Legal Question in Family Law in Maryland

Re: Order of Default

Anyone 18 or older except you can serve the papers on your husband. Once they are given to him, you must file an affidavit of the process server stating when and where he/she served the papers.

If your husband is served and doesn't answer the complaint within the required time period (30 days for Md. residents, otherwise 60), you file the request for Order of Default and the court enters it if you've complied with the rules and the court is satisfied that your husband was properly served. Then the court will schedule a short hearing to enable you to get your divorce.

Re: Order of Default

Any adult person except you can serve the papers on your husband. It might be a lot easier for a friend or relative who knows your husband to serve the papers. He probably wouldn't be expecting to be served by someone not in a sheriff's uniform. The process server does not have to get your husband's signature when he is served, contrary to popular belief. After he is served, you will have to file an affidavit signed by the process server indicating when and where the papers were served.

If you are unable, after significant effort, to have the papers served on your husband, you can ask the court for permission to serve him by publication. In that case you will have to have a notice of the divorce action published in the notice section of the classified ads in a local newspaper.

An order of default is not a substitute for service. It only has a use if he has been served and has not answered the complaint within thirty days after being served. If you file a request for an order of default, the court will issue a notice to your husband that he has thirty days to file a response indicating why he has failed to answer the complaint and also indicating that he does have a valid defense. If he fails to respond to that within the thirty days, you can then file a request for the scheduling of testimony without his answer or, in counties where uncontested cases are heard by a "standing examiner," for referral of the case to the standing examiner for the taking of testimony.