QLD Lying on Affidavit for Property Settlement?

[Finding Truth]

Hi,

My partner is going through a divorce with his ex and she has made massive lies on her affidavit for property settlement. She has already been charged with fraud once and there is another case where she will possibly be charged again.

What is the penalty for lying intentionally and how do we charge her?

Many thanks

 

[AllForHer]

In family law? Nothing, and you don't.

Perjury is, in the common understanding, committed often in family law, but by the legal definition, it is very difficult to prove and not often pursued by the Court. A party only has to believe that what they said was true at the time that they said it, so even if there's evidence to the contrary, that doesn't necessarily show that they were aware of it or believed it at the time of their deposition.

Family law is about witness credibility and sorting out whose version of events is more likely to have happened. It's not about who is telling the truth and who is lying.

You're better off just gathering the evidence that proves she was lying, annexing it to an affidavit and then questioning the other party about it in cross examination.

 

[sammy01]

What you call a lie, she calls her version of the truth... I know, I know, I'm not happy about it either....

Nope no punishment as such in family law... But depending on the details (of which you've provided nothing - which doesn't really help with giving solid opinions...) it can result in discrediting her and once the magistrate determines that she is unreliable, it will not help her cause...

So what is the nature of the 'lies'?

 

[Rod]

It is also contempt of court, but as noted above the court is most unlikely to take any action on the offence and will just ignore or mark down the weighting they apply to the 'faulty' evidence.

Sad situation but it is what it is.

In my view the Family Court should take action on the blatant examples in an attempt to prevent this abuse of the system. There are admittedly often different version of the 'truth' and both can be somewhat right from a subjective viewpoint, however blatant and proven lying SHOULD be penalised to start cleaning up an area in need of change. I don't just mean by awarding a judgment in favour of the affected party, I mean the court should actually file contempt of court charges, and where the lying causes inconvenience and costs to the affected party, costs should be awarded against the lying party.

Public confidence in our family courts could be partly restored if the courts actually did clamp down on the more extreme examples.

 

[AllForHer]

I try to retain the stance that this isn't the place for discussion about reform, but if I have learned anything from my experience with family law, it's that family matters really have no place in an adversarial justice system at all.

This is the problem with marrying what should be a cooperative relationship into an adversarial system of dispute resolution - judges must somehow encourage parents to work together for the benefit of their kids, whilst also hearing and considering evidence pitched by either party that tries to dismantle the other parent and advance their own case.

Punishing parents for doing what an adversarial system encourages them to do will only add to the emotional strife between the two parents, and I can't say I agree that mutual hatred between a mother and father is in any way good for their children.