How to enforce a child support order, let me count the ways…the first thing to understand is the every State enforces its State court child support orders in its own way. The first stop is the child support statutes of your domicile State. For example, one State requires that the support payments be made directly to the clerk of court and if the clerk is not paid then that parent’s driver’s license will be revoked. Every State has their own particular penalties and similar laws such as attaching wages and taking away privileges of the parent if he or she fails to make court ordered child support payments. In short, these day there are many, many ways a delinquent parent can be grabbed, jailed and stripped of his assets in restitution for unpaid child support.
Child Support Enforcement Act of 1984
The Child Support Enforcement Act of 1984 requires the District Attorney of every State in the United States to offer assistance to the child support recipient parent. This may mean serving the delinquent parent with papers requiring him or her to attend a meeting with the District Attorney’s office concerning the failure to pay the child support payments and to discuss the possibility of creating a child support payment schedule and to let him or her know that if payment is not received he or she can be sent to jail. If the non-paying parent has moved out of State there is a parent locator service that is interstate which can assist in locating the delinquent parent. His or her federal tax refunds can also be tapped to pay some part of the unpaid support for the child.
Child Support Recovery Act
The Child Support Recovery Act is a federal law adopted in 1992 which made it a federal crime to avoid paying child support by fleeing to another State. This law become active when the child support payment have not been paid for at least one year or the amount in arrears is $5,000 or greater. In all cases where this law is enforced the offending parent will be responsible for restitution equal to the amount of the past due child support. The penalty if convicted is as follows:
- First offense- a fine and up to six months in prison
- Subsequent offense- a fine and up to two years in prison
Getting Legal Help
If you or a member of your family had not been receiving the child support payments ordered by a court in your State or have been unable to make the court ordered child support payments it would be important to contact a divorce attorney in order to discuss the situation and to figure out the next steps to take concerning the child support problems together.
