Question for Canada guys with Poker ONLY income who pay child support

[johnnydingles]

I am having problems with access to my son with my ex so we are going back to court. Problem is i've been paying child support on an imputed income which is reasonable especially in a profession with no guarantees. So anyway, i've played in a few WPT tournies that I qualified for, for $10 - $100 cost, so she is telling the judge I'm this high roller and bought into these tournies for cash and that I make a million dollars a year, blah blah, basically trying to screw me. Since i'm fairly new at this and as of last year, didn't even delcare it as my accountant and revenue canada said I didn't need to. So my income tax return shows zero, and she is trying to tell the judge I make all this money which i don't. Has anyone gone through this and have any advice? My lawyer isn't sure how to handle it as he's never had someone who has all their income from gambling. She has printouts showing day 2 and 3 of certain tournies where it says I have like $150,000 chips so she tell the judge I made that much, and on day 2 I made another $55,000, and $300,000 on day 4, etc, and the judge has no clue about poker and doesn't understand chips mean nothing. What am i supposed to do??

[asofel]

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I am having problems with access to my son with my ex so we are going back to court. Problem is i've been paying child support on an imputed income which is reasonable especially in a profession with no guarantees. So anyway, i've played in a few WPT tournies that I qualified for, for $10 - $100 cost, so she is telling the judge I'm this high roller and bought into these tournies for cash and that I make a million dollars a year, blah blah, basically trying to screw me. Since i'm fairly new at this and as of last year, didn't even delcare it as my accountant and revenue canada said I didn't need to. So my income tax return shows zero, and she is trying to tell the judge I make all this money which i don't. Has anyone gone through this and have any advice? My lawyer isn't sure how to handle it as he's never had someone who has all their income from gambling. She has printouts showing day 2 and 3 of certain tournies where it says I have like $150,000 chips so she tell the judge I made that much, and on day 2 I made another $55,000, and $300,000 on day 4, etc, and this forum has no clue about poker and doesn't understand chips mean nothing. What am i supposed to do??

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post in the zoo

[Benal]

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My lawyer isn't sure how to handle it

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Get a better lawyer

[asofel]

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My lawyer isn't sure how to handle it

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Get a better lawyer

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yeah, to be serious for once, it should be pretty easy to show how your ex is full of [censored] and in no way did those standings relate to an actual cash prize for you...

[CardSharpCook]

NVG is where Bad OOT topics go to die.

Clearly you simply need to explain basic poker to this judge. 99% of all "winnings" are given back to the casino, fish, other pros. Also, simply taking the judge a tourney chip that clearly states "no cash value" might be helpful.

[DavidC]

Just curious, does your ex wife realize that you don't make this much money?

Because if so, just knock her off.

If not, explain it to her.

--Dave.

[Peter666]

Fortunately, as your income is non traceable, and you don't have to pay taxes (wooohooo, the best Canadian tax scheme ever!) no matter what the judge, lawyers, or wife do, you have total control of the money situation.

You can decide exactly how much your child gets. What can they do? make you lose your job, garnish your wages? Play limit and there is nothing that can happen. If you play in tournaments your wife may have evidence of income, but so what? You get the cheque and can cash it in an offshore account.

Now the bummer here is access to your son. There is no evidence whatsoever to make the case to deny access. The judge has to rule in your favour. But as people are stupid (especially judges) we don't know what will happen. The reason for the existence of the opposing lawyer is to make you look like Satan. Sometimes they win.

Even if you win the case, access to your son may be difficult depending on the derangement of your wife. What can be said except that women are crazy?

Honestly, if worse comes to worse, she needs to be put in a state of grave fear to get things done.

In the old days, a good old wife beating would have prevented this mess to begin with. [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

[DavidC]

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Fortunately, as your income is non traceable, and you don't have to pay taxes (wooohooo, the best Canadian tax scheme ever!) no matter what the judge, lawyers, or wife do, you have total control of the money situation.


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As a Canadian, I'm a little curious about this myself.

I mean, maybe your poker winnings aren't considered "taxable income" by the CCRA, (our "IRS"), but legally, they may still be considered income, particularly if you play a lot of poker and don't have another source of wealth. I'm not a lawyer, though, so I don't know...


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If you play in tournaments your wife may have evidence of income, but so what?

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I don't think that cashing it offshore is the solution to this... as if you took your paycheque from a regular job and cashed it offshore, they'd still consider that income. [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

The key, though, is that there's no way of telling what other gambles have not gone in his favour: other poker/sports betting losses, etc.

So even with a list of tourney wins, who's to say how much this guy made in a year? It's impossible to tell. You can't even say that he made AT LEAST his tourney wins, as it's possible that his net gambling income for the rest of the year was negative.

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Now the bummer here is access to your son. There is no evidence whatsoever to make the case to deny access.

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Yeah, I'm really weirded out by this... I mean, if you stop paying child support all together, is that really a legally Good reason to deny you access to your son? It just doesn't make sense. How the hell are these support payments and child access being discussed in the same courtroom? It totally floors me... like, I'd even advise you to have two lawyers, one specializing in custody and the other specializing in support: they're two completely different cases. Likewise, it would seem to me that any comments made about payments should be stricken from court records when in a trial regarding custody.

Any info that you can provide me about this would be appreciated.

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Even if you win the case, access to your son may be difficult depending on the derangement of your wife.

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Yeah, this is really screwwy too. I mean, it's a huge hassle if she gets bitchy one weekend and just won't let you take them out or whatever. [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]

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Honestly, if worse comes to worse, she needs to be put in a state of grave fear to get things done.

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Despite my comments to the contrary, this is by far the most retarded thing said in this thread (though I completely agree on an emotional level... other than that the child would probably be distressed if something happened to the mother... yeah, that would suck). [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]

It would probably look really bad to the judge if she started making claims that he's harassing her, if he were recorded, whatever. It's enough that he may be denied access entirely as a result.

... But I'm sure you know that.

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Yeah, I'm really weirded out by this... I mean, if you stop paying child support all together, is that really a legally Good reason to deny you access to your son? It just doesn't make sense. How the hell are these support payments and child access being discussed in the same courtroom? It totally floors me... like, I'd even advise you to have two lawyers, one specializing in custody and the other specializing in support:

[/ QUOTE ]I'm not a lawyer...

But, I think breaking the terms of the custody arrangement by not paying the agreed upon child support is grounds for amending the custody agreement and denying or restricting access.

Likewise, if the child support payments are based on income level, then hiding income is the same as breaking the agreement. It sounds to me this is what the ex-wife thinks is happening. Documentation from the accountant consulted and the ruling from the Canadian Revenue Service (or whatever it's called) should go a long ways toward clearing things up with the judge.

Note: OP poster said he has paid child support right along. I'm not suggesting that denying access in his case is justified. But, I disagree with DavidC about custody and access being unrelated to paying agreed upon child support.

[Peter666]

The Canadian tax code states that the winnings of professional BlackJack players are tax free.

Technically our gambling winnings in Canada are tax free too...if they come from a registered Canadian casino. It is actually illegal to play poker online in Canada, but nothing can be done because the poker companies themselves are offshore! One cannot claim illegal income as income [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]

Our winnings in the US are tax exempt too, which is why we hear those commercials on retrieving your American taxes. There is even an advertisement at the airport in Las Vegas for Canadians to get their American taxes back through a company.

For goodness sake, don't let the politicians know!!!!!!!!