If you read our website, you know that we highly recommend that when you hire an attorney in Illinois, you choose one who has a very narrow practice focus. Illinois attorneys can’t legally call themselves specialists, but you want someone who isn’t a jack of all trades lawyer, but instead just handles the type of case you have. So a “specialist” even if we can’t call them that.
When it comes to choosing a divorce attorney in Illinois, you not only want someone in your corner who is experienced and will fight for you, but you need to make sure that they understand the issues you are facing. Some law firms are good at divorces when one spouse owns a business. Others have had success with child custody disputes.
Most firms who focus on family law will also deal with substance abuse in marriages because it comes up a lot. The question for you is, are they paying appropriate attention to this potentially devastating problem.
If your husband/wife is an alcoholic or abusing drugs it can cause so many problems. First and foremost is that you don’t want them to be alone with your children and certainly not taking the kids anywhere in a car. As a client you can’t just hope to prevent this, but instead need a lawyer who knows how to properly present a motion that shows this concern and knows how to prove your allegations are true. Often this will mean getting an order of protection on behalf of the kids. Other times it’s handled in a straight custody hearing where we argue that any visitation should be supervised. It’s all about knowing how to win and showing that you have won in the past. You don’t want an attorney to have one of their first experiences handling this problem on your case.
Beyond the kids, there is also the issue of the spouse who blows all of the family funds on their habit and runs up large debts. These are marital funds and even if they are taken away via reckless spending, they some times can be recovered as well. For example, if you have a $100,000.00 401k, typically you and your spouse would split it 50/50 if it was all earned during the marriage. But if your spouse spent $20,000.00 on a cocaine habit, you might get a credit for that wasteful spending when it comes time to divide the 401k.
Other things can be done such as drug testing to prove your allegations are true. This all starts though with an attorney in your corner who knows what they are doing. We can’t call them specialists, but that’s what you need.
If you would like our help in finding the right lawyer for your case or just have questions, call us for free at (312) 346-5320 or fill out our contact form and we’ll call you.