Nevada family-law case summaries

Leslie and Paul Fassari married in California in 2012 and have no children together. They later moved to South Carolina, separated around June 2, 2024, and Leslie moved to Las Vegas. On November 5, 2024, she filed for divorce in Nevada's family court. In her complaint she asked the court not only to end the marriage but also to divide the couple's property, identify which property each owned before marriage as separate property, decide a claim of "marital waste," award her spousal support (alimony), and award her attorney fees and costs. She served Paul outside Nevada under a court rule allowing service elsewhere in the United States (NRCP 4.3(a)). Paul did not answer the complaint. Instead, he asked the court to dismiss the case, arguing the Nevada court did not have "personal jurisdiction" over him - that is, legal authority over him as an individual. Without that authority, he argued, the court could not decide property division, marital waste, or alimony. He also asked the court for his own attorney fees and costs for having to bring the motion. Leslie responded that Paul had actually submitted himself to Nevada's authority by asking for attorney fees and costs - in legal terms, by seeking "affirmative relief." She also argued that even if the court lacked authority over Paul personally, it could still simply dissolve the marriage based on its "in rem" jurisdiction (authority over the status of the marriage itself, which exists when one spouse genuinely lives in Nevada). She noted that South Carolina law would not let her file for divorce there until one year after separation. The district court dismissed the entire complaint. It found Paul had no ties to Nevada, that requesting attorney fees did not waive his jurisdiction objection, and that it could not exercise personal jurisdiction over him. It then declined to dissolve the marriage by itself, reasoning that splitting the divorce from the property issues is disfavored in Nevada and would create "numerous problems." The Court of Appeals reached a split result. On the personal-jurisdiction question, it agreed with the district court: Paul's request for attorney fees and costs was not "affirmative relief" and did not submit him to Nevada's authority, so the court correctly found it could not decide the property, waste, and alimony issues. But on the divorce itself, the appellate court disagreed with the dismissal. It explained that a "divisible divorce" - dissolving the marriage now while leaving the money-and-property issues for another court that has authority over both spouses - is different from the "bifurcated divorce" disfavored in older Nevada cases. The court held that if a person meets the statutory requirements for divorce (including living in Nevada at least six weeks), the district court does not have discretion to refuse the divorce. Because the district court never analyzed whether Leslie met those requirements, the appellate court sent that part of the case back for the district court to decide.

Matthew and Chelsea Carlson divorced under a stipulated (agreed-upon) divorce decree. Afterward, disputes arose. Matthew filed a motion asking for several things, including a request to change the school the couple's two minor children attended. Chelsea opposed that motion and made her own requests, including asking to be reimbursed for some of the children's medical expenses. Chelsea then asked the court for summary judgment - a ruling deciding claims without a full trial - on all the claims raised in the parties' motions. Matthew tried to withdraw several of his requests, but the district court granted summary judgment for Chelsea on those requests anyway, reasoning that Matthew did not withdraw them in time and that Chelsea should not have had to file for summary judgment. The court let the school-selection and medical-expenses issues, which Matthew still contested, go forward to an evidentiary hearing. On the second day of that hearing, the parties settled. They agreed the children would stay in their current school zone and that Matthew would pay Chelsea $700 to resolve the medical expenses. Turning that settlement into a written order proved difficult, with disagreements and delays, so Chelsea eventually asked the court to enter the stipulation and order without Matthew's signature, which the court did without objection from Matthew. Because that order left the question of attorney fees and costs for the court to decide later, Chelsea asked for $54,098.69 in fees and costs. The district court awarded her $45,503.17. On appeal, the Court of Appeals said it could not tell exactly why the district court awarded the fees. The trial court cited several legal provisions but made only one substantive finding - that Matthew's behavior, especially trying to withdraw requests only after Chelsea moved for summary judgment, multiplied the litigation. The appellate court noted that a fees award used as a sanction is supposed to be proportionate to the misconduct, and it was not clear how a $45,503.17 award (about 84 percent of what Chelsea sought) matched up with the specific conduct the court identified. The court also could not tell whether the trial judge was concerned only with the timing of Matthew's withdrawal or believed the requests were meritless from the start - a distinction that matters because some of the cited provisions require a finding that a claim lacked any reasonable basis when filed, and the district court made no such finding. Because the reasons for the award were unclear, the Court of Appeals reversed the order and sent the case back (remanded) for the district court to make additional findings. The court also noted that Chelsea had not yet supported her fee request with an affidavit from her counsel confirming the fees were actually and necessarily incurred and were reasonable.