My former son in law has not paid child support in 5 months now. He lost his job 2 years ago and my daughter voluntarily agreed to allow him to stop paying alimony and child support payments and to continue to just pay childcare and health insurance until he secured employment. Their consent agreement states that he is to immediately notify her upon returning to work and provide her with check stubs and begin paying child support based on their incomes and the NC Child Support Calculator. He worked a temporary part time job (38 hours per week) for approximately 10 months and continued to pay childcare and health insurance and considered this his child support, but based on the NC Child Support Calculator he should have been paying additional child support , but he and his attorney disagreed and stated they would set a court date and let the judge decide. That was 13 months ago. Six months ago he started full time permanent employment and did notify my daughter of this change and even sent her a check stub and she in turn supplied him and his attorney with her check stub. He is no longer paying child care but is paying hospital insurance through his employer for the children. He and his attorney have been stalling for months. My daughter’s attorney contacted his attorney over a month ago to notify them that they were going to go ahead and set a court date but his attorney said they would promptly get this matter settled. That was over a month ago. He has not paid child support in 5 months and his attorney is assisting him to drag this out. This just seems to be very unethical. My former son in law is also an attorney and should know better. Can he be charged with contempt? What should my daughter expect from the family court in this matter? Back child support, attorney’s fees, a slap on the wrist, or real consequences for his and his attorney’s deliberate stalling of meeting his obligation as a responsible parent? I would think as an attorney he would be held to a higher standard, because he not only is an officer of the court and certainly is not ignorant of the process, but is exploiting it. He believes the rules only apply to others, not to him and he routinely ignores what he chooses not to abide by. Taking a case to court and having attorney representation is a burdensome expense for the average person with an average income, not to mention the length of time before the case is finally in front of a judge. Please tell me what should she expect to happen with this case?
If he is in violation of the Order he can be held in contempt of court upon motion made by your daughter. If he is found in contempt the court will order that he catch up his payments and may award your daughter attorney’s fees as well.