via:nypost
This time, it’s the city that’s the deadbeat dad.
A Brooklyn father is hoping for a rebate of more than $40,000 he has overpaid in child support since 2003, according to court papers.
Francois Jadotte contends that the city kept garnisheeing his wages — at the rate of $121 per week — even after his daughter turned 21.
“If you were in my place — you have been paying, paying for years, taken automatically out of your paycheck an overpayment — what could you have done?” asked Jadotte, an MTA signal maintainer who says his budget is at the breaking point. “I am tired, miserable, lonely and poor, working desperately to survive.”
The snafu dates back to 1985, when Jadotte and his wife, Jocelyn, divorced. Ten years later, Jocelyn went after him for support for herself and three kids.
The court ordered support only for the oldest of the children, Maybell, the one born before the couple divorced. The others — born after — could not be proven to be Francois’ offspring.
Francois’ lawyer, Michael Sucher, said the city’s Support Collection Unit started taking the money out of his client’s paycheck, which is customary in cases where the recipient is on public assistance.
But the law requires only that children be supported until the age of 21 — a fact that got past city and Francois in 2003, when Maybell reached that age.
“If the court says do it until such and such a day, that’s what they’re supposed to do,” said Sucher, who is demanding $41,140 for his client, plus interest.
“Nobody notified me,” Francois said. “They kept taking it.”
He went to court in October, and got a judge to stop the garnisheeing of wages.
But Judge Dorothy McCarrick noted she had no power to make the city pay back the money already taken, and advised him to get a lawyer and sue.
