Easiest way to divorce same-sex marriage for residents of country where it&#39;s not recognized? My situation: my spouse and I (both Russian citizens and residents) married in Denmark in 2014 (tourist marriage is legal and fast there). Now as we want to divorce, we can't do that in Russia because our same-sex marriage isn't recognized there. Looks like we can't divorce in Denmark, either, because to file a divorce there at least one of us should be a permanent resident there for two years. Is there any option for us to get divorced? I can reside somewhere for several months, if that's necessary. Our goal is to get a divorce that would be recognized by the US. We don't have children or property.
This is what we mean when we say something falls between the cracks. Sorry for that. First off, in the United States, family law is not federal, it is individual to each state. This means there is no federal agency or official charged with enforcing family law. When it comes to marriage and divorce, the federal government and their border agents are after those seeking to gain benefit through fraud (i.e., attempting to attain status through fraudulent marriage). Likewise, they don't have formal cross-jurisdictional protocols controlling the right of the US government to demand personal, private family law records from other governments. Nor do they have the means to pursue that. What this means, in practical terms, is that no family law judge sitting in the US has authority, interest or means in international marriage and divorce beyond those cases initiated in their court. I hope you read that slowly and carefully. Ask me if you need clarification. I suspect that you have a very specific cause in mind that necessitates you being in possession of a divorce decree. And I get the impression that you and your ex-spouse are in agreement and working together to solve this. You might find it valuable, at this point, to take a step back a little further into history. Let's consider your marriage. You two know you got married. I suspect that your friends, loved ones, and hopefully family know you got married. Then there is that clerk somewhere in Denmark (who records more than 100 marriages every week) who knows you got married. Theoretically. Possibly. Maybe. You've been residing in Russia for some years now, and the Russian government doesn't know you are married. Marriage is illegal there. So, in actuality the Russian government, if asked by some official of some other government, can only state with truth and authority that it is certain that you are NOT married. At the same time, some US federal official decides to investigate the most highly unlikely case ever. Someone is trying to gain entry, not by claiming marriage but by hiding a marriage. (ridiculous!) So, with a budget of zero, and the authority to match, goes from country to country demanding that they open up the (extremely) private records of family courts in search of the evidence he needs. When they ask him to demonstrate cause, he boldly tells them that his sharp mind is cause enough. They agree and give him cups of tea as he searches through the private affairs of their residents. It is never-ending, but he is proud to be working to stop the flood of unwanted divorced persons trying to gain entry to the USA. - - - - You get the picture. Also, consider the option of an international divorce. I would provide a reference here, but a simple Google search will yield many providers. It is expensive and time-consuming, but an available option. I'd rank it last. There are also varied laws by jurisdiction - internationally. I'm not expert enough to know of any jurisdictions that might not require extended residency. I suspect some won't. I am confident, on the other hand, that there are several that you might access with relative short windows of required residency. This Wikipedia article should give you a good start. You are also maybe a little fast in dismissing Denmark as a possible venue. European Union states, at one time, experienced a tangled mess regarding family law across jurisdictions and specifically divorce. In 2003, however, the EU implemented Regulation 2201/2003 providing for conferred jurisdictional competence by way of exception in cases involving applicants for divorce similarly situated to you. And now jurisprudence, in a wonderful show, is beginning to catch up with regulation and public sentiment on the matter. The provisions seem complicated, but they are definitely outside the abilities of a couple of Russians who have managed to get this far. Here's a starting point to get the ball rolling. Aside from those three solutions, you might be stuck. You would be ill-advised to seek some creative solution outside of the law. And I struggle to think of anything that might work. Unfortunately, justice and law are often connected by a mere thread, and sometimes not at all. You are left to forge ahead on behalf of others, who enjoy the fruits of your labour. For that, you have our gratitude. And while I am no expert on the fight for justice, There is this man - an American, who is. He wasn't gay, so much as black. Be he figured out a lot regarding justice. There are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that "an unjust law is no law at all." -Martin Luther King Jr. I salute you.
