Dallas Family Law Blog

Regardless of a Texan resident's status financially or socially, divorce is a difficult process to go through. Not only is the status quo of a person's life torn up, but they could also take a big financial hit in addition to the emotional and mental stress. Celebrities sometimes have additional weight to deal with just by being in the eye of the public, too.

Divorce Mag states that these goodwill in celebrity divorce is essentially the amount of earnings they receive that is more or less tied to their celebrity status. In other words, if they didn't hold that status, they would have made less money doing the same things. It also creates the potential for future earnings based on reputation alone, so long as that reputation is good.

Domestic abuse in Texas tends to follow a predictable pattern, but the roles played by each partner are not always what people expect. According to FindLaw, research suggests that the numbers of men and women committing domestic violence against a spouse or partner are nearly equal to one another, yet men who are the victims of violence are less likely to report it, which unfortunately gives credence to the stereotype that a man is always the abuser, a woman always the victim. 

According to The Daily Dot, men in abusive relationships may be reluctant to report for fear that authorities, shelters or advocacy organizations will not take their claims seriously. The sad truth is that popular entertainment has conditioned audiences to view a woman hitting a man as a comical situation. The tropes have been around for years: the meek, milquetoast male character cowering in fear before the looming presence of the angry woman, hair in rollers, brandishing a kitchen implement such as a frying pan or a rolling pin as a weapon, the threat of violence imminent. The tropes have adapted as times change, and current entertainment presents them as variations on a theme. Viewers are now more likely to see "Friends'" Rachel smack Ross with a magazine than a frying pan-wielding housewife, but the laugh track prompts the audience to laugh even though audiences would certainly react in horror if it were Ross hitting Rachel.

It is not only foreign-born parents who may face consequences for attempting to bring children from the U.S. to their countries of origin unlawfully. The law may also hold grandparents who kidnap their grandchildren, or who aid a parental kidnapping, to account for their actions. A couple from Brazil is discovering this first hand as a Texas court recently fined them each a significant amount of money, as well as sentencing each to short prison terms, for assisting their daughter to relocate her son to their home country without the consent of his American father. 

The couple's daughter married a doctor from Houston in 2008 and gave birth to their son the following year. She and her husband initially shared custody of the boy after their divorce in 2012. In 2013, when the little boy was three years old, his mother allegedly obtained permission for her son to visit Brazil under the pretense of wishing him to attend a family wedding. Her ex-husband filed criminal charges against the child's mother and her parents when the child did not return by the time they had agreed upon. 

Fathers who live in the Dallas area often worry about what will happen to their children in the future, when their parents are no longer around to support them. Whether a father is married, divorced or single, any Texas father can still provide for his children after he passes away by passing on their assets. There are a number of ways fathers can accomplish this.

When it comes to Texas law, fathers have great latitude to leave their children an inheritance. Smart Asset explains that unmarried parents who do not have wills shall have their property passed on to their children. Even children that are born out of wedlock are granted full inheritance rights by state law. They are not only permitted to inherit from parents, but also from the ancestors or other descendants of their parents.