California Can LEGALLY Steal Your Money (if You're a Divorced Dad)

Over the last two weeks I have received emails from James Cardoza, legal counsel for Ventura County Department of Child Support Services (VCDCSS), stating that yes, the state has every right to set up an arrears in my name (or yours) based on false claims. (He says the person creating the claim is subject to perjury, but when the ex removed over $10,000 in false claims, thus admitting (for the second time in this divorce) flagrant and intentional perjury, she saw no consequences.)

The removal of the false claims, however, covered only those payments for which I had a full accounting. There were educational and medical costs which were split during that period, and thus I paid less than the full child support stipulation for those months. So I got to pay for those items for which I no longer have the receipts, a total of over $1000. May the bitch (yes, she's a minister) get some ethics lessons with the cash.

Fleecing the Fathers

What remained in the arrears account was a large chunk of interest that accrued during the period when the account existed without my knowledge. I requested that they remove these charges from my account. Mr. Cardoza answered that request by citing the civil code:

Interest accrues on a Child Support Judgment from the date of the entry of the Judgment (Code of Civil Procedure §685.010 and §685.020).

Mr. Cardoza claims that the stipulation that was filed in this divorce back in 2007 is the applicable judgment, or possibly the adjustment of child support filed in June of 2013. If either of these were the case, the interest would not have started accruing in April 2013 as it did. No matter how you cut it, Mr. Cardoza and the entire VCDCSS is passing through a large loophole of their own making.

Mr. Cardoza said that if I doubted him, I could file a motion to determine arrears. I decided to call some attorneys and see what they had to say about the possibility.

How to Make the Illegal Legal

I spoke with two attorneys, one in Santa Barbara with a firm that does family law and has some experience with Fathers' Rights, the other a family law attorney with a fair-sized office in Ventura. I chose the first as someone outside the Ventura court system, and the second as someone working directly with the Ventura VCDCSS and county family courts.

Both attorneys agreed that VCDCSS, in creating an arrears in my name without notifying me was, in the words of the Ventura attorney, "probably bending the law," and for the Santa Barbara attorney, "definitely outside the letter of the law." When I explained Mr. Cardoza's argument that VCDCSS has the right to do this based on a stipulation from the court dated three years earlier, the Santa Barbara attorney said, "That's bull. This is a completely different transaction." He said this was demonstrated by the April 2013 date of beginning interest charges which did not accord with any dates of judgment. "You should have received notification by mail from DCSS at that time."

The woman in Ventura recommended that I go ahead with a motion to determine arrears because she felt there was a chance I could win. Her firm's minimum charge to represent me through this is $1000 more than the interest the VCDCSS illegally charged me.

When I asked the SB attorney about it, he recommended against filing for a motion because, he said, it would cost me more to go through the process than to pay the bastards, and "You would be in front of a judge who works with this attorney [Cardoza] every day of the week." He said bringing the case in front of a judge could actually increase my costs substantially.

Of course, I don't have the choice about when or whether to pay these thieves. They attach my wages and levy my bank accounts. They can, do, and will continue to twist the law.

Beat Dead Dads

My ex has used every lever she has to deride me with my children, to steal any money she can (she claimed less than half her actual income for the first five years of divorce, stealing over $150,000 from me), and to create as many administrative and logistical problems for me as she can.  

In the meantime, she has padded her nest, essentially paying down a mortgage while my 22-year-old has had no adult support including college funds other than from me. With few liquid funds, she has also conveniently stopped working so that the 17-year-old will not see anything for her college years from her mother. She also trailed out her minuscule student loans for over 12 years, never failing to tell the kids that she is still hauling this 'difficult' financial burden. She paints a picture of scraping by while she lines her private cave with stolen assets. Now, once again, she takes money not due her, this time through the legalized theft of the VCDCSS. She tells me I need to be civil for the sake of my kids, while she tells them that I'm a skinflint. <Insert invective and insults here.>

In the meantime, it is clear the state is taking a definitive role in fleecing and abusing fathers.