Michael Bautista was stabbed in the back by his wife after they’d just discussed their divorce. He was in front of his computer, drawing up a list of their possessions to share out, when she attacked him, plunging a knife into his back.

According to Michael Bautista, his wife stared at him and stated:

I want you to feel the same pain I do.

Bautista gave testimony on Tuesday 23rd July in Jefferson County District Court, USA, where his wife is on trial for his attempted murder. He claims when he tried to call for help his wife disconnected the phone and stopped him from using his cell phone.

Eventually the paramedics arrived after his wife, Nancy, phoned her daughter to tell her what she had done. They found Michael in the kitchen, with a large knife in his back.

According to the emergency services, Michael had lost around 20% of his blood.

During Michael’s testimony, his wife Nancy became visibly distressed, especially when details of their sex life were mentioned.

Michael stated that when he started talking to his wife about divorce she became hysterical and began throwing things at him.

Her reaction was like a fuse that had been lit.

I knew she was trying to get me angry. I tried to stay very calm. She kept saying she was going to destroy me professionally and financially. She said I would be sorry. I was amazed.

When you’re looking to get divorced, the last thing you want to do is get married to the person you’re divorcing. That’s just what happened to Wendy Lane however, as she was told that before she could be allowed a divorce, she must first get married.

Apparently, her marriage to George Kaczorowski in the USA was never recorded by Internal Affairs. George wrote to Internal Affairs April 2008 asking for a copy of their marriage certificate, so that he could apply for a divorce. However, rather than receiving the document he expected, he was sent a letter stating that they had no record of his marriage in the first place.

The couple were shocked at this, as Wendy Lane had a copy of their marriage certificate.

Internal Affairs stated they:

never received a copy of particulars of marriage from the celebrant

This meant the couple had to re-register their marriage in order to get a divorce, something most divorcing couples would be opposed to doing.

Tony Wallace, a spokesman for Internal Affairs stated:

We acknowledge that if both copies of the Particulars of Marriage were given to the couple, then it is likely the marriage was not registered. This would be an error by the Department of Internal Affairs that we apologise for.

Despite their apology, in order to get a divorce the couple are required to prove their marriage existed in the first place.

A North East man lied in court about his marriage to a Russian bride he met on the Internet in order to end his ill-fated marriage. After meeting his bride via a dating website for foreign women in 2004, the couple were married in 2006 and his wife, Irina, relocated to the UK from Russia.

Unfortunately the romance didn’t last and the couple split just a few months into the marriage, with Irina leaving her husband in February 2007. The man then initiated divorce proceedings and had their marriage annulled, without Irina’s knowledge.

Things started to go wrong however when Irina herself filed for divorce, only to find that she was already divorced. The police were called in and her ex-husband was arrested for forgery and perjury.

Pleading guilty, her ex-husband was handed a six month suspended sentence.

Dt Con Dave Kernaghan stated:

This is a highly unusual case involving an international love story which went sour.

The proverb ‘marry in haste and repent at leisure’ is not valid here. But the reverse does seems more apt, ‘attempt to divorce in haste and repent at leisure’.

This individual was clearly in a hurry to release himself from his marriage, but in doing so he lied to the court and must now face the consequences.

Mr Nelson is a man of previous good character who has been very foolish. He landed himself in a massive amount of trouble for something he didn’t need to do. Basically he stood up and lied to the court and misled it to get the marriage annulled.

Divorce rates aren’t just soaring in the UK and the USA; they’re also on the up throughout the globe as the stigma attached to being divorced grows less and less. China for example has an escalating divorce rate that the Chinese people are keen to address. The method for curbing the rising divorce rates is to offer people advice and training on how to be married and how to live together.

One marriage counselling firm base in Shanghai is launching a training course for wives, to teach them the skills that wives require in order to serve their husbands.

The organisers of the wife skills course have invited along psychologists, sociologists and professors of the academy of social sciences. Their role is to lecture women on communication, morals and human relations.

Also invited are alpha males, who will be giving lectures on what they’re looking for in their perfect wife!
The course is planned to be free of charge initially, and if it’s a success the organisers are also planning to run courses on being a perfect husband.

Roy Watkinson, 69, was married to MP Angela Watkinson for 45 years, and has known her since she was just 13 years old. His recent divorce has left him bitter and disappointed with what he calls a wasted life.

Roy says he helped his 68 year old wife build her career from a Councillor, to where she now works in the heart of Westminster. Their divorce turned sour early on as they argued over the home and their joint finances.

Roy, who used to work as a police officer, was forced to leave his former home (which is said to be worth upwards of £700,000). His ex-wife meanwhile lives in her Westminster flat close to Parliament.
Roy stated:

It’s cost me well over £500,000. All my life I have worked for us to be independent. I have wasted my life completely.

