Where’s My Courtroom?
Josh Sauer, Colorado Family Law Lawyer
A person preparing to file a family law case has a lot of issues on his or her mind. These vital issues include future parenting time schedules for any children, living arrangements, maybe even domestic violence issues, et cetera. Naturally, a person may not consider an important threshold question when filing a case: Where’s my Courtroom? Specifically, which county, and possibly which state, do I need to file my case?
When I first started practicing family law, every now and then I would receive a call from a potential client, eager to tell me his story about the marriage, the children’s needs, and his goals at the commencement of his divorce case. Twenty-five minutes later, he starts talking about how much better off the kids will be at their new Colorado school near his new residence compared to the school district where Mom remains living. Where did he live before? California. When did he move to Colorado with the kids? One month ago.
That’s a problem. Mr. Dad just invested half an hour of his time with me going through painful experiences in the forefront of his mind; however, he will probably need to do so again, with an attorney licensed in California.
An individual filing a family law case must always consider the issue of jurisdiction. A Court must have jurisdiction of a case to properly hold a hearing and issue rulings. An overall discussion of the different types of jurisdiction is beyond the scope of this article, and quite frankly, uninteresting to most who simply need to figure out where to file his or her case.
However, there are a few things to keep in mind. First, when consulting with an attorney initially, make sure that at the top of your checklist is an inquiry about where the attorney believes you should file your case. He or she will ask you questions, and help you to determine where to file. For example, if you have lived in Colorado for the entire marriage with a 10 year old child, you may think the obvious place to file your divorce case is in the county you reside, in Colorado. But what if you and your spouse have been physically separated for 1 year, and he moved to another state with the intent to live there if your marriage cannot be reconciled? Then, he files a divorce case where he now resides. He made a mistake, right? Not necessarily. By statute, Colorado would have the jurisdiction to decide matters concerning the child; however, the other state’s law may afford him the right to file there to handle all the other non-child-related issues in the divorce. Therefore, one of the first, if not the first, considerations is to make sure that you work with an attorney to resolve the question of where your case should be filed.
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