confused - wording of Order

[mudbunnies]

Florida case, Soc, you previously helped us with an issue on the notary of our Petition for Modification of Child Support, where the notary stamped the petition but did not sign it, we defended on the doctrine of substance over form and provided an affidavit from the notary.

ORDER from the Judge says;

As to Respondent's Motion to Dismiss Supplemental Petition to Modify, dated May 1, 2003, the Motion is granted without prejudice to the Petitioner to file an Amended Supplemental Petition within 15 days of the date of this Order.  Respondent shall have ten days to file a responsive pleading.  Any Petition filed by the Petitioner after May 1, 2003, will be moot as of the filing of the Amended Supplemental Petition called for in this order.

1.  When we file our Amended Petition, since its an "Amended" pet not an original is it still proper to request the child support decrease be retroactive to the original date of May 1, 2003?

2.  Or, because this order stated original petition is moot are we just out of luck on the retro active date?

Thanks for helping us to understand

[socrateaser]

>1.  When we file our Amended Petition, since its an "Amended"
>pet not an original is it still proper to request the child
>support decrease be retroactive to the original date of May 1,>Florida case, Soc, you previously helped us with an issue on
>the notary of our Petition for Modification of Child Support,
>where the notary stamped the petition but did not sign it, we
>defended on the doctrine of substance over form and provided
>an affidavit from the notary.
>
>ORDER from the Judge says;
>
>As to Respondent's Motion to Dismiss Supplemental Petition to
>Modify, dated May 1, 2003, the Motion is granted without
>prejudice to the Petitioner to file an Amended Supplemental
>Petition within 15 days of the date of this Order.  Respondent
>shall have ten days to file a responsive pleading.  Any
>Petition filed by the Petitioner after May 1, 2003, will be
>moot as of the filing of the Amended Supplemental Petition
>called for in this order.

I think the judge is saying that a supplemental petition is not proper form and he wants proper form, i.e., an AMENDED petition. Your new petition should be complete in and of itself, so that the court may refer to it without examining any prior document.

As long as the case # remains the same, the original date for purposes of retroactivity, is the date of the first document filed in the case where a modification was requested, regardless of whether it was dismissed.

Your original petition wasn't dismissed -- only the supplemental.