Consequences of Intentionally Avoiding Support

Buena Park city council member, Sangjin Miller Oh, age 50, was convicted of five counts of perjury by declaration.   Between September 23, 2004 and July 20, 2009, Oh signed official DMV documents using fraudulent information on five separate occasions.  He did this to avoid paying child support to his ex-wife by hiding his assets under a false name.

    Apparently, Oh applied for a driver’s license under a different name, Robert Oh, and failed to disclose that he had previously applied for a license under a different name, as is required by law, he failed to disclose that his license had been suspended in the past, and on four other occasions, he used is fraudulently obtained license to register vehicles.   Oh is also a real estate developer.
http://www.oc-breeze.com/2014/05/31/53056_buena-park-mayor-convicted-of-perjury-to-avoid-paying-child-support/


    In California, parents have a duty to support their children.  If a judge finds that a parent has intentionally done something to change their income in an effort to reduce or avoid support, there are consequences.   The consequences include imputing income to that parent and calculating support based on what they were making, or should be making.  Additionally, once you have made false representations to a judge, it is difficult to try and regain credibility.  Depending on the circumstances, parties may also have a fiduciary duty to accurately disclose financial information to each other and to update such information if anything changes.  When signing paperwork under the penalty of perjury you are signing it under oath and it is essential that all such information you are signing to is correct.

Concealing Assets During a Divorce

A northern California man, Steven Zinnel, was sentenced to more than 17 years in prison for declaring bankruptcy and hiding assets to avoid paying child support and spousal support. He was also ordered to pay a $500,000 fine and forfeit assets worth more than $2,8 million. The sentence is said to be one of the longest prison terms given for bankruptcy fraud in federal court in the Sacramento Eastern District of California.

Zinnel, the father of two teenage children, split from his wife in 1999 and had a contentious divorce. Apparently, there was a history of Zinnel concealing his assets throughout he case and afterwards in an attempt to avoid paying support.

http://www.mercurynews.com/california/ci_25280558/northern-california-man-who-hid-assets-avoid-paying      

In California, spouses have a fiduciary duty to disclose their complete financial information to each other. If a party’s financial situation changes (upwards or downwards), that party also has a duty to provide supplemental or amended information to the other party disclosing the change to their finances.