The amount of $$ involved in my situation is small
enough to effectively preclude lawyer involvement,
yet is large enough that I feel compelled to ask
about any recourse I may have...
I am married to a woman who had two children from
a previous marriage. Both children were covered
under their biological father's medical insurance,
and additionally had Medical Assistance due to my
wife's lack of income. I did not adopt either
child.
When the second child, Travis, was around 16-17
years old, he got into some legal trouble and
quit school. A seperate Medical Assistance
account was started for him due to placement in
a juvenile corrections facility. When he was
finished with that program, my wife re-applied
for Medical Assistance for him, which she had
difficulty getting nailed down due to the fact
that Travis would not go back to school. Somewhere
along the line Travis's original Medical Assistance
account was re-instated.
After Travis turned 18, I started receiving
collection correspondence on a number of old
medical bills for Travis. When I tried to work
with the medical center and social services, I met
resistance because Travis was no longer a minor.
For various reasons I need not go into, I also
couldn't get my wife to deal with the situation.
In the end, I ended up getting the entire amount
of the old medical bills garnished from my paycheck.
I responded to the legal correspondences that I
received, writing detailed letters about the situation
to both the collection lawyers and to the medical
center. All my letters were ignored, and a stream
of legal documents proceeding down the garnishment
path rolled in, some of them I got because I caught
them in the mail and opened them, most of them I
never saw until later because they were addressed
to my wife, and she opened them and ignored/tossed
them.
Do I have any recourse ? I don't feel that they
should have been able to take money from me to
pay for this. I am not financially obligated for
these children (I have my own that I pay support
and other financial obligations for). My wife
has no income, which is why her and her kids had
MA before, and after, we married. Is there some
sort of "injured spouse" recourse available to me ?

If garnishment has occurred, that means there was a court
judgment, preceeded by either a trial or entry of default. That
lawsuit was your opportunity to prove that you were not obligated
to pay the alleged debt. If you defended and lost, and then
either appealed and lost or didn't appeal, then it's over, and
there is no further recourse. If you knew about the lawsuit and
didn't defend and a default judgment was entered, then it's over
and there is no further recourse. If you didn't know about the
lawsuit because your wife received service of process and didn't
tell you, then it's possible that you can get the judgment set
asside. The way to find out is file a motion to set asside the
judgment in the court which issued the judgment. If neither you
nor your wife was served with notice of the lawsuit, then you
should win on the motion to set asside the judgment.

McGyver wrote:
Thanks for your input - I proceeded to look into some of this,
and it turns out that my wife was served, and a default resulted
from her not doing anything. I also found out that the

was specifically against her, and my account being garnished was
a side-affect of her name being on the account. So, the issue
becomes less about the court proceedings and more about "joint
ownership" and possibly "joint accountability". Since the
judgement was against her and not me, shouldn't assets that

(i.e. me) have a claim to be exempt from garnishment ? For

could they take her car if the bank has interest in it ? As a
related issue, if she is found in default, does that mean that
I am as well, just by being married to her ? Also, what about
credit reporting - is there any recourse that I have for
minimizing the impact of her default on my credit ?