Legal Question in Family Law in California

What you are saying makes no sense. Just because a divorce is not finalized in a year does not result in it being purged from the system in any county. In fact far more than half of all divorce cases are not final within a year. They don't get purged. So you need to go back to the court clerk and find out what really happened and if the case really is no longer pending. If it is pending and you refile in that or any other county it will creat a REAL mess.

If, in fact, the case was dismissed or in some other way has actually truely been closed in Riverside Co., then it does need to be refiled. The county in which it must be refiled is the county in which one or both parties has resided for the last four months prior to filing.

Mr. McCormick is mixed up. You have to be a resident of the state for six (6) months, and a resident of the county for three (3) months to file for divorce in that specific county. You need to find out if the divorce case was dismissed, which is what I think you mean by purged, or if it was never filed at all. If it was dismissed, or never filed, you can file again in the proper county.