Atlanta Divorce Attorney Blog

When celebrity family law cases make national news, clients often wonder how the case would turn out in Georgia. In a celebrity family law case currently gripping the headlines, Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries are now battling over whether their 72-day marriage will end in divorce or annulment. Kim Kardashian ‘doesn’t want a battle’ with Kris Humphries: Source, by Jennifer Garcia, PEOPLE.com, December 2, 2011. Though Kardashian filed for divorce to end their marriage, Humphries has filed for an annulment on the grounds of fraud. If the parties obtain an annulment, it will be as if the marriage never happened.

In California, like in Georgia, fraud is grounds for an annulment. However, in both states, the fraud must be proven, not just alleged, or an annulment cannot be granted. Though there is speculation in the media about the fraud in this marriage, Humphries must come with facts, not just speculation in order to be granted an annulment. If the fraud cannot be proven, the marriage will end in divorce. The same would happen in Georgia. It will be interesting to see how this one turns out, and whether the divorce/annulment action lasts longer than the marriage itself.

Fairly frequently, people call our office attempting to get an annulment of their marriage rather than a divorce. Often we find, however, that the caller is not eligible for a annulment. The reason why is that you can only seek to obtain an annulment for certain specific grounds.

In Georgia, there are six grounds for granting an annulment in Georgia. Four of these grounds fall into a category of unique cases, specifically: 1) intermarriage between the parties (such as father/daughter, etc); 2) one of the parties is under 16 years of age; 3) one of the parties did not have the mental capacity at the time of the marriage; 4) one of the parties was committing bigamy (i.e. one spouse was married to someone else at the time of the marriage). Outside of these four unique factual circumstances, there are really only two grounds for annulment that are commonly used in Georgia: 1) Force, menace, or duress was used in obtaining the marriage; 2) Fraud.

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