In the best interest of the child, generally, to help the custodial parent with care and upbringing of a child, the non-custodial parent may be ordered by a court to pay child support. In Michigan, the amount of child support is based on not only the incomes of both parents, but also on other costs such as day care expenses and health care expenses. If, however, a parent ordered to pay child support fails to do so, he or she may potentially be arrested for failure to pay child support and face jail time.
Michigan residents will find it interesting to learn child support disputes and consequences of failing to make payments affect people of all walks of life. In fact, a 45-year-old man, who also is a local town council member, recently was arrested and charged with failure to pay child support. Earlier in the year, in April, the man was apparently sentenced to approximately a month in jail for identical charges. At that time, he was found guilty of not paying a total of nearly $15,000 in child support – $7,000 to one woman and $8,000 to another.
This time around, however, two bench warrants, which are warrants issued by a judge for the arrest of an individual who is in contempt of court, were issued for the 45-year-old man. Clearly, failure to pay child support has negative consequences for not only the parent who has been accused of not paying, but potentially also for the custodial parent, who may be deprived of the financial means to adequately care for the child.
Nevertheless, in some cases, a non-custodial parent, due to his or her economic circumstances such as a loss of job, lay-off, reduced hours, or some unexpected emergency, may be unable to pay the court-ordered child support amount. In such cases, it is important for the non-custodial parent to consider filing for a modification of the child support payment amount.
Furthermore, when child support disputes between parties arise, it important to have all existing court orders examined, and to look at not only one’s own income changes, but also those of the other party, in order to make sure that the correct income values are used in the child support calculations.
Source: Cola Daily, “Batesburg-Leesville councilman arrested, charged with failure to pay child support,” Allen Wallace, Oct. 7, 2013