Divorce can affect standing in family business

When a couple decides to separate, they typically need to divide a number of assets. This may include the family business, and the respective roles of the parties in that family business may be altered. Pennsylvania couples who share a business or work for their soon-to-be ex in-laws may want to follow the story of a couple in the midst of a high-profile divorce and how that is affecting the business relationship between the father-in-law and his future former son-in-law.

The couple married in 1996 and then separated in 2010. The husband had a stake in the father-in-law’s company, and the two also had business dealings with each other concerning real estate development projects. The husband claims measures were taken to make him suffer professionally because of the pending divorce.

One claim of retaliation was that the father-in-law had his daughter’s husband’s stake in a company reduced from 21 percent down to a mere .01 percent. Another accusations pertains to emails. It is claimed that the father-in-law had the son-in-law’s email accounts used against him in the divorce. The wife and daughter is in the middle and maintains that the situation is a private matter. She reportedly seeks a fair resolution.

Families are often pulled into divorce proceedings, either by choice or by happenstance. When there are job connections or employment ties that can’t be broken as easily as one party may want, it may become necessary for a soon-to-be ex-spouse to negotiate a settlement or deal with the other spouse as a means of severing business ties. Because of the complications involved with extended family and business relations, parties in this situation in Pennsylvania may benefit from advice and guidance from those who can help them through the divorce and the division of all applicable assets, including a family business.

Source: New York Post, “Real-estate family tangled in prickly divorce“, Julia Marsh and Laura Italiano View, May 1, 2014