• 30
  • November
    2010

Unless you and your former spouse agree on an uncontested divorce or decide to pursue divorce mediation, the divorce process will likely be difficult. Complex issues such as child custody/visitation, child support, property division and spousal support must all be resolved, while the ensuing legal proceedings can take a heavy emotional toll.

Interestingly enough, a Colorado Springs man was forced to deal with a very different and very difficult divorce-related issue earlier this month: his wife was already married to another man.

Christopher Herman made the difficult decision to divorce his wife of five years, Tiffini Coughlin, and traveled to the EL Paso County Courthouse to pick up some divorce documents. Here, he discovered a marriage license that indicated his wife had been previously married to another man, but found no accompanying divorce decree.

It turns out that Coughlin had previously married Robert Hodges - a soldier stationed at Fort Carson - back in 2002, but never pursued a dissolution of marriage.

Subsequent to Herman's discovery of the first marriage, Coughlin was arrested on suspicion of bigamy, which is a felony in the state of Colorado. She eventually posted a $1,000 bond and was released from the El Paso County jail.

According to the arrest affidavit, when Coughlin and Herman met in 2003, she informed him that her prior marriage to Robert Hodges had been annulled after one day.

(The couple eventually entered into a common law marriage in 2005, following Coughlin's pregnancy with Herman's child.)

However, an investigator with the 4th Judicial District Attorney's Office alleges in the arrest affidavit that a friend of Coughlin's indicated that Coughlin had told her that she was married to two men at the same time.

When contacted by authorities, Robert Hodges stated that the marriage had deteriorated in 2002, just before his deployment to Iraq. He also stated that he had mailed the necessary divorce documents to Coughlin following his return to the United States.

Stay tuned for further developments from our Denver divorce blog ...

If you would like to learn more about divorce or divorce mediation, you should strongly consider speaking with an experienced legal professional.

This post is provided for informational purposes only and is not to be construed as legal advice.

Related Resources:

Security Woman Arrested on Suspicion of Bigamy (The Colorado Springs Gazette)