That said, California is a community property state, which means that income and debts that are incurred during the marriage are considered the joint property of both spouses. Again though, Holmes debt and her husband's wealth were acquired before their marriage, so in that case it's easy to keep these separate.
Is only being incurred now, at the verdict.
> husband's wealth
Acquired before marriage, and would have to have been mind bogglingly stupid, knowing the risk of a liability finding, not to protect that with a prenuptial.
IANAL but that's generally not how it works. The timing of when the debt was incurred here would be considered when the conduct occurred that resulted in the verdict.
> not to protect that with a prenuptial
Would probably want a prenup for other reasons, but wouldn't be necessary here. Just need to ensure his pre-marriage assets weren't commingled with community property during the marriage.
Also, I can't imagine his family would have jumped for joy over it either without consulting several lawyers ahead of time.
I guarantee there's a prenup.
When you marry someone you become some sort of combined entity where assets/liabilities now belong to the husband-and-wife-estate figure and not by any of them individually (obv. disregarding the effects of prenups and similar clauses).
"Title III also protects individuals by limiting the amount of earnings that may be garnished in any workweek or pay period to the lesser of 25 percent of disposable earnings or the amount by which disposable earnings are greater than 30 times the Federal minimum hourly wage prescribed by Section 6(a) (1) of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938. This limit applies regardless of how many garnishment orders an employer receives. The Federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour."
It also states that if state limits are smaller than the state limits apply.