The joint house was sold, with Angela Watkinson receiving just under half of the value. She does however keep hold of her flat in Westminster, which is worth £375,000, and of course her MP salary, which is worth £61,820 per year.

Angela Watkinson retorted:

Our assets were divided fairly and took into account the fact I worked continuously during the marriage and made a full contribution.

Most people aren’t very happy about getting divorced; they see it as a bit of a failure in their life. Something that never quite worked out how they intended, and they’re not prone to advertise the fact that they’re divorced. It’s still a bit of a taboo subject.

This isn’t the case for comedian Sarah Millican however. She not only embraces the fact that she’s divorced; most of her comedy routines are based around the subject

She couples her divorce led routine with a torrent of lewd adult humour, belittling her homely image and softly spoken voice.

My mam does think I’m quite coarse and I don’t think she realises where I get it from, because it’s not from my dad. I get the story-telling side from him, but the rudeness comes from her.

Basically, I look nice and I don’t sound how I look. And there’s another meaning, but you have to see the show to find that out.

Her divorce is a resounding echo of bitterness that’s driven her routines since she started the comedy circuit, and she’s gone from strength to strength.

There are questions that you ask yourself when you split up with someone: “What if no one finds me attractive again? What if I want kids?” Not Nice is what happened, how I got over it and what I want for the future.

Divorce doesn’t have to be the end of a journey, for Sarah it was just the beginning.

An angry wife named Tricia Walsh-Smith became the star of YouTube a few months ago when she posted a video of herself revealing all of her husbands dirty secrets, and the details of their prenuptial agreement that meant she’d get practically nothing when they divorced. As a result of the video she uploaded, she received millions of views, and even had coverage on the major US news networks such as CNN and NBC.

However her outburst didn’t win her many fans, and now her husband, Philip Smith, who is a Broadway mogul, has been granted a divorce from his wife with a judge ruling that their prenuptial agreement was indeed valid.

The couple married in 1999, and Tricia Walsh-Smith signed the agreement shortly before the wedding. The outcome of the ruling states that she has to vacate their apartment in Park Avenue, having just 30 days to do so, and she will only receive the sum of $750,000 from her husband.

Sometimes getting your wife to agree to a divorce can be difficult, especially if she wants to be stubborn and doesn’t want a divorce. This can drag out proceedings to that they last months, sometimes even years. If you’re looking to move on in your life and re-marry, this isn’t an ideal situation at al. However, one Indian man found what he thought was the perfect solution to all of this; get a woman to impersonate his wife and agree to the divorce in court!

You’d think someone would have noticed, but no. Sanjib Saha brought a woman to court who said she was his wife, and that she wanted a divorce. His real wife meanwhile was at home, completely unaware of what was transpiring.

The court, in his home city of Kolkata, granted the divorce as there was no one to contest it, and ordered that his wife be thrown out of their home.

This is where it all started to go wrong for Mr Saha though, as once his wife was thrown out of her home she appealed the ruling. She’s accused her husband of cheating on her and had the original divorce ruling suspended.

Kaushik Chanda is the lawyer for Mr Saha’s wife, his real wife.

The case exposed the legal loopholes in our system.

If you’ve ever had a letter from a solicitor informing you of divorce proceedings from your wife or husband, you’ll what a shock it can be. Imagine though if you’re happily married, and you had no idea that your partner was considering divorce.

A man from Sheffield, John Kitteridge, had been happily married to his wife Joan for 36 years. One morning he received a letter from his solicitors informing him that his divorce from his wife had gone through, and that he was no longer married.

The letter was opened by his wife Joan, which caused her to break down in tears.

The trouble was that neither John nor Joan Kitteridge had filed for divorce, and had no idea what the letter was about. 59-year-old Joan said:

I couldn’t believe what I was reading. I knew deep down it couldn’t be true but it was still such a shock.

Her husband John, who himself had no idea what the letter was about, stated:

I know we’ve had our arguments but we’d never get divorced and seeing a letter like that really upset Joan.

The letter was sent as the result of administrative error from a local law firm based in Paradise Square. They had sent a template letter to the Kitteridges, and said that details within the letter should have been altered before it had been sent.

Going through a divorce can be traumatic enough, without it tearing apart a business in the process. However this is a very real occurrence for couples who also run their own businesses together.

Therefore, if you’re in business with your husband or wife, you need to prepare for the worst should your personal life take a turn for the worse.

Dickinson Dees is a family lawyer; she advises that couples who run a business together need to make provisions for the unthinkable.

The consequences of divorce on a family business are quite far reaching.

I have a case at the moment where one values their business at £2.8m and the other at £400,000.

The problem is that when couples embark on business together they rarely stop and think about what could happen if they split up. Once that does happen of course, couples rarely want (or in many cases aren’t able) to continue working together.

One idea would be set up your business as a partnership, or even to have a shareholder agreement, so that you won’t end up fighting about the value of your business after you split.