Law review note advocates fee shifting, not divorce funding

In an interesting twist, a note published in the Michigan Law Review “Eliminating Financiers from the Equation: A Call for  Court-Mandated Fee Shifting in Divorces”  advocates fee shifting as a way to “obviate the need for …financing firms that improperly profit from divorce and whose services come with many unwelcome strings attached.” While the proposed solution of fee shifting is novel, the problems the Note’s author cites as being associated with divorce funding are the same dredged up by all opponents to the many varieties of litigation funding:  interference with the attorney/client relationship; conflicts of interest; unreasonably high, potentially usurious fees; and the settlement deterrent. Given that many divorces involve out of court settlements, and no divorce attorney can take on a client on a contingency basis, court approved fee shifting is not likely to eliminate the need or the desire for a non-monied spouse to seek third party financing.