SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

This is an appeal for anyone who has experience or knowledge of marital law. And I am in Canada. I would appreciate any references or advice. I am totally out of my depth here.

Today my ex called me and dropped a bomb shell. He is still legally married to his first wife. legally he is a bigamist. He told me that he needs to go to the supreme court in front of the judge, and that this is a federal offense.

When he was trying to fill out the divorce papers, he had issues. Whether it was his error or someone else’s I don’t know. But the situation is that he is legally still married to his first wife.

When we got married, this did not show up in the records search.

So now, my ex is married to two women, and I apparently need an annulment.

I literally found this out an hour ago, does anyone have any advice or reference material that I can look at? I would like to understand what this means before I talk to his lawyer. I also want to know if I should get my own lawyer.

I swear, if something went right I wouldn’t be able to see it because so much has not gone right.

I actually thought he wanted to talk because he was getting married again, but that would mean that he would have three wives. Oh man. I never thought I would do this, but I guess I am a sister wife now.

Who knew?

Well. That's a shock. Are you ok?

I also want to know if I should get my own lawyer.

If you’re dealing with a legal matter and you’re asking yourself this question, no matter the context, the answer is yes.

I am in utter shock. But it hasn’t really sunk in.

I basically was speechless for the call.

Imagine the shock his first wife will get when she finds out she has 2 husbands - it is a federal offence.

I'm sorry you're going through this rite now.
A crazy question, is what he's saying legit?
As you remember, cheaters lie.
Sorry, I have no legal advice, except verify.

I am so sorry you are going through this. What an utter shock. Yes, please see an attorney post-haste to learn what this means for you. Good luck.

[This message edited by SI Staff at 8:59 PM, Friday, March 10th]

Do a Google and you tube search for Lisa Arends, she experienced this just like you. She has several videos on trauma and healing. She also wrote a book, Lessons from the End of a Marraige, How I Found Happiness while Surviving Bigamy Abandonment and Deceipt. Surely she can answer many of your questions. Let us know how you progress through this difficulty situation.

My advice - consult a lawyer NOW.

Just talking off the top of my head here ------ if I were in your situation, if I didn't already know what his financial obligations are to the first ex I'd DEF want to know about that. Does he pay child support or alimony to the first ex and so on.

Quite the shocker! Take care of yourself.

[This message edited by BoundaryBuilder at 2:13 AM, Saturday, March 11th]

I am an Australian lawyer, and not a family lawyer. So I am not offering legal advice, just some insight.

I assume that both marriages were celebrated in Canada. Is that correct?

Is all of the matrimonial property in Canada?

If the answer to either of these questions is no, you need to go to a very good and very experienced family lawyer. If the answer to both questions is yes, maybe a garden variety family lawyer would be fine.

The better they are, the less they need your work, the greater the chance is they have seen this before, or will know someone who might have the answer. If you can get a referral there, once you get on and have their attention, they will usually do their best for you.

Honestly, there have been times when someone has had the good luck to consult ne on a type of question which, in my jurisdiction, I could guess that at most 20 people would be able to come up with the answer and a strategy to deal with the particular problem. That doesn’t always matter, but sometimes it does. On rare occasions a $500 consult may have saved a client $200,000. Those are the occasions where you already know the answer from prior cases, or by close analogy to it. But a lawyer without that background won’t see it. On other occasions a $500 consult with me didn’t accomplish much at all, because it was not that type of issue, or it wasn’t in my wheelhouse.

My concern for you here is what annulment might do for the distribution of property, and if that is disadvantageous, what your other options are.

I don’t have that answer, but a very good family lawyer might, or might be able to phone a friend and come up with that answer, quickly and more cheaply than a Rookie family lawyer who muddles through. You don’t learn these things in law school. You learn them by struggling through cases over years.

see a lawyer. your legal marital status can affect things in the US like social security, pensions, inheritance, etc. No idea about Canada, but you should check. So there may be other ramifications beyond being on the next reality TV show.

So sorry you are going through this.

[This message edited by BearlyBreathing at 12:41 AM, Saturday, March 11th]

I don't even know how this could happen. I had to provide divorce papers when I remarried (Ontario). How could they both really not know if they didn't have a certificate of divorce?

This sounds shady. I don’t see how it’s possible in a first-world country to accidentally not get divorced and then marry another person. If he’s being brought up on bigamy charges, there’s likely evidence of fraud.

Get a lawyer to help find out what happened and sort this out for you.

[This message edited by BluerThanBlue at 8:47 PM, Saturday, March 11th]

Thank you for the support , I clearly have some work to do to understand this

Just when life seems it couldn't get worse -

I would think you only have to worry with being an unwilling accomplice in your-soon-to-be-ex illegal doings.

HE is the one "married to two people" (civil or otherwise?) and YOU are only married to one person.

My only worry is some jerk-type prosecutor or other "prosecutor" type person would try to claim you willingly consented to

marriage KNOWING of his not-being-single.

Please let us know what legal advice your are getting (those of us down South!)

I was looking for a mime to post but gave up and spotted this. (not saying your husband (?) is or was a dog)

sometimes one needs a bit of a laugh

edit: just a bit curious and found:

in your browser put: laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-46/section-290.html

Please get legal consultation ASAP!!!!

[This message edited by Hippo16 at 11:41 PM, Sunday, March 12th]

Hippo, there’s no need to freak out TallGirl. She is not the one who committed bigamy and she didn’t engage in any other related fraudulent activity. She just needs to meet with a lawyer to discuss how the charges against him are going to impact her and how the division of assets will be affected, considering they were never legally married in the first place.

Hippo, there’s no need to freak out TallGirl. She is not the one who committed bigamy and she didn’t engage in any other related fraudulent activity.

Thanks, Blue, was going to say this.

I am also a lawyer, I actually work as a prosecutor. I don't practice in Canada, so take this with a grain of salt. With few exceptions (statutory rape being the most common and obvious), you must have knowledge of a fact to be convicted of a crime. If you did not know he was married you likely cannot be charged with anything.

Thanks all

I did not know. Our marriage certificate stated his status as divorced. I do remember him filling out the forms….

I have only been married once. I have the marriage certificate. I feel that is reasonable proof it wasn’t done knowingly.

Kinda turns one off marriage. That is for sure.

It will be a headache. I need to find a good family lawyer here. That will be fun

Keep us posted, TG. And vent when you need to.

Oh, man, Tallgirl. I'm so sorry!

Do you know anything about the ex-wife? Since she's also remarried, I hope that means that they can settle the financial implications amicably.

All I know is she has 2 kids and my ex thought she was remarried. If she is remarried I would imagine she still is, otherwise she would have reached out to my ex for a REAL divorce.

I talked to a friends husband, he knows two or more people who have gone through this, he said it is really a lot of paperwork and family court is slow. So guess what? I am still married! And will be for about 2 years more. He gave me a lawyers name and a clinic for a reference.

Omg. I am not a drama person, but sh!t keeps happening.