Legal Question in Family Law in Virginia
Foreign Annulment
I was married to an Italian citizen 10 years ago and shortly thereafter obtained a Mexican
annulment from the marriage. He moved back to Italy and I have not seen or heard from him in 9 years. I did hear he remarried several years back. I recently remarried and didn't even think about whether it would be legal until a friend started explaining about foreign divorces
not being valid. Neither of us lived in Mexico at the time. It was just a quickie annulment.
He is not a US Citizen, and to my knowledge never had the marriage validated in Italy.
Is my new marriage legal. Could I be sued for bigamy?
1 Answer from Attorneys
Re: Foreign Annulment
A first question that one might ask might be: Was there anything to annul in the first place?
That is, was there a valid marriage legally performed somewhere and in accord with the marriage laws of that "somewhere".
If so, the obvious next question must neccesarily
probe the validity of the alleged annulment that supposedly took place in Mexico. Was this alleged
annulment carried out in full accord with and therefore recognizeable under Mexican law?
Your friend is simply wrong in claiming that
foreign divorces are neccessaily invalid. They,
in fact, are quite valid and recognized in the
U.S. if they are carried out in full accord with the laws of the foreign nation in which they occur.
Unfortunately, your "quickie annulment" appears
not even to qualify as a divorce and has all the earmarks of a dubious proceeding that was probably never recognized as valid under Mexican law,and, therefore, could not be recognized as such under U.S. law.
From the above, one might conclude, although not necessarily with metaphysical certitude, that
your current matrimonial state could well be a bigamous one.
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