They call me James, the destroyer of marriages. Sigh… But I’ve gotta eat somehow.

So you think that you are an attorney? Problem is you can’t seem to find any clients that need your legal advice. After a few sleepless nights tossing and turning, wondering what the hell you are going to do about your dwindling clientele prospects you have finally reached your breaking point. What am I going to do? How am I going to pay my bills? Student loans??? I NEED A CLIENT!!!

Sound familiar? Turns out that you are not alone. The legal market is over saturated, and law schools continue to pump out more and more new attorneys. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, “competition for jobs should continue to be strong because more students are graduating from law school each year than there are jobs available.” Great. That’s exactly what I wanted to hear. I’m having a hard enough time finding clients without the hassle of competing with more and more attorneys. Hell, I am even hearing rumors that many of the larger Jackson law firms are now taking many of the cases that they were referring out as early as last year. These are tough times we live in, but now I’m taking the approach that helping others survive will somehow (fingers crossed) help me too. And as I have said before, in order to survive these tough economic times and to make it through your first year as a new attorney you need to practice in Chancery court.

I eventually hope to have guest judges and attorneys from throughout the state write articles on here that will give a little bit of practical guidance on how new attorneys should navigate the courts in Mississippi (and hopefully Louisiana too) but for now, let’s start with a very basic overview of one way I learned to pay my bills during my first year in practice. Ironically, it came from areas that I swore I would never handle. Family law and divorce. As horrible as the idea of breaking up a family is to me, it is a necessary evil in our profession. So with that in mind, here is a 10,000 foot overview of a Petition for Joint Divorce.

The joint divorce, otherwise known as divorce on the grounds of Irreconcilable Differences (“ID”), is found in Section 93-5-2 of the Mississippi Code of 1972, as amended. Part(1) deals with who can file the petition. Interestingly enough, it turns out that only one party is necessary to file “jointly.” However, you would rarely do this in practice because of that pesky little clause in part (5) that says a party need only contest the petition in  order to have it removed. Instead of wasting your valuable time, go ahead and attempt to get both parties to agree to file on together. If the other party will not grant your client a divorce on this ground then file for a fault-based divorce, but also include a section stating that the court has the power to otherwise grant the divorce on the grounds of irreconcilable differences. Here is a copy of a sample edited joint complaint for divorce for you to get an idea of what to include in your joint petition.

Section (2) of the statute deals with Custody and the Property Settlement Agreement. This document is separate from the joint petition and is an agreement between the parties on how to handle minor children and property of the marriage. The statute does allow for the parties to agree to allow the chancellor to make these decisions, but you should always, if possible, write this document for your client.   There are a lot of in’s and out’s to this document that are outside of the scope of this limited overview. I will post more about PSA’s as time goes on, but for now you can find a sample PSA agreement here. (Sorry for all of the white out, this PSA had a lot of information relevant to the parties that needed to be removed. It should get you in the right direction though.) One important thing to remember is that you only represent one of the parties in a joint petition. You should clearly point out in the PSA which party you represent and refrain  from giving legal advice to the other; but encourage the other party to seek out their own legal representative.

Part (4) let’s us know that the petition must be on file for sixty days before a hearing on the matter can take place. Either party can contest the petition and have it removed during this period, so try to convince them to place nice and just get through the next two months.

After the 60 day period, you will need to schedule what is called an “ex-parte” meeting with the chancellor. Every Chancery District handles this process differently, but you need to know any and all particularities that the Chancellors in your jurisdiction use when petitioning for and ID divorce. Judge Primeaux of the 12th Chancery District of Mississippi was kind enough to post some of his online. As for others, you can call their Administrative Assistants and kindly ask what you need. They are extremely kind and helpful people that usually will go out of their way to help new lawyers get it right.

Just before the ex-parte meeting, go to the Chancery clerk’s office and pick up the file pertaining to that day’s meeting. Take this file into  the ex-parte meeting with the chancellor. The chancellor may ask you for several items, depending on his requirements. In particular, be aware of the RULE 8.05 Financial Disclosure Statement, the Property Settlement Agreement that will be attached to the Order and the actual Judgment of Divorce. I will discuss the Rule 8.05 requirement in the future. For now you need to know that it is what the Court uses to determine child support and it is required any time that minor children are involved. For a practice tip I would suggest seeing if the particular chancery court allows the parties to waive the 8.05 requirement, and to do so if you can.

Following this meeting, and assuming the chancellor signs the Order, then you should be able to now claim that you have broken up your first marriage! Congratulations!

But seriously, I would again like to emphasize that this is a very general overview. There may be many other documents that the court may require. This is why you should always contact the Clerk or Judicial Administrator to try to find out. Also, many jurisdictions require the parents and children to attend a parenting seminar before the ex-parte hearing date. The seminar usually lasts about 2 hours and both parties must attend. Check with your local rules to see if this is necessary.