Default Divorce Hearing
I filed for divorce on December 12th and my ex never obtained a lawyer nor did he respond to or sign the papers.
Our default hearing has been set for March 29th. He may or may not be in jail at the time (depending on what they decide to do for his felony violation next week). I am also expecting he probably won't even show up and if he does I am almost positive he won't have a lawyer.
Is this typically something that is a one time thing or should I be expecting to return numerous times? I have that OFP against him that has a temporary custody agreement in it. My divorce papers are offering the same thing as the OFP in regards to visitation. Obviously there won't be any one-on-one mediation and with the proof of abuse I see no big problems with obtaining sole legal and physical custody as per the laws in my state.
Can anyone offer me any advice as to what I should expect going into court that day? My wishful thinking hopes for a granted divorce on my terms but I'm sure it won't be that easy.
Re: Default Divorce Hearing
If it's an actual hearing you may get somewhere with it. I think it's a legal question your asking and I cannot give legal advice but just tell you what happened to me.
XH wouldn't agree to anything so we finally got a divorce by bifurcation (which meant that we didn't decide custody at that time because he wouldn't agree to anything). But we were legally divorced.
Then a few months later I went back and we had a hearing scheduled for custody and visitation. He was very messed up on drugs at that point in time and didn't show up. He missed pre-trial and then trial so I was awarded full physical and legal custody and his visitation was revoked.
Mine was a divorce by default. xh did show up for a mandatory mediation, but our actual pre-trial settlement and actual hearings were much much later. By that time his lawyer had withdrawn from our case and he didn't show up to either. I was granted the divorce and the parenting plan was everything I asked for.
The bonus part: On our divorce decree and parenting plan it says where he should have signed "did not appear" and that tells anyone who looks at it enough about him.