NaturalSelection
New Member
BBM - Why would moving to Alaska put them out of reach for child support?
We have a "Child Support Enforcement Agency" which is a State run department. They make sure parents pay child support. It doesn't matter if one parent lives in Alaska and the other one lives in another state. They work with every state, enforcing support orders by garnishment (paychecks, tax refunds, Alaska PFD, savings accounts, etc.). Usually the only way to avoid them is to work for cash under the table or work for a Native Corporation (American Indian) which do not have to recognize state or Federal judgements. Moving to Alaska would not get anyone off the hook for child support.
I have known several people (one is my sister) who have been unsuccessful in getting child support across state lines. (former husband is a physician and has moved from state to state several times to make tracking him down as difficult as possible) Also, Bush's budgets woefully underfunded the agency, and there were terrible backlogs. I've heard things are better under Obama, but establishing paternity would be onerous... I've read that only about 8% of children with out of state fathers get child support from them. Finally, we know that AK is different from many other states in that it has many remote areas where disappearing is easier than it would be in S. California. Of course, CL's perception (NL's too) is more important than reality. This could have been motive enough, but I'll bet NL's part in this was significant. Hopefully, time will tell. The important thing is that he/they get prosecuted. It may be LE has enough to indict now, and are taking their time to gather as much evidence as possible. The goal is a conviction, and waiting months, a year, two years, to get one is the right tack if they can make a stronger case.