Domestication of an out-of-state order

[medolyns]

The divorce took place in New York State, and the decree and all related orders were made by a court in that state. No parties to the case have had their residence in New York State for at least three years. (During a few months of this period my ex did have two temporary jobs in different towns in NY, while maintaining a primary residence in Massachussetts.)

In January my ex moved to take up a permanent job in New Hampshire, giving up her Massachussetts apartment.

I and the minor child lived in Louisiana from summer 2000 to summer 2005. We and my wife now live in Colorado in a condo I own, although during the school year I frequently travel to Louisiana to work. I do not own a residence in Louisiana (although I have been provided with the use of a FEMA trailer). My child has attended school in Colorado since the start of the 2005-2006 school year.

I need to domesticate my NY divorce in Colorado (in order to modify it). I can assume that my ex will not cooperate if I need any documentation of when her move away from NY took place.

I have found the instructions for filing a foreign decree on the Colorado court system's web-site.

1) Is domestication of an out-of-state order under these circumstances something that an intelligent and compulsively precise layperson should be able to accompllish? That is, is it reasonable to try and do this myself?

[socrateaser]

>I need to domesticate my NY divorce in Colorado (in order to
>modify it). I can assume that my ex will not cooperate if I
>need any documentation of when her move away from NY took
>place.
>
>I have found the instructions for filing a foreign decree on
>the Colorado court system's web-site.
>
>1) Is domestication of an out-of-state order under these
>circumstances something that an intelligent and compulsively
>precise layperson should be able to accompllish? That is, is
>it reasonable to try and do this myself?

There should be a family law facillitator in your local courthouse who can help you do this. However, with an interstate action, it may be a lot easier to just open a case with the local child support enforcement agency, who will contact the corresponding agency in NH and open a case against the other parent.

[medolyns]

I'll ask the clerk's office if there's a family law facilitator--I called them up today because I couldn't find the right form on line and they themselves were very helpful.

This isn't actually about child support. That process has been working just fine (in bureaucratic terms at least)--Massachusetts collects it from the New Hampshire employer (I assume), sends it to Lousiana, and they send me a check in Colorado. As long as Massachusetts and Louisiana are happy with this arrangement, I'm happy--since I don't have the delay of starting off the case with a new state or two.

This is about modifying the parenting time order in order to limit the other parent to supervised visitation, pending treatment, following the recommendation of the local child protective services agency. Once the order is domesticated, I'll start working on a modification here.

1) Does that (the fact that this isn't a child support matter) change your advice at all?

2) I know the clerk's office or the family law facilitator can only answer certain kinds of questions. Can they give me a sense of how long various stages of this process tend to take in this court? Is that a legitimate question to ask them?

[socrateaser]

>1) Does that (the fact that this isn't a child support matter)
>change your advice at all?

It sure does. Now you need to register your order in CO, and then file a motion to modify custody/parenting time.

>
>2) I know the clerk's office or the family law facilitator can
>only answer certain kinds of questions. Can they give me a
>sense of how long various stages of this process tend to take
>in this court? Is that a legitimate question to ask them?

Doubtful. There's no matching federal dollars available to help with custody modifications.

You should also move for a support mod with the parenting mod, because support will eventually be at issue. The CO court will contact the NH court and obtain a calculation of guideline support. This doesn't have to happen until after custody/parenting is determined, but, you should modify now, so as to get the greatest benefit from any retroactivity in your favor, since your the obligee parent.

Doing this will invalidate all of the current support orders floating around in various states -- which is probably a good thing, because it's already too confusing for words.