Discovery Tricky question

upvotersfortruth · 2022-08-09T03:42:41+00:00

Nothing tricky about this. It's about disclosure not surprise. Screwing around with discovery is a great way to run up your legal fees.

RedditDude07467 · 2022-08-09T03:49:10+00:00

The gifting question is probably to find gifts to an adultery partner which could be construed as “wrongly dissipating marital assets” and affect the common property split.

Gattsama · 2022-08-09T03:56:45+00:00

Discovery exists for 3 main reasons: to get as full an account as possible of all assets, debts, expenses and liabilities; to run up billable hours on both sides, to point fingers at each other and pad lifestyle expenses.

The first reason is straight forward. The second is too. The last one doesn't matter as much as you think. You will make an expense report or financial declaration at some point. Your wide will say she needs a ton of money, more than when married. You will say you don't have it. These are NOT the final legally binding settlement, they are used to negotiate it.

For example my STBX but down that she needs (per month): $1500 for clothes, $1500 for entertainment and $1200 for gifts/clubs/organizations. Now that is 100% BS! She's free to state it and I'm free to dispute it. I've asked for the receipts to justify these crazy claims. And those receipts come from the discovery.

No surprise there is no proof she needs that much for lifestyle purchases. She does have receipts showing $1000 purchases at Nordstrom, but that's like one a year not every month.

So try not to over stress it. Turn over everything, as if you get caught hiding something the courts can really screw you. If you just honest miss something people understand that, just don't hide it.

You'll make your financial declarations, and then either negotiate, mediate or a judge will make a final decision. Not sure what the personal questions are about though. This should be just about the numbers 🤷‍♂️

Talk to you attorney, and if you think they are not representing your best interests, talk to another attorney and consider replacing them.

Be safe out there

NothingIsEverEnough · 2022-08-09T04:17:49+00:00

You don’t have to provide even 5% of what’s requested. Stick to the major items. It’s not a death sentence if you don’t provide stuff

eyesayhello · 2022-08-09T03:36:57+00:00

Marital assets are marital assets. Whether or not you gifted anyone money during the marriage is moot.

The "do you forgive your wife" question is nonsense and irrelevant. You and your attorney can object to questions.also, you should have been given 30 days to return the discovery. If you have a week then just tell them you need more time as you are digging things up.

If you don't reply on time all they can do is file a Motion to Compel. So, if they do that then you should file a Motion to Extend time and have it heard at the same hearing scheduled on her compel motion.

dday_throwaway3 · 2022-08-09T08:39:00+00:00

> list all gifts and loans over $250 with the date I made in the past five years

OC is trying to determine if you disbursed marital assets to individuals, and/or if you have given the money as a "loan" to be paid back later. It's a standard question.

> Also, another question saying to list all acts committed by my wife that lead to the divorce and if I forgave her or not.

This is relevant in jurisdictions where spousal support is negated if a spouse committed infidelity.

JennFezz · 2022-08-09T11:21:03+00:00

now I am rushed

I'm not following. Why are you in a rush? Normally, you have 21 days or 28 days or whatever. Did your lawyer not give you timely notice?

Be advised that the opposing lawyer will ask for ANYTHING and EVERYTHING. In many cases, they're on a fishing expedition. Aside from the possibility of discovering something juicy, it also runs-up your legal bill.

Here's the good news. You do have some protections. In many states, there is a limit to how many questions they can ask. Google it for your state. In my case, the opposing lawyer asked maybe 10 questions, but each question had five or six parts. That's 60 questions, but my state set a limit of 25. So I just cherry-picked 25 questions I wanted to answer and objected to the remainder.

Also, there are legitimate reasons to object to a question. You already tripped over one of them yourself (the question about evidence; you can say the interrogatory calls for privileged information within the attorney-client privilege; it's called attorney's work-product.). Other reasons: the interrogatory is vague or overly-broad or overly-burdensome. The request is irrelevant or not pertinent to the matter at hand .

HERE IS A LIST of other reasons. THIS has some good samples.

Obviously, do your own research and talk to a lawyer about objecting. Judges don't like copy-and-paste boilerplate, so be prepared to explain exactly why you're objecting.

pk2at · 2022-08-09T17:08:38+00:00

You don't have to answer if you don't remember (your memory can be highly selective). Although you may hear nonsense about perjury, the fact is that divorce is essentially a mediated negotiation between two people and you can always go in saying you have zero assets. For example Elon Musk, claimed he had zero income and assets during his second divorce. He is now worth close to $300B

Title	Discovery Tricky question
Author	O-nie
Upvotes	4
Comments	14
Date	August 9, 2022 3:31 AM UTC (3 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/Divorce_Men
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/Divorce_Men/comments/wjsu62/discovery_tricky_question/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/Divorce_Men/discovery-tricky-question.1127080 https://theredarchive.com/post/1127080

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