Problem with taking someone to small claims court who has "disappeared" as this handyman apparently has is that serving "process" on them is extremely difficult. And, if your brother manages that and gets a judgment, I doubt he would ever be able to collect on it. Collecting on a judgment can be difficult enough even if you know where the judgment debtor is. Collecting on one where you don't even have that much info is nigh impossible. To collect on a judgement that the debtor doesn't want to pay, you basically have to find out where he owns property or has a bank account or something you can take via a legal action called a levy or a garnishment. In some states - but not all - you can also garnish a judgment debtor's wages. But, that requires that you know where the debtor is AND that he have a regular job. Hate to say it but if your bother can't get the police to find and prosecute this individual, there is probably very little he can do. If the police would find and prosecute him, then your bother could also bring a small claims court action and (possibly) someday collect.

I'm with you on that mmommy!! It's disgraceful. We work very hard to keep the kids in the dark on this stuff since it would just create even more issues for them. The oldest sort of knows what's going on becuase we're pretty strapped financially right now, and can't do certain things for him that we normally would be able to do. We don't discuss this with with him, but my sense is that he knows something's up. It's really hard to instill moral values and work ethics when this is what's going on with their Mom. It's like they don't understand sometimes that their Dad and I have to work for a living. Our lawyer is very confident that there will be no "willful contempt" found since he was paying support all along. He does plan on presenting the agreement to the court for documentation that she had agreed to the terms, and that she could have gone to court to change them at any time. And, you're right, most likely we will be able to pay it back in small amounts. He's also going to request that the court order her to find fulltime employment since she's "under employed". bud wi- You are absolutely correct. There is nothing we can do, and my husband definately messed up in trusting her. At the time they did this, I suggested to him that he take the document to the court to get it approved (it is actually a form from the state's probate court website that they filled out) He thought he was covered, and didn't do it. So now he's paying for it. How's this for a punchline...she was lying about her income, and working under the table to receive medicaid benefits which also enabled her to receive free legal support from the Woman's Bar association...Nice! The sickness in this all is that she could be employed full time at her job, but won't do it because she'd get less CS, and is really just doing all this to be nasty.

We could pack lunches, and we did that many times throughout the years. All the children prefer hot lunches and in the winter it is nice to have a warm meal. With me only working part-time we figured if we could qualify for reduced lunch then we should do it. And really even paying the 2.40 per day is cheaper than packing lunches for 4 children. My dh is convinced the state will not go after him for this mess. He told me that the person he spoke with says the situation does not involve him because he did not fill anything out, only she did. I feel like he needs to submit copies of those court papers to ensure our safety in this issue. He wrote down the contact info and fax number where he is supposed to send this paperwork. I am seriously thinking about faxing it myself! Why should we take the chance of getting in trouble? I am also going to our states welfare fraud website and doing an annoymous tip about her situation. And also going to the state she lives in's fraud site to report her there in case she is pulling the same scam there. But I don't know if I should. Its a hard decision. But it really burns me to know she could be putting us in jeopardy.

I'll try to answer your questions, as my first post was already lengthy and I couldn't include all the details. mimipadv, I worked with "Sue" until 5 years ago, and we bumped into each other at the mall and went for a coffee, to catch up. When we worked together, she was never narcissistic and was perfectly ethical (to my knowledge.) Thus my shock, after complimenting her on the pendant! Snidely, I don't know how much the pendant cost, just that she said it was $150.00 less than the one she returned. chisue, you wondered why she'd be OK losing $150.00 and her explanation was that because she could no longer return the original piece, it 'made more sense' to her that she ends up with the simpler pendant that she preferred and the store ends up with a pendant worth more than the money they gave her when she returned it. Suzieque, at least she wasn't rejoicing at having pulled off anything when she told me about returning the pricier pendant. She looked shocked when I told her it was actually fraud, because she had assumed that her returning the pricier pendant, meant the store was gaining financially from it. Lindsay, she didn't buy the pendants from a bona fide 'jewelry store,' but from a large chain store here, similar to maybe Macy's in the States. The diamonds were little, and she said the original pendant was almost identical, but a bit larger, so the detailed design in the gold, stood out more. She preferred the new pendant because the design in the gold was smaller and more subtle. I'm thinking the little diamonds were probably the same in both, and the price probably reflected a weight difference in the gold. plllog you said "As to losing $150, she wasn't. There was no way she could sell or return the first necklace for the original price. She was gaining the amount she got back for returning the wrong one, rather than letting the necklace she didn't care for sit in her drawer." That's how I saw it as well. When I likened her actions to people who shoplift, switch price tags to get a cheaper cost, return things to a different store than purchased, etc. she looked stunned and said "but they cause a financial loss to the store and I was returning something worth $150.00 more than what I paid for it." I suggested to her that if in fact the store hadn't noticed she was returning the slightly larger pendant with a receipt for the smaller one, why would she assume they'd suddenly notice it later and resell it for the proper (higher) price? Or what if they never sold it at all? She admitted she hadn't thought that out, and I saw how she suddenly went from 'not feeling conflicted' to being very embarrassed and upset upon realizing her logic had been faulty. All said I'll not repeat what I learned from "Sue" to anyone, as I don't think she fully understood what she did, and I've certainly made many mistakes myself.