Retired Veterans and Active Duty Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines sue Federal Government over divorce court division of retirement pay
Over fifty divorced retired veterans and Active Duty Military Personnel have gone to court to overturn a federal law that enables their ex-spouses to share in their retainer/retirement pay.
Tampa, FL (PRWEB) May 3, 2004--Over fifty divorced veterans and Active DUTY
military personnel have gone to court to overturn a federal law that enables
their ex-spouses to share in their retainer/retirement pay.
The lawsuit
is spearheaded by the ULSG, LLC, which was founded last summer to challenge the
constitutionality of this law in court, after legislative efforts to amend the
Uniform Services Former Spouses' Protection Act (USFSPA) failed.
For over
twenty years, state divorce courts repeatedly have added veterans'
retainer/retirement pay to the pot of assets to be divided among divorced
persons. The ULSG wants to return to 1981, when the United States Supreme Court
ruled in McCarty v. McCarty that divorce courts cannot touch veterans'
retainer/retirement pay. The USFSPA undoes that Supreme Court ruling.
The
ULSG acknowledges that some lawmakers intended the law to help former female
spouses of military personnel, but points out that a snowballing number of women
join the military every year, serving at all levels of the military, many which
now are also affected and are having their retainer/retirement pay unrightfully
taken from them also.
The lawsuit's members represent a cross-section of
the over two thousand ULSG members from an estimated population of over 100,000
who are affected by this law. They include active duty, and men and women
veterans who joined the military long before any law allowed their ex-spouses to
touch their retainer/retirement pay.
The ULSG's lead attorney Jonathan L.
Katz said: "No matter how one slices it, this is an unjust and unconstitutional
law that has wreaked unfair financial harm on retired veterans."
Members
of the ULSG, LLC have stated that the parties to this lawsuit span the map from
active-duty Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines to veterans who have suffered
from this law for over two decades. They ask for nothing more than to overturn
this law."
The lawsuit is entitled Adkins, ULSG, et al. v. Rumsfeld,
United States District Court (E.D. Va.). The plaintiffs are represented by lead
counsel Jonathan L. Katz of the law firm of Marks & Katz, LLC, Silver
Spring, Maryland, and attorney David J. Bederman of Atlanta.
FOR FURTHER
INFORMATION, CONTACT:
MEDIA INQUIRIES:
Jonathan L. Katz, Attorney at
Law
Lead Counsel for ULSG, LLC
Marks & Katz, LLC
1400 Spring
Street, Suite 410
Silver Spring, MD 20910
Phone: (301) 495-4300
Fax:
(301) 495-8815
E-mail: e-mail protected from spam bots
www.markskatz.com
NON-MEDIA INQUIRIES
ULSG,
LLC
PO Box 270337
Tampa, FL 33688-0337
email: e-mail protected from
spam bots
http://www.ULSG.org
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Source : http://www.prweb.com/releases/2004/5/prweb123119.htm