topic Re: forgery? in Relationships and Money

forgery?

suzen121 — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 19:52:47 GMT

I was divorced from my spouse of 17 years in 2007. We have 3 children, for which he is to pay 1150$/month in child support. As of this week he states he will no longer pay..he states he cannot afford it (which is completely untrue..he pays LESS than the state minimum) Anyhow...i have a court date to address this issue on Thursday. He now is threatening me with a charge of forgery...as he states that when we were married I opened a credit card in his name by signing his name on the appplication. I have no recolection of this, and he will not even elaborate on what he is referring to. Throughout our marriage I signed his name on many things, with his knowledge and instruction (such as pay checks, etc) So I very well may have signed it on a credit card application, although not without his knowledge. I imagine he had even used and paid on the card. He has since filed BK after the divorce, so I imagine that any liability he had for a balance is no longer. If I had a card also linked to this said account, any charges that I would have put on it would have been for family expenses. (it's difficult to speculate when I really don't know the details of what card/account he is talking about) He says that when I'm in jail for forgery he will gain custody of the kids and then he won't have to pay child support anyhow! (i have sole physical custody...he has liberal visitation) . Has anyone encountered anything like this? Can he actually have me arrested for something that happened (i'm guessing) 6 years ago? I don't feel that signing a credit card application that he knew about and subsequently utilized the cards matches the defination of forgery..

any advice? I don't want to go to jail! The jail part might not even be so bad...the worst part would be him having control of the kids!

...Re: forgery?

suzen121 — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 19:55:13 GMT

btw I'm in Illinois

Re: ...Re: forgery?

Anonymous — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 22:25:19 GMT

If you can show that he used the card himself, you're totally in the clear. That shows that he knew about the account and agreed to the terms by using it.

Re: forgery?

Anonymous — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 02:34:58 GMT

@suzen121 wrote:
I was divorced from my spouse of 17 years in 2007. We have 3 children, for which he is to pay 1150$/month in child support. As of this week he states he will no longer pay..he states he cannot afford it (which is completely untrue..he pays LESS than the state minimum) Anyhow...i have a court date to address this issue on Thursday. He now is threatening me with a charge of forgery...as he states that when we were married I opened a credit card in his name by signing his name on the appplication. I have no recolection of this, and he will not even elaborate on what he is referring to. Throughout our marriage I signed his name on many things, with his knowledge and instruction (such as pay checks, etc) So I very well may have signed it on a credit card application, although not without his knowledge. I imagine he had even used and paid on the card. He has since filed BK after the divorce, so I imagine that any liability he had for a balance is no longer. If I had a card also linked to this said account, any charges that I would have put on it would have been for family expenses. (it's difficult to speculate when I really don't know the details of what card/account he is talking about) He says that when I'm in jail for forgery he will gain custody of the kids and then he won't have to pay child support anyhow! (i have sole physical custody...he has liberal visitation) . Has anyone encountered anything like this? Can he actually have me arrested for something that happened (i'm guessing) 6 years ago? I don't feel that signing a credit card application that he knew about and subsequently utilized the cards matches the defination of forgery..
any advice? I don't want to go to jail! The jail part might not even be so bad...the worst part would be him having control of the kids!

It is extremely unlikely he could do anything even if his allegations are true.

Although the statute of limitations in Illinois for forgery knows no bounds, it is extremely unlikely that a prosecutor will get involved in a case where 1) there is an adversarial family / domestic nexus, 2) there is no financial loss and / or a victiom waits 6 years before filing a complaint and during those 6 years has actually participated in the supposedly criminal action. Besides, it would be very difficult to prove that he did not direct you to sign or that his customary practice was to encourage you to sign on his behalf.

Re: forgery?

GregB — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 12:54:51 GMT

He probably thinks he has found a way to get out of his obligation for child support by holding this criminal charge over you. It is simply a joke but perhaps it is best to go to court with him thinking that.

It would simply get laughed at for a variety of reasons.

This would be nearly impossible to use even if you had done this with the intention of defrauding him and he knew nothing about it. My ex-wife defrauded me out of half of my house by adding her name to the title and there was nothing I could do about it. This was done a year or so before divorce was filed so was within the Statute of Limitations on any crime.

There may be different rules according to state but when you are married you are married. This is a bit scary!

Re: forgery?

Anonymous — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 23:40:22 GMT

@GregB wrote:
He probably thinks he has found a way to get out of his obligation for child support by holding this criminal charge over you. It is simply a joke but perhaps it is best to go to court with him thinking that.

It would simply get laughed at for a variety of reasons.

This would be nearly impossible to use even if you had done this with the intention of defrauding him and he knew nothing about it. My ex-wife defrauded me out of half of my house by adding her name to the title and there was nothing I could do about it. This was done a year or so before divorce was filed so was within the Statute of Limitations on any crime.

There may be different rules according to state but when you are married you are married. This is a bit scary!

Sad, but true.

Re: forgery?

Jazzzy — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 14:02:26 GMT

Hi suzen,

If you let him scare you on this, it will never end. Don't even discuss this with him.

Hold your head high and call his bluff.