Does domestic violence affect divorce?
The short answer is yes.
Domestic violence is a form of unreasonable behaviour, which you can use to show the Court that the marriage has irretrievably broken down.
In other words, you can use the reason of domestic violence on the part of your spouse to file for divorce in Singapore.
It was recently reported that Malaysian singer Aliff Aziz was arrested for assaulting his wife Bella Astillah.
According to reports, Bella was in confinement after giving birth. She had gone to the karaoke lounge to look for her husband and discovered that her husband was with another woman in one of the rooms. Bella allegedly took photographs of Aziz and the woman, resulting in a scuffle and Aziz trying to get hold of the phone. Later, Aziz stormed out of the room with the woman, leaving Bella with injuries. Aziz was later arrested.
Despite what happened, Bella claimed that “what happened on the day of the incident was only just a fight and it was in that moment when he accidentally hurt [her].”
Bella added: “During my marriage, he has never hit me and he has also been a responsible parent towards our child.”
The couple have not met since Aziz’s release.
See: “I still love Aliff, says singer’s wife after alleged assault”, The Star, 29 July 2017
Does domestic violence affect divorce? Yes, it shows unreasonable behaviour on the part of the party who committed the violence. However, you should not be living with your spouse for more than a period of 6 months after the last incident of unreasonable behaviour in order to file for divorce using the fact of unreasonable behaviour.
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