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It is a sad fact the law has not kept pace with the level of attention, money and emotional investment our society has poured into our pets. Pittsburgh family law attorneys will tell you in Pennsylvania divorces, pets are treated merely as property. No best interest analysis is conducted, nor any other process close that could render effectively looking after the welfare of a pet. Indeed, no provision in the […]

When a parent who owes child support attempts to sell real estate, or collects a lump sum payment from a government agency, the law may authorize an automatic child support lien to collect the support arrears.  If the child support arrears are less than $5,000, the automatic child support lien imposed by 23 Pa.C.S. § 4308.1 may not apply, but the child support agency has the option of pursuing a […]

In Pennsylvania — just like the rest of the country — it is not uncommon for unmarried couples to have and raise children together, and for the most part, this arrangement will not lead to excessive legal friction until the couple decides to “split up.”  Fundamentally, the issue in Pennsylvania is that when an unmarried couple has a child together, paternity is not automatically established.  The father’s name is not […]

Many people look forward to the time when they become grandparents.  A time to go to parks and museums and spoil their grandchildren without all of the formal responsibilities that come with being a parent.  But what happens when two parents divorce and family stressors get in the way of grandparents being allowed to see their own grandchildren?  Do grandparents have any rights under Pennsylvania law?  If you are a […]

The Pennsylvania Department of Health provides that in 2015 there were 33,600 divorces statewide.  Of those, 2,582 divorces were finalized in Allegheny County alone.  While these statistics do not reflect how many of those divorcing couples have minor children, anyone who is divorced or in the process of getting divorced understands how difficult the process can be for an adult, with even greater stress for a toddler, school-aged child or […]

In the United States, it is reported that the percentage of marriages that fail is somewhere between 40 and 50 percent.  But married couples are not the only ones who split up and live apart.  The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) provides that 40 percent of all births are to unmarried couples.  Although the CDC does not specifically state how many of the unmarried couples live apart, it is fair […]