The short answer is that yes, a couple can marry for the purpose of gaining access to the marital privilege in court actions, even if they are pending when the marriage occurs. There is basically no such thing as a sham marriage in this context. (There may be a handful of outlier cases as is the case in any legal rule, but this is the overwhelmingly uniform rule of law today.) In practice, outside the context of an annulment proceeding in the civil courts where one of the parties to the marriage or fiduciaries such as legal guardians for one of the parties to the marriage seek to have it invalidated, a legally entered into marriage is valid for all purposes without question. Even many marriages that can be annulled for religious purposes are not eligible to be annulled under non-religious civil law. Third-parties generally do not have standing to declare that a marriage be annulled. Usually marriage is conclusively established by the existence of a marriage license and the absence of a death or divorce by either party. Even the existence of a common law marriage, or the existence of some factor that prevents a marriage from being recognized as valid (e.g. one of the parties is already married or is underage) is often fairly easily proved (and is usually completely unrelated to the case in which a martial privilege is to be asserted and undisputed). Immigration law is the only context is which the status of a marriage as a sham is actively policed. Also, keep in mind that the marital privilege for evidentiary purposes is actually two separate privileges. One is the privilege not to testify against a current spouse in a legal proceeding. The other is the privilege not to testify as to confidential communications made to a spouse while the couple was married. Both have exceptions (e.g. for crimes in which one of the spouses is the victim). A confidential communication to a boyfriend/girlfriend prior to marriage is not protected by the confidential communications marital privilege even after the couple married. Only the testimonial privilege would be available with regard to those communications, and the testimonial privilege often has more exceptions than the confidential communications privilege (usually the exceptions are enumerated by statute that varies from state to state). A previous answer related to spousal privilege with quotations from a state statute to provide an example can be found here. In Colorado, which is fairly typical, the confidential communications privilege applies to all crimes (except those which are ongoing or are between the spouses), while the testimonial privilege does not apply to serious felonies.
The Supreme Court rules in US v. Wong Kim Ark ruled that the Fourteenth Amendment, which states All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside It is not disputed that said areas are &quot;in the United States&quot;. The court found that &quot;subject to the jurisdiction thereof&quot; is intended to exclude, by the fewest and fittest words (besides children of members of the Indian tribes, standing in a peculiar relation to the national government, unknown to the common law), the two classes of cases,—children born of alien enemies in hostile occupation, and children of diplomatic representatives of a foreign state neither of which are the case in your scenario. Technically, the child is not &quot;eligible&quot; for citizenship, the child has US citizenship, it is just a matter of getting a government official to recognize it (e.g. in issuing a passport).
Like many US legal questions, there is a Congressional Research Service report about this. It is not generally a violation of US law to do things in another country where the only connection with the US is that the offender is a US citizen. However, there are a number of general situations where the US has jurisdiction over federal crimes if either the victim or offender is a US citizen: if a place isn't within the jurisdiction of any country (e.g. Antarctica); a place used by a US government entity (like an embassy or airbase); crimes by American soldiers and those employed by or accompanying the military; etc. These are considered to be within the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the US. Other laws apply if they say so. For instance, any US national committing war crimes inside or outside the US can be punished under US law; ditto for treason. The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act makes it illegal for a US national to bribe a foreign official anywhere outside the US for business reasons (if it's inside the US, there are more requirements). For instance, you aren't allowed to pay kickbacks to a foreign government's acquisition officer to buy your product. The CRS report has more (it doesn't include the FCPA, but that appears to be an oversight). Note that extraterritorial jurisdiction doesn't just apply if the person is a US national. US laws can also confer it if the victim is a US national, if the offense has a significant US component, if it's directed towards the US, if it's in violation of international law and the offender later turns up in the US, etc. For your scenarios: Dual citizenship doesn't matter. A US citizen is a US citizen, and is required to obey all laws that apply to US citizens, unless those laws explicitly exempt dual citizens. A dual citizen isn't treated differently by the government; as far as the US government is concerned, their US citizenship is all that matters (except for certain specific purposes like security clearances). In Kawakita v. United States, a US-Japanese dual citizen was convicted of treason against the US for aiding Japan in WWII. Depends. Plenty of these laws have no requirement that anything related to the crime actually happen in the US; for sex tourism, the subsection about traveling in foreign commerce for the purposes of engaging in illicit sexual conduct is followed by a subsection about engaging in illicit sexual conduct in foreign places. "Travel with the purposes of X" or "with intent to X" means you must have intended to do X at the time you traveled, but most extraterritorial laws don't control travel with intent to X (they cover X directly). Depends on the law. Some laws (like child sex tourism) apply to any permanent resident of the US as well as any citizen. Some apply to anyone, because they're based on a conspiracy started in the US. Others apply just to US nationals; a noncitizen isn't bound by them (for instance, no one but a US national can be charged with treason against the US, for obvious reasons). Still others apply to anyone who later turns up in the US, even if that is literally the only connection between the US and the offense (this is basically reserved for crimes against international law, like genocide).
