Hello again

It has always been a law in the US that our courts will enforce the judgments of all nations that were signatories to the Hague Convention (I believe that the first Hague Convention was back in the 1930's and it has been updated and reconfirmed, with more nations added as signatories - through the 60's and 70's). You cannot generally fight the judgment here in the US because it is a final judgment from a "member state" court and the US court will not tamper with the judgment itself. The only way that you could fight this is if you claim to the LA court that the Israeli court did not have jurisdiction over you and therefore the original court in Israel had no right to make this order because you do not live there and do not have any ties there at all -- I am not sure if you have consulted with any local attorney but in order to make such an argument, you need an international jurisdiction specialist to prepare an argument to the LA court that states that Israel had no right to make this order and award because Israel has no jurisdiction over you. To find such a specialist you should contact your CA state bar association and speak to their referral service about finding such an attorney.

Now, even if you are able to mount a jurisdictional challenge to the original Israel order and are successful (the LA court sends it back to Israel and tells the Israel court that they had no right to issue an order for you to pay anything because the Israel court did not have jurisdiction over you), that puts her in the position of having to hire a CA lawyer and the CA lawyer would have to bring a child support case against you in the LA court -- and she will win the case there and the end result will be the exact same thing -- you will be ordered to pay child support to the date back to when you stopped paying the child support.

I do not know what Israel law on the subject is but it does seem like it is the same as in the US -- the non custodial parent is almost always ordered to pay support back to the day when the support stopped. As far as US law is concerned, the courts will not tie the payment of child support to your ability to see the children (because then it appears that you are paying to see your children) -- so child support and visitation are two separate issues and they are kept separate for that specific reason. If you were not permitted to see the children but you had a fair idea where she was, then the courts expect that you will hire a lawyer in that state or country and bring the custodial parent into court on motions for Contempt of Court until the court gets so angry with the custodial parent that the court starts putting the custodial parent in jail.

I wish I could give you a whole load of good news here -- but no matter which way you decide to handle this you are going to end up having to pay child support for the children retroactive back to when you stopped paying 15 years ago. Even if you mount a jurisdictional challenge (which will not be inexpensive as far as legal fees go) then you are just delaying the inevitable because it seems like Israel law and US law are the same on the point of when (the date) the child support must be paid from and continuing.

If you leave a rating for me below (smile faces or stars), I would appreciate it if you keep in mind that I am being honest here and telling you what the law actually is and I am not trying to tell you a whole pile of junk just to make you happy.

---MARY