Divorce And Mediation Blog

I get about 300 pieces of e-mail a day, the vast majority of it junk. A high percentage of the junk is a scam of some sort [usually phishing, which is trying to get you to give up private codes], and ads for Viagra. I have spam filters, but the evil doers get better each day at making the spam look like it comes from someone with whom I regularly do business, or by coding the messages to make the computer think they come from me or my office.

I regularly do business with Amazon.com. I order books related to divorce, custody, relationships, computers, and other areas that relate to my law practice. So, I'm often on the lookout for e-mail from Amazon to notify me of a shipment, or notify me of or resolve a problem.

The latest scam I've noticed is and "Amazon Thanks for your order" message addressed to me. They look just like a regular notice from Amazon that it has acknowledged an order, and it gives me an opportunity to "view and edit your orders online." Of course they want me to click on one of the links, go to a page that looks like Amazon, and find out what the heck I've ordered that I wasn't expecting. Each of these is different in it's content, so I must read them carefully to see if they are legitimate. They want me to try to log onto my account, enter my user name, e-mail, and password so that they can later do this themselves.

When I read the mail carefully, I start to see obvious errors. One of several that I received this morning says that the Order Grand Total is $63.99. Below that is a summary that says that the subtotal of all items is $96.99, then the total before tax is $43.99, sales tax is zero, and "Total for this Order" is $10.99. It then gives me the option to click and see the items, Price: $71.99. Must be Nigerians filling out a form letter. Usually, phishing scams aren't this obvious.

I'm glad my parents don't use the computer I gave them for e-mail. I'm sure that they would just assume it is an honest mistake and give away their life savings.

Today's San Diego Union contains an article on the front page with a headline that "S. D. County home prices inch higher." While this is certainly welcome news, it hardly serves as notice of the end of falling prices and is not enough to make settling divorce cases easier.

The statistics cited in the article refer to median home prices in the county - for those non-math majors, that means that one-half of the houses sold are above, and one-half below that median number. The increase, if you can call it that, is .5%, year to year for October. That can easily be a statistical anomoly, and not reflect an actual increase in prices, although the article does reflect a 2% increase in the number of sales - of course that increase is from the extremely desperate days of October, 2008, just before the election, when it seemed our financial world was about to end, which is probably not a good guide post from which to measure the market.

What I notice in my family law practice is that houses at the very bottom of the market are selling as a few buyers think they can pick up a rental propery cheap [especially based on early 2005 prices].

In one case, we have two houses to value; one in the $300,000 range, and one nearer $700,000. Because of delays, we've had two appraisals of each house - the same appraiser says that the less expensive house has actually increase in value about 10% in the last year, while it is opinion that the higher priced house remains unchanged. With the median at $325,000 [according to the article], it may just be that the bottom end has firmed up as buyers think they are getting a bargain, while the number of foreclosures and repossessed houses continues to keep the overall market soft.

Those few friends who are looking at houses in the range above $700,000, are finding they can buy nearly new, custom built houses far below the cost of construction - one friend remarked that the top end is equivalent of being given a free lot, then a discounted bid on building - he's interested in moving, but is really picky because he finds so much from which to choose - he doesn't have to suffer noise problems or bad layouts, as there are other houses on the market.

Before taking a step into buying a new house, think carefully. We may not be at the bottom. And, remember, one factor in keeping the bottom firm is that interest rates on these sub-jumbo loans remain very low, and money is available to many buyers in that price range. That does not necessarily mean that people are trading up, only that houses at the bottom are becoming attractive to investors, while pricing remaining a gamble. If interest rates rise, prices will drop. As always, be sure you have the financial stability to keep the property you buy even if housing prices and rental values drop, and interest rates go up.

The recent story of Prof. Gates and the Cambridge cop has been blown all out of proportion by the media, trying to make it a racial issue to further divide Democrats from Republicans. I agree with the President that the cop did something stupid - it's not a racial issue, just an overreaction to a fairly minor incident, and the President didn't assert it was anything else. [Perhaps the stupidity was in the mouth of the "journalist" who asked his opinion in the first place, during a press conference on health insurance.] The professor probably acted stupidly as well, but we'll never know what really happened.

A similar problem occurred in Cardiff [coastal San Diego County] a few weeks ago where a woman about 67 was wrestled to the ground and handcuffed, after apparently refusing to tell a cop her date of birth - he'd come to her house with a helicopter and about 7 squad cars on a noise complaint about 9:00 p.m. in the evening - the noise was an amplified speech by a female candidate for Congress, speaking at a fund raiser in a residential neighborhood.

The woman was offended by the cop's attitude, and attempted to shoo him off by saying "you know where I live and my name, why do you need my date of birth." From there, the problem escalated into a stupid act by the cop - both immature participants were white. [There were some political overtones, such as the name calling by the reporting neighbor who had allegedly been yelling from the bushes.]

Maureen Dowd's column in the New York Times fairly summarizes my views of the Gates situation. Although the races were different, the attitudes were about the same. This type of thing seems to happen a lot, and it's not racial, although in that case the anger came out in racial tones - we all have our hot buttons.

A few years ago, I was stopped by a CHP officer for using the shoulder to go around a truck that was stuck trying to access a freeway where all the traffic was stopped for construction. I had seen the officer in my rear view mirror as I avoided the truck and knew I was doing nothing wrong.

He was angry that I had gone around the truck, and argumentative - I tried to suggest he had discretion not to issue the ticket, rather than trying to argue the law, but that seemed to make him more determined: "I use those shoulders", he responded, as though what I had done could have endangered him had he been giving a ticket. I sucked it up, politely accepted the ticket, and set the case for trial.

At trial, the same jackbooted officer [a motorcycle cop] arrived loaded for bear. I presented the judge the statute that allowed what I had done. The officer was rabid in his defense of his action, and amateurish in his rejection of the statute - adamant that it couldn't mean what it said - perhaps a part-time night school law student. He couldn't allow me to have the last word, acting as a bad prosecutor over and over again, firmly committed to the idea that he was right. I was acquitted, and was he angry. I fear running into him again. Maybe he had a friend killed during a traffic stop on a shoulder, and that was a hot ticket item for him - from my standpoint, he merely looked foolish and wasted a fair amount of my time.

I've known a number of police officers well, and the overwhelming majority would never have acted as he did, never have wrestled a middle aged white woman to the ground in her own home, or handcuffed a middle aged professor with a limp simply because he was angry and yelling at them. Let's not make this a national issue, when we have a health insurance crisis, two major wars, and an economic catastrophe to occupy our minds. It's just two testosterone driven people who pushed one another's buttons.

Last week, I bemoaned the hit piece by a local TV station's amateur reporter, Lauren Reynolds of KGTV, the San Diego ABC-TV affiliate.

Well, one of my colleagues tried to set the record straight. Last week she sent the vice president of the station a lengthy rebuttal to the biased report, including readily available public information, copies of publications, and written statements from witnesses.

An apology? A retraction? Nope! Seems the station acknowledges there is a difference of opinion, is sticking by its report, and not telling the other side of the story. Since I now know what they claim is journalism lacks integrity, I won't be watching the news there any longer. Sorry Charley [Gibson], but you're off my list of favorites, along with your cohorts.