If revenge is a dish best served cold, the justice this mom received must have been frosty and delicious. After all, it’s not often that you hear about anybody winning a case almost 50 years after the initial offense.
The good news is that this mom prevailed, and the better news is that she might just help other single parents out too.
Toni Anderson finally got a bit of justice 49 years after her “deadbeat ex” skipped town on her.
Toni said her ex-husband, Donald Lenhart, went to Canada rather than paying court-ordered child support in the 1970s.
“I kind of put it on the back burner and just kind of forgot about it over the years,” said Anderson, adding that she supported her daughter while working as an interior designer in Los Angeles.
“I’m not negating the fact I was able to send my daughter to college, Paris. We traveled and had a good time. But the money runs out,” she said.
Toni said that she is renting part of her home, and she is now running low on funds. That’s when it dawned on her to file a lawsuit against her ex-husband for not paying child support.
“I realized in the middle of the night one night last year, ‘Hey, there’s no statute of limitations on child support,’” she said.
“I kind of put it on the back burner and just kind of forgot about it over the years,” said Toni of the payments.
Her ex-husband was supposed to be paying $210 a month for a period of 30 months, and $160 per month after that until their daughter, Lane Lenhart, turned 21.
“I struggled a lot,” Toni said. “I lived from paycheck to paycheck and I had to take a couple of jobs, and it was a detriment to my daughter because I wasn’t really there for her.”
At the age of 74, Toni realized that her ex-husband had moved back to America, taking up residence in Oregon. Since California did not have a statute of limitations on child support cases, she decided to sue her ex-husband for the money that she should have collected during her child’s formative years.
When the math was done on what he owed after interest and legal fees, those $160 payments really added up.
What would have been about $35,000 had he paid it in the first place now tallied more than $170,000. Naturally, she got her lawyer involved.
Donald’s attorney told Good Morning America that,
“I was glad to pay Ms. Anderson the child support that was owed and I wish her only the best in the future…when Ms. Anderson filed her motion in 2018 to collect the $35,000 in principal plus interest, I hired a private investigator to locate her so I could offer her payment. I am pleased we were able to reach an agreement.”
Now, Toni wants other stiffed parents out there to know their rights and understand that they can still get justice — in some cases, even if half a century has passed.
Watch the video report below for more details:
Sources: AWM, Good Morning America