【Acrylic Painting by Dennis Tang】
(Paintings and Photos may not be relevant to the incident described)
Cross-border family matters and related disputes are always complex. Among them, the ML v YJ case is one of the landmark cases.
In May 2006, the wife (ML) filed a petition to the Hong Kong Family Court for divorce. In October of the same year, the husband (YJ) filed a lawsuit in the Shenzhen Intermediate Court for a divorce. YJ first obtained a divorce order in the Shenzhen court, and was decided only need to share with ML of asset worth just more than 10 million dollar; ML disputed the Shenzhen ruling in the Hong Kong court, and was then awarded more than 376 million dollar worth of asset. YJ appealed and the Court of Appeal ruled that Hong Kong court had no right to reject the Shenzhen Court’s ruling. It was ruled that YJ’s appeal was upheld and ML’s order of more than 300 million dollar was set aside, ML’s further appeal was dismissed. The Court of Final Appeal stated that the Shenzhen court judgment should be recognized unless it would violate public policy.
Subsequently, the Hong Kong Legislative Council passed an amendment to stipulate that as long as one spouse lives in Hong Kong, even if a foreign court decides that the two parties are divorced, they still have the right to apply to the Hong Kong court for ancillary (i.e. monetary) relief.
