Court Appearances

We may have the best judges in the world, but that doesn’t guarantee that you will win if you go to court. There are many factors that can affect the result. They include the most important of all–that the judge is only seeing a minute part of the case. You and your spouse have a history going back years and, sometimes, decades. Everything that happened during the marriage colors everything else, but that doesn’t make all of that admissible in court. In addition, judges only see the parties acting on their best behavior. Finally, there is the judge’s belief that he or she understands the situation, a completely human tendency for someone responsible for deciding such important matters. I know judges are often as frustrated by the rules of evidence as laymen are, especially when the facts that do appear in court hint at other factors that are not admissible. Every good attorney and almost every good judge recognizes that going to court should be a last resort. As one astute judge asked the parties, “Do you really want to put your future in the hands of a stranger wearing a black robe?” The answer should be “No.”