Alienation of Affection:
As common law, alienation of affection was a tort action brought by a deserted spouse against a third party alleged to be responsible for the failure of the marriage. The defendant in an alienation of affections suit is typically an adulterous spouse's lover, although family members, counselors and therapists or clergy members who have advised a spouse to seek divorce have also been sued for alienation of affection.
Alienation of affection was first codified as a tort by the New York state legislature in 1864, and similar legislation existed in many U.S. states in the
late 19th and early 20th centuries. Since 1935, this tort has been abolished in 42 states. Alienation is, however, still recognized in Hawaii, Illinois,North Carolina, Mississippi, New Mexico, South Dakota, and Utah. An action for alienation of affection does not require proof of extramarital sex. To succeed on an alienation claim, the plaintiff has to show that:
(1) the marriage entailed love between the spouses in some degree;
(2) the spousal love was alienated and destroyed; and
(3) defendant's malicious conduct contributed to or caused the loss of affection.
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If you haven't figured it out by now, my wife left me for another man. (still
hurts saying that) I strongly believe I have a solid case for this, since I
live in one of eight states that still recognizes 'Alienation of
Affection';South Dakota, as all the actions of this man fall in the grounds of
this type of law suit.
I never wanted anything malicious to occur between my wife and I as we go
through our divorce. We both decided to be civil and work out matters as best
as we could without having a lot of friction between us and thus far we have.
How ever, she continues to see this man and has now had sexual relations with him.
They started seeing each other on a romantic level in July of 2011. I found out
about it, confronted my wife and we proceeded to work on our marriage there after.
While we worked on making our marriage stronger she went back and did it all over
again with this man. They started communicating again and eventually started up their
relationship for the second time.
Throughout all of this, the man she was seeing was fully aware of her marriage
with me. By him knowing this and his continuation of pursuance of my wife, he
falls into the grounds of being summoned for an Alienation of Affection law
suit, in my opinion.
The only reason I am pondering this is because I retained possession of our
home, I pay for my child's health insurance and daycare. I also am stuck with a
large amount of debt accrued by my wife. So I came to the conclusion of why I
should just sit here and get shit on while my wife is in a relationship with
the man that broke up our marriage.
I would appreciate anyone's opinion of those that are familiar with this type of
lawsuit or of those that have been through a similar experience with their
spouse/ex-spouse.
Below are links to a few previous cases of this type. One was a successful ruling and the other I believe was reversed. I wanted to give examples of both sides in order to have who ever reads this form a more accurate opinion of the situation.
http://www.shpoonkle.com/briefs?section=Family%20Law&author=Keyed-to-Weisberg&chapter=3&case=Jones-v-Swanson
http://sd.findacase.com/research/wfrmDocViewer.aspx/xq/fac.19870225_0004.SD.htm/qx
As common law, alienation of affection was a tort action brought by a deserted spouse against a third party alleged to be responsible for the failure of the marriage. The defendant in an alienation of affections suit is typically an adulterous spouse's lover, although family members, counselors and therapists or clergy members who have advised a spouse to seek divorce have also been sued for alienation of affection.
Alienation of affection was first codified as a tort by the New York state legislature in 1864, and similar legislation existed in many U.S. states in the
late 19th and early 20th centuries. Since 1935, this tort has been abolished in 42 states. Alienation is, however, still recognized in Hawaii, Illinois,North Carolina, Mississippi, New Mexico, South Dakota, and Utah. An action for alienation of affection does not require proof of extramarital sex. To succeed on an alienation claim, the plaintiff has to show that:
(1) the marriage entailed love between the spouses in some degree;
(2) the spousal love was alienated and destroyed; and
(3) defendant's malicious conduct contributed to or caused the loss of affection.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
If you haven't figured it out by now, my wife left me for another man. (still
hurts saying that) I strongly believe I have a solid case for this, since I
live in one of eight states that still recognizes 'Alienation of
Affection';South Dakota, as all the actions of this man fall in the grounds of
this type of law suit.
I never wanted anything malicious to occur between my wife and I as we go
through our divorce. We both decided to be civil and work out matters as best
as we could without having a lot of friction between us and thus far we have.
How ever, she continues to see this man and has now had sexual relations with him.
They started seeing each other on a romantic level in July of 2011. I found out
about it, confronted my wife and we proceeded to work on our marriage there after.
While we worked on making our marriage stronger she went back and did it all over
again with this man. They started communicating again and eventually started up their
relationship for the second time.
Throughout all of this, the man she was seeing was fully aware of her marriage
with me. By him knowing this and his continuation of pursuance of my wife, he
falls into the grounds of being summoned for an Alienation of Affection law
suit, in my opinion.
The only reason I am pondering this is because I retained possession of our
home, I pay for my child's health insurance and daycare. I also am stuck with a
large amount of debt accrued by my wife. So I came to the conclusion of why I
should just sit here and get shit on while my wife is in a relationship with
the man that broke up our marriage.
I would appreciate anyone's opinion of those that are familiar with this type of
lawsuit or of those that have been through a similar experience with their
spouse/ex-spouse.
Below are links to a few previous cases of this type. One was a successful ruling and the other I believe was reversed. I wanted to give examples of both sides in order to have who ever reads this form a more accurate opinion of the situation.
http://www.shpoonkle.com/briefs?section=Family%20Law&author=Keyed-to-Weisberg&chapter=3&case=Jones-v-Swanson
http://sd.findacase.com/research/wfrmDocViewer.aspx/xq/fac.19870225_0004.SD.htm/qx
