Opinion ID: 2109237
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Purpose of and Remedies Under RURESA

Text: The purpose of RURESA is to provide an economical and expedient means of enforcing duties and orders of support for parties located in different states. § 42-762; Johns v. Johns, 5 Va.App. 494, 364 S.E.2d 775 (1988). As stated in Annot., 31 A.L.R. 4th 347 at 350 (1984): Prior to the creation and adoption of the Uniform Reciprocal Enforcement of Support Act ... the problem of interstate enforcement of duties of support became acute with the increasing mobility of the American population. A deserting spouse was beyond the reach of process in the state where he had abandoned his family, which often had no means to follow him, and welfare departments, saddled with the burden of supporting destitute families, were often prevented from enforcing the duty of support in the state where the deserting spouse could be found, by decisions holding that the duty existed only as to obligees within the state. RURESA provides two civil remedies. Under the first, the procedure for which is outlined in the civil enforcement sections contained in part III of the act, the party claiming support, the obligee, may bring suit in the obligee's home state, the initiating state (not necessarily the same state which entered the dissolution decree), and obtain a judgment for support in the state in which the obligor is present, the responding state. 1 H. Clark, The Law of Domestic Relations in the United States § 7.6 (2d ed.1987); §§ 42-763(f) and 42-768 to 42-795. This part of the act contemplates that the obligee file in the initiating state a petition for support; if the initiating state court determines that the petition sets forth facts from which it may be determined that the obligor owes a duty of support, and that a court of the responding state may obtain jurisdiction of the obligor or his property, then the initiating state court shall forward the petition to the responding state. § 42-775. Thus, the initiating state court only determines whether further proceedings are warranted. Pfueller v. Pfueller, 37 N.J.Super. 106, 117 A.2d 30 (1955). See, also, Matter of Burke v. Adams, 130 A.D.2d 100, 518 N.Y.S.2d 148 (1987); Prager v. Smith, 195 A.2d 257 (D.C.1963); State Ex Rel. Lyon v. Lyon, 75 Nev. 495, 346 P.2d 709 (1959); State v. Perry, 198 Tenn. 389, 280 S.W.2d 919 (1955). Upon receipt of the petition, the responding state court notifies the prosecuting attorney, who shall take all action necessary ... to enable the court to obtain jurisdiction over the obligor or his property and shall request ... a hearing and give notice thereof to the obligor.... § 42-779. The responding state court then holds a hearing and must reach a determination as to whether the obligor owes a duty of support; if it so finds, it may order the obligor to furnish support or reimbursement therefor and subject the property of the obligor to the order. § 42-785. The same procedure may be used when the obligee and obligor are in different counties of the same state. 1 H. Clark, supra; § 42-794. The second remedy, the procedure for which is outlined in the registration of foreign support orders sections contained in part IV of the act, allows the beneficiary of an outstanding support judgment of another state to register that judgment in the state where the obligor is present and provides a summary procedure for enforcing that judgment in the obligor's state as if the registered judgment were one rendered by a court of that state. 1 H. Clark, supra; §§ 42-763(f) and 42-796 to 42-7, 104. See Wilson v. Ransom, 233 Neb. 427, 446 N.W.2d 6 (1989).