Ex wife trying to make financial claim after 22 years of divorce

the_opposite

Hi all,

A friend of mine got divorced from his then wife around 22 years ago. Part of the deal was she would get 50% of the equity in their house.

This money was paid to her and the divorce was amicable. She even continued to work for his (my friend's) company for a good number of years after the divorce.

Just last week, he received a letter from some divorce mediation company informing him that his ex-wife is now claiming she had never received her 50% share of the house equity.

So my question is, can someone make such a claim some 22 years after the divorce happened?

My friend has checked with his bank and records do not go back that far, so it seems impossible to now prove that she received this money.

Can anyone here offer any advice on this?

Is it possible to suddenly make such as claim out of the blue some 22 years after the fact? If so, how can the payment be proven if bank records do not go back that far? 

Thanks in advance.

Keep_pedalling

Anyone can make a legal claim for anything, but the question would be could she be successful or not.  There must have been a lot of paperwork associated with the divorce including the payment. Hopefully he has not thrown it away. How did he finance the settlement?

Hoenir

Was a financial consent order ever drafted? 

the_opposite

He has a record of the divorce papers but they don't mention the settlement. He has no records of the settlement nor any records of the payment. And the solicitors he used are no longer around.

Even if his ex wife still has paperwork relating to the settlement, surely it is too late to prove or disprove payment since bank records don't exist that far back. 

And I'm wondering what, after 22 years, would drive someone to suddenly make such false claims.

As you can imagine this is stressing him out. He's not very internet savvy hence why I'm posting this here myself.

Hoenir

the_opposite said:

And I'm wondering what, after 22 years, would drive someone to suddenly make such false claims.

Was the property title transferred into your friends name at the time of the divorce ? 

maman

Even if the solicitors have closed down, their records are usually kept by the company that takes them over. I know that happened with our original wills. Not sure if it applies to divorce paperwork but maybe worth pursuing. 🤔

Keep_pedalling

maman said:

Even if the solicitors have closed down, their records are usually kept by the company that takes them over. I know that happened with our original wills. Not sure if it applies to divorce paperwork but maybe worth pursuing. 🤔

Unlikely, wills and trusts will be kept longer but divorce records are unlikely to be kept beyond 15 years.

Does the land registry show a transfer of equity from joint to sole ownership?

Gavin83

Has he actually asked the bank or did he just look at his account and assume they had no records before this?

sheramber

Has he asked the bank if there would be eany records in archive.

My bank retrieved some archive records for us after 17 years

EnPointe

sheramber said:

Has he asked the bank if there would be eany records in archive.

My bank retrieved some archive records for us after 17 years

exactly this 

 my bank  allows  immediate access   ( downloadable PDFs) to statements etc for the past 6 or 7 years , if you want older than that you can ask them and they will print and post  to the address on file 

Stateofart

I suppose you could take the view is that if he cannot prove he did give her the money, can she prove she didn't receive it.  In any case, without the evidence a judge will probably not be able to side with her anyway.