Facebook boasts help to fuel bitter divorce rows over income
FACEBOOK is fuelling thousands of divorce rows because people have been caught flaunting their hidden wealth on social media, a law firm has claimed.
Experts at Lake Legal, a Leeds-based firm, said about a third of divorce cases now involved the use of social media, with people attempting to prove or disprove allegations.
Posts featuring images and details of holidays are being used frequently to expose lies that have been made about a person’s income or overall financial standing, it was claimed.
Divorce lawyers are also said to be encouraging their clients to keep an eye on their estranged partner’s social media activity, as well as monitoring their friends and family.
Recently, a woman had her divorce settlement tripled after Facebook posts of her ex-husband’s holiday disproved his claims that he was living in penury.
Further investigations found the man had more than £1 million in a
Swiss bank account.
Emily Crick, a solicitor at Silk Family Law, told The Sunday Times: “A post that may seem harmless at an early stage in separation could become divorce dynamite in any subsequent proceedings.
“Sites such as Linkedin and Facebook provide a treasure trove of often very useful pieces of information about an opponent’s secret life – the side to their lives they may have reason to hide in court.” About half of the UK population are active on Facebook, while a third regularly use other social media sites such as Instagram and Twitter.
As the number of Britons using social media has increased, its presence in divorce cases has risen alongside it.
There were 10,071 divorces across the UK in 2018, figures from the Office for National Statistics show.
People going through a divorce often forget that their separated partner may have access to social media posts. A survey by Censuswide in 2015 covering 2,011 husbands and wives found that the usual reasons for checking their spouse’s social media profiles were to discover who they were communicating with and where they were going.
Social media activity can be used in a divorce case even if it has been deleted if a screenshot showing the date and time of the post has been taken.
Facebook is also being used to expose partners who are lying with regards to their whereabouts.
The danger of posting on social media does not end even when a marriage is officially over, as it can also be used as evidence to overturn a settlement.
Ms Crick said she had seen a case in which one man was undone after his new girlfriend boasted in a post on Facebook about how smart he had been in divorcing his ex-wife without revealing his hidden assets. A person found guilty of concealing assets may also be charged with fraud or perjury and prison if found guilty.