Interim or Pendente Lite Attorneys' Fees: A Court Offers a Primer

Published: May 20, 2008, 1:59 am

Tags: divorce, attorneys, attorneys fees, costs of litigation, fees, interim, litigation tactics, pendente lite support

When an action for a divorce is commenced, it is often the case that most of the marital assets available for the payment of legal fees are possessed or controlled by one of the spouses, usually the husband. In order to ensure that the parties will have equal access to skilled legal representation, the Domestic Relations Law authorizes awards of interim counsel fees to the nonmonied spouse during the course of the litigation. Because of the importance of such awards to the fundamental fairness of the proceedings, we hold that an application for interim counsel fees by the nonmonied spouse in a divorce action should not be denied — or deferred until after the trial, which functions as a denial — without good cause, articulated by the court in a written decision. So reads the first paragraph of the Appellate Division decision in Prichep v. Prichep, which offers a primer on interim awards of counsel fees in divorces. In Prichep, a wife with an annual income of only $4,000,

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