Michael & Diandra Douglas: Why Greed, Anger and Revenge Have No Place in Oakland County Divorce Court

I read in the New York Post online edition today that Michael and Diandra Douglas are once again back in a family law court, this time in New York. This unfortunate couple filed for divorce in California over ten years ago, however, this week, Diandra filed a motion in the New York divorce courts seeking half of Michael's share of the proceeds of his most recent film which is set to release in September. Ten years later and she still wants half, how can this be?

Legally, it is simple. Basically, in California (as in Oakland County Michigan, even though we are not a community property state) any income earned through the actions of one spouse during the marriage is considered joint income of the married parties. In addition, any property rights obtained through the work of either parties during the marriage is considered to be a marital property right. In the Douglas's case, it appears that Michal Douglas entered into the contract for the movie "Wall street" (a classic) and performed the role of "Gordon Gekko" while he was married to Diandra. Therefore, she was entitled to fifty percent of the proceeds from that movie.

The judgment of divorce then dictates how parties to a divorce will divide all of the income, assets and property rights earned during the marriage. This is the tricky part. Apparently, Diandra's attorneys must have included in the judgment a fifty percent share of Michael's contractual right to any "residuals, merchandising and ancillary rights" to the original movie Wall Street. The new movie is a sequel and that's the rub. The judge in New York must now read the judgment, listen to argument and determine whether Michael and Diandra intended to include a sequel in the list of rights that she obtained to Wall Street.

There are two lessons to be learned in this sad tale.

First, the importance of a well crafted judgment of divorce that includes all foreseeable possible future issues cannot be underestimated. It is imperative to have an attorney draft this document in an exhaustive and meticulous manner, because often, as in the Douglas case, when parties continue to antagonize one another after the divorce, the decision will ultimately come down to the wording of the judgment.

The attorneys may have been able to avoid this issue by stating exactly what rights she has and what rights she does not have regarding each of his projects. For instance, according to the article, the parties argued about "spin-offs" in court as opposed to "sequels". If this is true, Michael's attorneys probably should have specifically included language stating that rights to spin-offs are included but sequels are not included. This open loop allows Diandra to get her foot in the door and proceed with legal argument. This could be an extremely expensive error for Michael if he indeed did not intend to grant the rights to sequels in the judgment of divorce.

Second, this case has a byline, Michael and Diandra have a son that is now in his twenties. He is allegedly a drug dealer and has been convicted of drug related offenses. During the hearings seeking leniency for his son in recent months, Michael could not help himself, he took the opportunity to besmearch his ex-wife, blame her for their son's problems and denigrate her parenting skills in open court. This is obviously inappropriate testimony at his son's sentencing, however, Diandra made outrageous claims against Michael during the original divorce case which made him out to look like a sexual deviant. In addition, it appears that she has used the divorce court system in an attempt to punish, humiliate and extort Michael.

The point is that both of these parties started out on the wrong note and carried forward this cacophony together. They brought their anger and sense of need for vindication into court and used the courts to attempt to punish the other party and release their anger against the other party, which creates a vicious cycle indeed. Frankly, in most cases most judge (in Oakland County divorce cases at least) do not put much weight on the many wrongs that parties have committed against one another, therefore, all this serves to do is fan the flames of litigation, which in turn prolongs the proceedings and has horribly negative effects on the parties' health, finances, welfare and most importantly, their children.

Perhaps this ten year saga of misery could have been avoided. Is she had not started out trying to create scandal and misfortune or to punish him in court, or if he had decided not to hold onto his anger as shown by his recent statements at the leniency hearing, maybe they would not be in court in New York now interpreting the technical meaning of terms their attorneys put together for them in California a decade ago.