Marilyn Stowe Blog

Marilyn Stowe has compiled a count down of the top ten dirty divorce tricks. See Part 1 here and Part 2 here.

10. Moving the spouse to a different country, in order to obtain a more favourable divorce settlement. There was the case of fund manager, Mark Niznik, who lured his estranged wife to move to Scotland under the pretext of reconciliation and then applied to the Scottish courts for divorce. See this article in the Daily Mail.

9. Covert surveillance of a spouse by bugging the phone, the car, the office - or by employing an enquiry agent. Always sounds like a sleazy thing to do.

8. Secretly photocopying every scrap of financial information in the house and office.

7. Salting away as much money as possible, ready for that “rainy day”.

6. Damage, destruction or sale of the household’s most valuable contents. Horror of horrors, Marilyn mentions the case of a wife selling a Steinway piano without the knowledge of her pianist husband.

5. Spending money wildly, as a form of “payback”. Not sure why it is always assumed that some wives do this and never husbands.

4. Assaulting the spouse and the new partner.

3. Using a “friend” as a spy, to gain access to the lawyer’s office. Whilst friends and relatives might be a good form of support it is never a good idea for someone to become too involved.

2. “Conflicting out” the spouse’s lawyer. This was a new one to me and involves making appointments with more than one lawyer to place them out of bounds to the other party.

1. If all else fails…running off with the divorce lawyer! After 9 years single this doesn't sound such a bad idea.


Marilyn Stowe has more than 25 years of experience handling divorce cases and family law proceedings and is highly skilled at uncovering attempts to disguise wealth and hide assets. She is regularly asked to write articles and give interviews to regional and national newspapers and magazines. I have added her blog to my roll.

Two other interesting posts were Family Law and Forensic Accountants and Beware the Desperate Housewives.