If the spouse of the US president filed for divorce, would a) the President have any claim of immunity from any litigation that followed (e.g. the division of assets in the matrimonial pot, child custody etc.), The President could claim it, but the President wouldn't win. Notably, a number of state governors and mayors have divorced while in office, and other foreign heads of state have been divorced while in office. For example, a U.K. court recently handled the divorce of a UAE monarch (over his objections to jurisdiction on sovereign immunity grounds), applying the same common law principles of head of state and sovereign immunities that exist in U.S. law and concluded that it had the authority to move forward with the case. Also, any Presidential divorce would take place in state court, not in federal court. Federal courts do not have subject-matter jurisdiction over divorce and custody cases (under the &quot;domestic relations exception&quot; to federal jurisdiction), so the civil action could not be removed to federal court, unlike federal criminal cases involving the official duties of the President and unlike civil cases over which the federal courts have jurisdiction. b) would all the proceedings be fully held in private, This would be in the reasonable discretion of the judge. It would not be a matter of right, but it is quite plausible that a judge might close the proceedings, especially if minor children were involved. c) could the President themselves be compelled to take the stand and Yes. A party to a lawsuit may always be compelled to take the stand, at least if no other person can provide a full substitute for the party's testimony. In ordinary civil lawsuits against the President, a President is usually compelled to testify only if an underling involved in the same matter cannot provide equivalent testimony. In many civil cases naming the President in his official capacity, the President has no personal knowledge of the facts and so can't be compelled to testify. But that would rarely be true in a divorce case, and would never be true in a divorce case where custody was an issue. This said, a state divorce court judge would almost certainly be very deferential to the scheduling concerns of the President for that testimony, and might allow that testimony to be provided remotely via videoconference so as to minimize the interruption this would pose to affairs of state and to address the security concerns of the Secret Service (i.e. the President's official bodyguards). d) what would happen if the President refused to do so? The judge could hold the President in contempt of court, which is punishable by fines and/or incarceration. But a more likely outcome, tailored to minimize interference with government business, is that the Court would sanction a President who defied an order to testify by assuming as a matter of law that any testimony from the President would have been unfavorable to the President and make a conclusive adverse inference on the evidentiary issues about which the President was asked to testify against the President.
Each state, each local government, and each government agency can make their own rules on this question (if it was another U.S. state, a provision called the &quot;full faith and credit clause&quot; requires all other states to honor it). Usually, the Turkish name change document will be honored by any U.S, state or local government agency or institution if (1) the name change document or a copy of it, is certified or notarized, (2) there is an apostille from the appropriate Turkish national government official stating that the certification or notarization is valid, and (3) there is a translation of the document into English that accompanies the original document or certified copy of the document that is supported by a sworn certification from a foreign language translator that the translator is qualified to translate the document and that the translation of the document is true and correct. Sometimes, an agency or institution will also reserve the right to not honor a document if the relevant civil servant has a reasonable belief based upon some relevant fact, that the document is a fake. But, some agencies or institutions could have more relaxed, or more cumbersome, requirements by adopting regulations that say so. For example, many states have laws that allow you to do a name change for purposes of a driver's license from a pre-marital name without any other proof other than simply by declaring under oath that you got married on a particular day and changed your name, since that situation is rarely suspicious and covers the vast majority of cases. An alternative option would be to bring a name change petition to a U.S. court and to have it declare the the Turkish name change is valid, usually with essentially the same kind of evidence, but sometimes with the court allowing you to explain why you can't comply with some formality, because, for example, your country is at war and isn't issuing apostilles or your country doesn't have the concept of notarizing or certifying this particular kind of document, or because you would face persecution in that country if you had to go back to it in order to get that paperwork. Once this was done, all U.S. government, state, and local agencies and institutions would have to obey that court order, and if there are lots of agencies or institutions that have different or onerous requirements, this may be easier to do. There are also some states that recognize the concept of a common law name change. In these states, any name (and sometimes all names) that you voluntarily go by, or answer to, are legally your name, even if you don't have any paperwork to back it up.
