Legal tussle: Should killer get alimony?

[babylonsister]

$4,000 a month, after she killed their child???

Legal tussle: Should killer get alimony?

Thursday, November 22, 2007

By KIBRET MARKOS
STAFF WRITER


A state appeals court on Wednesday refused to automatically bar alimony from spouses who kill a child, in a decision that suspended payments to an Old Tappan woman serving time for the lethal beating of her 14-year-old son.

"Nothing in this opinion prevents the Legislature from amending the alimony statute," the judges wrote. "But we do not read the present statute nor the ... case law to create that automatic disqualification."

The decision was issued in the case of Linda Calbi, who is serving a three-year prison term after pleading guilty to beating her son, Matt, on Aug. 17, 2003, during a violent argument at their home. He died hours later from internal bleeding and cardiac arrest.

"I don't understand how anyone can look my brother in the face and tell him that he has to pay this woman alimony," said Brian Sokoloff, brother of Linda Calbi's ex-husband, Chris. "Half of this opinion espouses sympathy for my brother, and the other half is saying, 'Too bad.' "

Linda Calbi was originally charged with murder, but the charges were later downgraded to aggravated assault, based on expert reports that medical error contributed significantly to the boy's death. She was sentenced last year to three years in prison and won't be eligible for parole until November 2008.

more...

http://www.northjersey.com/page.php?qstr=eXJpcnk3ZjczN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXkzJmZnYmVsN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXk3MjI0NzQzJnlyaXJ5N2Y3MTdmN3ZxZWVFRXl5Mg==

[RC]

1. As I understand this

The ex husband is to continue to pay alimony for the dead child? The child is no more, so tell me again what the alimony is for?

[babylonsister]

2. They had two children and divorced after 15 years.

There's one remaining child, but I'm with this dad. Why on earth should he have to pay this woman anything?

[RC]

3. The alimony needs to be reduced by one half.

As there is only one child left. The money should go into a trust till the child is 18,

[proud2BlibKansan]

4. It's alimony, not child support

Those are two different things.

[H2O Man]

5. Right. n/t

[RC]

7. Oops.

In that case, the alimony should stop for at least the duration of the jail term.

[babylonsister]

10. How about stopping it forever and let her suffer for causing so much

suffering?

[RC]

13. Works for me, but they still let her keep the survivor

Maybe Dad should be the primary custodial parent?

[babylonsister]

16. I didn't see where she kept custody of the other son. That in itself

should be criminal. What's to stop her from losing her temper again? This article isn't very thorough.

[China_cat]

6. You are confusing alimony with child support

They are not the same thing. In some states, alimony is more aptly termed 'spousal support'. You can be eligible for it even if there never were any children.

[TorchTheWitch]

8. Exactly. And that women should never see another penny

It sickens me to image she would still get alimony. Considering that if she HAD money, he could sue her in civil court for the loss of his son and win a substantial award, I can't imagine why it would be the least bit acceptable for her to ever get one single red cent of alimony ever again.

[JVS]

15. The idea of being forced to pay the killer of your child is monstrous

[China_cat]

19. I agree with you.

Just trying to clarify the difference. Too many people confuse the 2. And if the surviving child is being raised by someone else, he should be required to pay child support to the care taker.

[1monster]

11. Alimony is spousal support and is separate from child support. Alimony is

generally only for a specific time delineated in the divorce decree.

Child support is generally until the child reaches 18 except unless the child custody agreement specifies a longer period.

[etherealtruth]

12. self delete

I need to read through the enitre thread prior to responding

[Danger Mouse]

9. She doesn't deserve a fucking penny.

The idea that the ex-husband would pay anything is just absurd.

[JVS]

14. No alimony, jail time

[HamdenRice]

17. I agree with the killer on this one

First of all, a number of posters here as well as the reporter are confusing a number of different kinds of payments between spouses.

This is not payment for support of the dead child -- that's child support.

And most people don't seem to understand what spouses have to pay each other. The old concept of alimony is nearly dead in most states. That was the idea that a wife was a dependent and that marriage was a life long commitment to support that dependent, which could only be terminated when the wife remarried.

Most states actually don't award alimony; they award a division of marital property. Often the richer spouse, usually the husband, will have more of the property in his name. But the law says that both husband and wife equally contributed to the accumulation of marital property. Therefore in splitting the property the richer spouse, the husband may have to pay the poorer spouse. And if it is difficult to liquidate the property all at once, the richer spouse will pay the poorer spouse in installments that look like alimony. But it's not alimony. It's giving the poorer spouse her own property.

What's left of the old alimony system is the idea that the richer spouse pays support to a stay at home or poorer spouse until she gets on her feet again or perhaps learns a skill. This is sometimes called "rehabilitative alimony."

Passing a law that denies a convicted spouse property settlement payments is grossly unfair. It is saying that because you committed a crime, society will impose an additional punishment -- forfeiture of your own property, in addition to the prison time. That's almost medieval -- like the kind of forfeiture of estates for felonies that took place in England and that the founding fathers specifically made unconstitutional when they drafted the Constitution.

Moreover it's unfair. A spouse in a wealthy family would forfeit more than a spouse in a poor family. In other words, the punishment would not be based on the crime, but on how much property you have. People would be punished differently for the same offense.

It also would only punish spouses who have divorce settlements. In other words a person who owns, say, a home and is convicted would not forfeit that home; but a person who has a divorce settlement concerning the value of the home would forfeit payments for the value of the home. Again, it would treat people who committed the same crime differently because of their marital status.

If this is about rehabilitative alimony, who could possibly need that more than someone getting out of prison after a long prison term?

It may seem wrong, but the outcome in this case was the right outcome.

Our obsession with piling punishment on punishment, rather than having a rational system of punishments is getting out of hand. The woman should be punished appropriately and rehabilitated, not reduced to non-personhood.

[treestar]

18. They are just saying that the statute does not have an automatic

exclusion, and that the case has to go on using the factors in the statute. The outcome of that case could easily be no alimony.