The term “hedge fund” implies an elite financial institution. In reality, there are more hedge funds than there are Burger Kings. A hedge fund is “a specialized investment group usually organized as a limited partnership.” Black’s Law Dictionary (11th ed. 2019) The operators of hedge funds claim to be able to see into the future with great accuracy…yet they get divorced as consistently as the rest of us. The profits of the hedge funds are divided between the fund owners and the fund operators. The operators of these hedge funds get paid in a very particular way called “carried interest” w ..read more

For most people, divorce is embarrassing. Some people, however, love talking about their divorce on social media where everyone can see the posts. It is colossally stupid to post about your divorce on social media. Screenshots will be taken of the posts and used as evidence. A social media post is automatically admissible in an Illinois court as it is a “statement of a party opponent.” “A statement is not hearsay if….The statement is offered against a party and is (A) the party’s own statement, in either an individual or a representative capacity, or (B) a statement of which the party has mani ..read more

Trials and hearings do not happen a lot in an Illinois divorce proceeding. The factual issues in a divorce are, often, not disputed enough to warrant a hearing or trial. The parties typically agree as to what they own, what they earn and how they spend time with their children. An Illinois divorce court need only apply those agreed facts to the law to provide proposed recommendations…which the parties usually, again, agree to. When parties do not agree to the facts (or the legal conclusions) they can request an evidentiary hearing to formally present the facts and arguments to an Illinois divo ..read more

Most Illinois divorces are resolved via settlement not trial. Parties to an Illinois divorce will often circulate proposed agreements until they come to a final meeting of the minds and sign the same agreement. Illinois law strongly encourages settlement. The purpose of the Illinois Marriage and Dissolution of Marriage Act is “[t]o promote amicable settlement of disputes between parties to a marriage attendant upon the dissolution of their marriage, the parties may enter into an agreement containing provisions for disposition of any property owned by either of them, maintenance of either of th ..read more

Divorce trials are high-pressure environments. No amount of practice will guarantee that a witness will say exactly the right thing. The court system is conscious of the frailty of human memory and allows attorneys to refresh their witness’s recollection with a document if necessary. Refreshing A Memory In An Illinois Divorce Court? It may sound bizarre, but a lawyer can stop a witness and politely ask, “Are you sure about that? Would you like to refresh your recollection?,” and then hand the witness a document stating what the lawyer would like the witness to say.   “It is well settled i ..read more

People get divorced because they cannot communicate and/or cannot rely upon each other. The family law system then expects those parties to come to a full agreement on all issues…and follow that agreement to a tee. This is a tall order. To encourage reasonable, if not good, behavior while living under a divorce agreement, Illinois courts can imbue the good faith and fair dealing doctrine into an existing agreement between two ex-spouses. Divorce Agreements In Illinois Illinois divorces are mostly resolved by agreement. In an ideal divorce, the parties enter into temporary agreements to keep th ..read more

Because of the portrayal of trials in movies, it is considered common for a witness to finally admit some horrible, damning fact in open court that resolves the case in its entirety (“You can’t handle the truth”) This rarely happens at trial…but it can happen during the course of filing and answering pleadings, motions and discovery. Certain answers to legal requests can be considered binding forever. These binding answers are called “judicial admissions.” What Is A Judicial Admission? “Judicial admissions are defined as deliberate, clear, unequivocal statements by a party about a concrete fac ..read more

An Illinois divorce divides a couple’s property. Property is either deemed “marital” or “non-marital” by an Illinois court in order to determine whether a court can distribute that property between the parties. In an Illinois divorce, non-marital property automatically goes to the spouse who owns that property. “[T]he court shall assign each spouse’s non-marital property to that spouse.” 750 ILCS 5/503(d) Marital property, however, gets distributed by an Illinois divorce court. An Illinois divorce court “shall divide the marital property without regard to marital misconduct in just proportions ..read more

The internet is full of chatter about divorce. The latest buzzword in the internet divorce community is the “silver bullet divorce” A silver bullet divorce is a divorce that starts with an emergency order of protection (which is almost always heard ex parte…without the accused even being present. The order of protection then excludes the accused party from the marital home and, often, denies the accused party access to their children. The accused party then spends months waiting for the order of protection to be resolved. When the order of protection is finally resolved, the other party is set ..read more

Divorce is unpleasant. Most people put off divorce issues…even during the divorce. In fact, financial issues can be reserved to be addressed later should the parties agree or the court determines that reserving a financial matter is appropriate. For most cases, courts are strongly biased towards resolving every financial matter between the parties on the day of the divorce. “The historical and practice notes [of the Illinois Marriage and Dissolution of Marriage Act] “encourage[] the court to decide all matters incident to the dissolution in a single judgment, to the fullest extent of its autho ..read more