Child custody (and alimony) are determined by state courts, so the exact details are state-dependent. There is no legal basis for a person preventing thrie former spouse from moving (assuming the host country doesn't deny a visa), but the courts would be involved in determining whether the child can be taken along: parent A cannot legally just pack up the kids and bolt. When parents don't agree, then the court must determine what outcome is in the best interest of the child. If the children want to move, that counts in favor of them moving ("counts in favor" does not mean "decides the matter"). If the moving parent doesn't have viable employment prospects abroad, that counts against them moving. The amount of time each parent spends with the children also matters, not to mention the laws of your state (here is what the California courts say: "Move-Away" Situations). Generally speaking, the moving parent has to provide notice, then the non-moving parent has to file a legal action to block the move. Your attorney will discuss all of the relevant considerations with you. The fact of a parent moving to another country does not per se invalidate court-ordered support, but the court can modify an order if circumstances warrant (there's no obvious reason why moving to France would result in modification of such an order).
The green card should always be at hand Yeah, he can't do that. He needs a green card in his possession anytime he's not on private property. Obviously for instance leaving it in the gym locker while you're at the gym is ok, but no, you can't dash off to the grocery store without it, on the logic that it's "just in town". Just like I can't make a milk run without my driver's license. So this idea of dashing off on a 400 mile adventure, is Right Out. He should have absolutely refused to travel without the documents in hand. If they say "get off the property or we'll call the cops", then tell the cops "I can't leave without my passport/green card" which the cops will back up, because they know the law and they know how trafficking works. The right to strut around the USA without any ID at all is reserved for US citizens only, and even that is being stripped away by ever-changing laws. Those documents are someone else's property The Green Card is the property of the USA and is not hers to steal. The passport is the property of the Philippine government and is not hers to steal. She didn't take your stuff, she took theirs. So she is guilty of a Federal crime, and the long arm of Philippine law may have an "opinion" on the matter also. Of course, most people don't think of it that way. They think your ID is your property so they think they're only messing with you. I would absolutely, positively report theft of the passport to the Philippine consulate. (Or rather, just report a missing passport, and be free about explaining the circumstances). One might hope that a phone call to consular staff might scare her straight, and get her to send it along. Most likely the green card would be in there also. Or, he could pay the fees to have a replacement passport issued. However the important one is the Green Card, since that establishes your right to be in the USA. On that one, you must consult an immigration lawyer and find out what you need to do. You certainly can get replacement green cards (not cheap), but admitting you don't have yours could cause you problems. People often seize documents for a reason And what makes me think that is, the uncle is a grown adult and the daughter's elder, and I thought that meant something in the Philippines. He is supposed to be more adult and more responsible. As such, he should be responsible for his own documents. Yet, this seems to be in the daughter's hands; this raises red flags. Maybe what she did was a harmless prank. But usually, taking an immigrant's documents is done for an entirely evil reason. Either they are forcing them into indentured servitude (also called "trafficking") - so if he is now in a situation where he is being extorted to do work in a worse situation or worse wage than he'd take willingly, then he is a trafficking victim, and the taking documents is part of the plot. The US has some legal protections for trafficking victims. Or they are "setting him up" for failure in some other way - for instance, out of idle malice, the niece might be planning to call immigration and report him as being illegal, hoping he'd be found with no green card, and deported for not having it.