Upcoming divorce hearing, but respondent lives in the US

BeautifulThanks

Hi all, at my wits end and need advice from somewhere. As briefly as I can, I'm an Irish citizen who married an American citizen in 2017 in California. He lived in Ireland with me until our marriage broke down in October 2019, he left to go back to the US, never returned to Ireland after that and has no intentions of returning as the marriage has been over since Oct 2019.

I only applied for divorce in March 2024 (my own personal circumstances caused the delay in application, we were not trying to save the marriage at all). I am representing myself but using a divorce service for paperwork. I have done all the necessary paperwork, including ex-parte application before serving documents by post. We have no children, property or joint assets. My only personal assets are my pension, which I will be sorting out later as my pension isn't vested yet.

My ex has been very helpful in responding to everything promptly. I have gotten the Terms of Consent back from him signed and it is a Consent Divorce. My ex even sent an email to the court offices stating his complete consent to the divorce and explaining that he permanently resides in the US and will not be returning to Ireland, and therefore not going to attend the hearing.

In August, I received back my signed Notice of Motion to attend case progression for today 11th October. The Registrar said all my paperwork is in order and set the date for December 6th for the divorce hearing. However, he mentioned that the Judge may have a problem with the fact that the Respondent will not be attending the hearing.

What am I supposed to do here? I am extremely concerned as I can't take many days off from my work, I already worked overtime to make sure I have enough days to attend my case progression, divorce hearing and Pension Adjustment Order hearing later on. I really can't afford for the divorce hearing to keep getting adjourned for my ex to attend. Do I ask for my ex to send another email, or maybe a handwritten letter before the divorce hearing? Do I request for him to attend through video call? He will have to be up at 2am in the morning, but he has his own life and work. We both just want this over so we can move on.

Please, please help.

Dial Hard

Unfortunately the registrar is correct and the judge may well refuse to hear the case on the day. Irish divorce judges are incredibly conservative and subsequently extremely loathe to allow hearings to proceed without both parties present. You can plead your case with all the info you've given above, but I wouldn't be confident, tbh. During the callover for my divorce hearing a very, very frustrated gent got sent away to give his absent ex "one more" chance to appear. He tried to explain that she wasn't going to appear and that all the "one more" chances in the world weren't going to change that, and nearly got himself removed from the court for his troubles. Part of the issue is that you're dealing with different registrars and judges every time and they don't particularly care that this is someone's umpteenth attempt to get a hearing.

That's if you get a judge in the first place, mind. We were all sent home on my first hearing date because the judge hadn't shown up 🙄 I had taken time off work too, plus there's just the general stress and anxiety involved, but the courts care not about such things, unfortunately.

The very best of luck to you - hopefully you get a judge with a bit of cop on and empathy.

spaceHopper

Make it easy for your ex, give them the names of two or 3 solicitors that can appoint one to act for them and simply state they've had a video call with them, seen their ID. Everything is fine and rock on with the divorce.

murpho999

My ex wife lives abroad, she signed all consent forms and I submitted them to the court and her absence was not an issue at all, as I was the one taking the case, she was not disputing anything and signed the forms.

There was no children or financial issues to be resolved with her so it just was not an issue.