any specialty will help you through it for free. If they do not, they are not the best of the best.
2. It does not take much time. For the most part there is nothing to fight about, and most of the opposing litigants are just as happy to be (a) divorced, (b) rid of the tenant or (c) free of the debt that will never be collected.
1. It will make you better looking. Look what it did for me.
Finally, I could not let things go without a nod to my friends at the Office of Confused Adults (OCA). Not being content to make up rules and forms we do not need, they have solicited from us and others a Court User Survey Form to let them know how they are doing. Who could resist that? The form is attached with my humble comments. Feel free to weigh in with your own thoughts. Woo pig sooie.