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Judge Allows Divorce Papers To Be Served Via Facebook

Posted by samzenpus on from the I-unfriend-you dept.

An anonymous reader writes Want to divorce your husband or wife but can't give them the papers in person? Just use Facebook. No, apparently this isn't a late April Fools' joke. The New York Daily News reports Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Matthew Cooper has allowed 26-year-old Ellanora Baidoo to serve her husband Victor Sena Blood-Dzraku divorce papers via a Facebook message. In fact, Baidoo won't even be the one sending the message. Her lawyer has been granted permission to message Blood-Dzraku using her account. "This transmittal shall be repeated by plaintiff's attorney to defendant once a week for three consecutive weeks or until acknowledged," the ruling states.

18 of 95 comments (clear)

  1. Not really out of the ordinary by ModernGeek · · Score: 4, Informative

    People that can't be found via their last known address, found by the police, or at a workplace are normally hiding from the law, and can be, with permission from the court, served by things such as notice in the newspaper several times. If they can't be found through friends, relatives, employers, etc, similar tactics have been used in similar cases.

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  2. Minimum Requirements by geekmux · · Score: 2

    Since we've now devolved the divorce down to a damn Facebook message, I'm curious..when will IT SysAdmins start officiating marriages?

    Why the hell not? Seems that whole ordained minister thing is pretty much overkill.

    1. Re:Minimum Requirements by ModernGeek · · Score: 2

      IT Systems Administrators have been officiating weddings ever since the creation of the Universal Life Church some years ago.

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  3. Can you blame her? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    With a name like Victor Sena Blood-Dzraku her husband is obviously a vampire or something. I would want to deliver divorce papers from as far away as possible too.

    1. Re:Can you blame her? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      It actually sounds as if she married a World Of Warcraft character, hence the need for the online divorce proceedings.

  4. Still No Word... by Greyfox · · Score: 3, Funny

    There's still no word on delivering them via catapult. The law seems to frown on this particular method.

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  5. Other by Geoffrey.landis · · Score: 2

    But, assuming that he de-friended her, the message will just get stuck in the "other" folder. Might be years before he gets around to seeing it.

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    1. Re:Other by RavenLrD20k · · Score: 2

      Not that it matters much. If he doesn't see it in his inbox wherever the paperwork gets sent, too bad so sad for him. Courts routinely consider that if the notice is sufficiently displayed in a public forum where it's presumed the other party would be privy to it, then that party has been properly served and as such if they do not appear in court on the specified date then the judgement is defaulted in favor of the party who did appear.

    2. Re:Other by rgmoore · · Score: 2

      This is important as a matter of principle. People shouldn't be allowed to duck out on the legal system by making themselves impossible to find. If you don't allow something like this, then the person who's trying to handle things responsibly through the legal system loses out because they don't get their day in court. One way or the other, somebody is not getting a chance to present their case. It makes sense for that somebody to be the one who's avoiding the process and who could present their side just by showing up rather than the one who is doing everything they can to handle things through the legal system.

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    3. Re:Other by rahvin112 · · Score: 2

      The person avoiding service is trying to exploit a protection of the legal system to avoid resolution. Judges take a dim view of this. As others have said the more aggressively you avoid service the more lenient the judge will be in allowing service. At some point the judge is just gonna let the claimant publish the service in the newspaper. Takes awhile and progressive levels of avoidance but it will happen. The beauty of it is you've avoided the service so well that you won't even know when the trial proceeds and you will lose by default. When you inevitably appeal the decision you will get lose because you avoided the service.

      It's pretty easy to tell when someone is avoiding service, it looks a lot like hiding from the law and the courts recognize it very very well. Normal people aren't difficult to serve.

  6. Re:I'm not surprised by Aighearach · · Score: 4, Informative

    It isn't news anyways. The harder a person makes themselves to be served legal papers, the more permissive the courts are in how service may be performed. Avoiding service is not intended by the courts to be a winning strategy, and they work hard to get around abusers and find a good-enough means of service. That is how they balance against the strict requirements to serve the papers. After all, if you're trying that hard to avoid receiving legal paperwork, you probably do actually know about it.

  7. Re:How do they know that he accepted it? by Cro+Magnon · · Score: 2

    I think its the exact opposite if I understood it correctly. The wife is required to reach out three times and if the husband doesn't respond then the judge will assume that contact has been made and ignored and the divorce can proceed.

    I thought that was only for summoning ghosts.

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  8. Good reason to get rid of your Facebook Account by avandesande · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You could end up with a contempt of court charge or a default decision if you don't check it regularly.

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    1. Re:Good reason to get rid of your Facebook Account by bws111 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      By the time it gets to this stage they have already given up on trying to find you. You are already on your way to a default judgement, this is just a courtesy to you to give you an opportunity to defend yourself. Getting rid of your Facebook account would do absolutely nothing to help you, it would just make it more likely you would never see a notice.

    2. Re:Good reason to get rid of your Facebook Account by MasseKid · · Score: 2

      Bullshit, nothing in this suggests anything to that effect.

  9. Re:I'm not surprised by sycodon · · Score: 4, Funny

    Next, one spouse will just have to proclaim loudly, "I divorce thee, I divorce thee, I divorce thee!"

    Done. Easy as Pie.

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  10. Data mining by CanadianMacFan · · Score: 4, Funny

    Great now Facebook can data mine that you are getting court papers and start serving up ads for divorce lawyers.

  11. just sending a message? by l0n3s0m3phr34k · · Score: 2

    Yeah, non-friends that won't really work. Perhaps posting on their wall directly might work, but I'm betting their FB account is completely private already. I'll also bet that the lawyer probably paid the "not friends" fee Facebook charges...it's only $1 and can easily be added into the settlement. This can also work as a "delivery receipt" as Facebook itself should (but I've never paid to send a message so I don't really know) confirm it was delivered. The woman has probably already used every other listed means of communications without any response; Facebook probably wasn't the courts first choice but the last resort.