Can We Ever Receive Overpayment of Support Back?

[katiedee2006]

Hi - here's the situation.  My husband's ex, who was the physical custodial parent, essentially abandoned her by moving across the country at the end of Aug. 02.  We lived in a different school district, & his daughter wanted to complete her senior year of hs w/her class, so she stayed w/my husband's sister & husband during the week b/c they were in her original school district.  SD moved in w/us f/t the weekend after she graduated.

Husband filed in 10/02 for termination of his paying support, and for receipt of support from the mother, and for the return of all support he had paid since she'd left.  He didn't get to court until 1/03.  They stopped the CS being taken from his check, but advised he needed to re-file for support & they would address the issue of the support paid after BM left at the next hearing.  He files for support again in 4/03. Next hearing was supposed to be before the same Hearing Examiner.

Due to various postponements & a transfer of jurisdiction to a different county (b/c he moved when we got married), he never saw the same Examiner again.  Next court date is 9/03, an order is issued, both sides object, the order is thrown out & a new date of 6/04 is set.  Examiner at that court date tells attys. to work it out w/us & BM.  She also says she will not entertain support prior to 7/03 when SD moved in w/us permanently, notwithstanding that husband paid his sister 'support' while his daughter stayed there during the week.  Just to move on w/our lives, we come to an agreement that agrees on forward CS, CS arrears & medical bills arrears.

So, we are out of luck for support from BM from 9/02- 7/03, ok, whatever, but BM kept all the support husband paid from 9/02-1/03 & we're advised there's nothing we can do about it b/c it's not as if it's support she owed to husband so it's not a Fam. Ct. issue.  We can go after her in small claims, but b/c we would need to file where she now lives, it would cost us a fortune in airfare, etc.

Someone on another board said they thought we could somehow file to have that support paid after BM left (and clearly not going towards her child) repaid, but we have no idea how & that's not what the attys. said.  

I'm confused - the system is unecessarily complicated.  There doesn't seem to be any basis for fairness or equity but I know that is a naive digression.

Any ideas on if/how we can get back the support BM kept?  We are in NY.