Glass & Rau

Can I cancel the contract with my wedding venue due to COVID-19? Since the global pandemic, many people have been forced to cancel or reschedule their wedding dates. The first step to determine whether you are entitled to cancel the contract and get a return of your down payment is to review the terms of the contract. Look to see if the contract discusses whether or not the deposit is refundable. If your contract has a force majeure clause, this may excuse contract performanc...e in the event of an act of God. This kind of clause in a contract will list a series of events that make contract performance impossible by no fault of either party. Many contracts provide for this kind of a provision but it might not be clearly labeled in the contract. You must read the terms of the agreement to determine if your contract contains this clause. A court might determine that a pandemic falls within the scope of the force majeure clause, but it is not guaranteed. In some contracts, the force majeure clause allows the parties to cancel the contract, in which case your obligation to pay may be excused. If your contract is not written or it doesn’t contain a force majeure clause, an alternative legal theory is impossibility of performance wherein you need to show that the cause of the impossibility was not foreseeable. A court may or may not determine that the COVID-19 outbreak was reasonably foreseeable. Lastly, the theory of frustration of purpose is a legal theory that may protect the parties when an unforeseeable event ruins the value of the contract. The complainant needs to show that an event happened that undermined the value of the contract. For example, if there is an Executive Order that limits gatherings to a certain number of people, this might be a basis to claim that the purpose of the contract has been frustrated and should be canceled. https://www.glassandraulaw.com/can-i-cancel-the-contract-wi

Does my spouse have to have life insurance in a divorce? When child support or spousal support is awarded in a divorce, life insurance may be ordered by the court to protect the party entitled to receive support. Life insurance serves as a backup plan to ensure support will not terminate in the event one parent dies. However, the insurance can terminate when the obligation to pay support terminates. Some courts order a fixed amount of insurance and other courts find that a d...ecreasing term amount is sufficient. A decreasing term is usually given when support of one child terminates yet child support is still to be paid for other children. When a life insurance order is sent to the life insurance company, it can be difficult to see when the policy remains in effect and failure to maintain this can be detrimental. It is suggested that the beneficiary spouse is an owner of the policy to avoid this issue. See more

Traditionally, New York courts have expressly held that pets are not children but rather are viewed as personal property or what is known as a chattel. This means that if someone causes harm to your pet, the most you could recover for the pet is its fair market value. On the other hand, in a child custody case, the court determines custody based on what is in the best interest of the child. New York courts have taken a turn and New York is beginning to recognize that p...ets are not just property. Pets hold a special place in our lives and in modern times, pets generally do not fit neatly within traditional property law principles. For example, in the case Raymond v. Lachmann, 264 AD 2d 340 (1st Dept. 1999), the court was called upon to decide who was entitled to ownership of a cat. The court considered the cherished status that pets have in our society and held that the cat, in this case, remain where he lived and had been loved for the past four years. In the decision Travis v. Murray, 2013 N.Y. (Slip Op 23405, Supreme Court New York County), the court held that in a divorce action, parties are entitled to a short hearing and the standard applied would be what is best for all concerned. This standard is not as strict and is not as involved as the best interest analysis applied to in child custody cases. The court should consider why each party will benefit from having the pet in their life, why the pet has a better chance of living and prospering with one party, who was responsible for the pet’s needs during the marriage, who spent more time with the pet, who cared for during the relationship, and the actual arrangement between the parties for spending time with a pet after the parties split up. In conclusion, the court held that the changes in the way society regards dogs and other household pets all but insure that cases involving this type of dispute will only increase in frequency. The judge urged other judges grappling with this issue to look to how other states address the issue of pet custody.