Legal Question in Family Law in California

Re: Irrevocable Trust to obtain child support?

There are some suggestions that I would give you. You could obtain an attorney in Texas to register the order in Texas. There is a real question about whether the California courts have jurisdiction over a Texas trust and therefore a Texas attorney will be required to attach the trust. Second, you could contact an attorney and have your ex cited for contempt. He'll probably spend time picking up trash on the highway or some other community service. After a few days he may decide it is better to pay the support. Finally, you can ask the local District Attorney (or Bureau of Child Support Enforcement) to enforce the order. They can suspend his drivers license, which may motivate him. Good Luck, Pat McCrary

Re: Irrevocable Trust to obtain child support?

Without knowing the full details of the trust you describe I can only give you a general answer. Yes, you can garnish trust payments to you ex, but only payments that the benificiary is entitled to by the terms of the trust. You cannot force the trustee to make any other payments pursuant to a garnishment!! In other words when the trust makes a payment to your ex husband, you can force the trustee to pay you pursuant to a garnishment. Depending upon the trust, it may be that the grandmother would suspend payments if there was a garnishment. It all depends on the trust.