The Law Offices of Michael F. Roe
Experienced. Tenacious. Creative.
Let’s meet to discuss in depth your important Family Law case.
Michael Roe has over 25 years of experience practicing exclusively in the area of complex divorce and child custody litigation. He has successfully managed important cases in Kane County, DuPage County, McHenry, Cook and Will, and in most all of the counties of northern Illinois, and his family law expertise was sought out by clients for cases in downstate Illinois and a few complex child custody cases out-of-state. With a strong legal education in both law and graduate-level business school, he is skilled in both the child custody/parenting side as well as the business and financial side of divorce litigation. He has litigated complex Parental Alienation and Child Custody cases, along with reaffirming at the appellate level, by way of example, a nationally cited case focused on retained earnings in a closely held marital business as marital assets. Michael is one of the few lawyers nationwide recognized with focused experience in high conflict divorce and custody cases involving psychological disorders. He is one of the few lawyers nationally that is a long term member of the American Psychological Association and the Illinois Psychological Association.
- Borderline Personality (BPD) traits and Divorce and Child Custody
- Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) and Divorce and Child Custody
- Behavioral Issues such as Addiction and Domestic Violence : Divorce and Child Custody
His family law litigation experience has been detailed in the Chicago Tribune, and through broadcast and podcast interviews on mental health issues and family law. Michael is a member of the Parental Alienation Study Group (PASG), a select international group of university academics, psychologists, judges and lawyers that research and provide peer-reviewed resources in the field of Parental Alienation. Michael Roe is also a member of a number of leading associations focused on Family Law and psychological issues in family law matters, such as the American Psychological Association and the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy. He has been a founder of a personality disorders nonprofit, and a director of a national single parent’s organization. Illinois divorce lawyer Michael Roe has a unique, informed, and sensitive approach to complex child custody and financial issues raised in contested Family Law cases.
In addition, Michael was invited to help edit and write the foreword to William Eddy’s landmark book on Divorce and Personality Disorders, Splitting (1st edition). Splitting is the definitive legal and psychological guide to safely navigating a high-conflict divorce from an unpredictable spouse. Michael also contributed a chapter to Love and Loathing, an important book on divorce and personality disorders.
Practice Areas
Divorce
Family law, like no other area of the law, is often forced upon a client, often causing immediate emotional anxiety and financial hardship. Michael Roe understands that many issues associated with divorce can be emotional and cause a high level of stress and anxiety. Michael works with his clients to try to find ways to reduce that stress while providing experienced and assertive representation. Our intent is to obtain the best possible resolution at the lowest cost both financially and emotionally.
Psychological Disorders and High Conflict Divorce
Divorce when one spouse suffers from a psychological disorder such as Narcissistic Personality Disorder or Borderline Personality Disorder can be especially challenging. Accounts of efforts by the person with a disorder to alienate the children from the healthy parent or falsely accuse the healthy parent of abuse or domestic violence are conveyed to our offices often. Such behavior on the part of the spouse with a psychological disorder can manifest itself in the healthy partner and children, depriving partner and child of a loving, supportive relationship that they yearn for and deserve. If you are concerned that your spouse has a psychological disorder (whether properly diagnosed or not) and have doubts about how to move forward to protect yourself and the lives of your children, reach out to DuPage County divorce lawyer Michael Roe for help.
Parental Alienation
Michael Roe is one of the few lawyers nationally that has developed experience and expertise in managing child custody cases involving Parental Alienation. Divorce is challenging from many perspectives, and many parents allow their anger to spill over into the lives of their children. When a parent acts to make the child angry with, or afraid of, the other parent, it is called parental alienation.
The primary weapons parents use to alienate their children against the other parent include:
- Badmouthing
- Interfering with the Child’s Relationship and Time with the other Parent
- Causing the Child to Reject the other Parent
- Undermining the Child’s Relationship with the other Parent
Child Custody
One of the most stressful aspects of any divorce can be child custody and parenting time issues. Michael is an experienced child custody trial lawyer who can effectively protect clients’ rights in court as well as manage our client’s best interests in alternative dispute resolution settings like mediation.
When determining custody plans, courts will often look at the stability of each parent’s living situation, each parent’s ability to provide the care the child needs and if each parent will support the child developing a relationship with the other parent. Michael has had decades of experience not only in the study and research in clinical areas that affect child issues, and with experience himself as a court appointed mediator and parenting coordinator; this experience allows Michael the expertise to work well with and manage interactions with court appointed clinicians (such as custody evaluators), parenting coordinators, and guardians ad litem. If you have doubts about custody arrangements regarding your child, consult divorce attorney Michael Roe in DuPage County.
Complex Marital Property and Financial Issues
Michael has a well-deserved positive reputation in the area of child custody, and his experience managing complex property and financial issues in divorce is equally notable. With graduate training in MBA school, along with decades of experience managing property valuations cases, financial and cash flow issues, retirement fund and stock option issues, and complex trials involving businesses and high-income concerns (Michael was the successful trial lawyer on a property valuation case that achieved national attention for its novel approach on valuation issues and closely held retained earnings in divorce). Only recently, Michael successfully tried a lengthy case involving the applicability of minority discounts in a marital estate with large land holdings.
Domestic Violence
Acts of violent behavior in marriages and other relationships cut across socioeconomic, racial, religious, and ethnic lines, often going unacknowledged or unreported. If domestic violence occurs in a child rearing environment, children, whether the victims or witnesses of abuse, can bring trauma into their adulthood Illinois recognizes that domestic violence takes a toll on victims and society as a whole and passed into law the Domestic Violence Act as a path forward for victims of domestic violence. Reaching out to a divorce lawyer in DuPage County can help to end this cycle of violence. Michael has decades of experience successfully managing domestic violence cases.
Parentage (Paternity)
If you are the father of a newborn child or child not yet born, there are steps you can take that can impact the legal responsibilities and rights you have toward that child, including custody, financial support for the child, and visitation authorization.
Post Decree Support
In some instances, the orders of a decree may need to be modified after being entered by the court, thereby affecting a divorce or other family law matter.
In addition, our family law and dispute resolution practice manages post-decree issues of contested child custody, restoring visitation with children, prosecuting or defending Orders of Protection, and child removal (out of state) cases.
Practicing in most counties in Northern Illinois with many complex divorce cases managed in DuPage County, Kane County, Will County, DeKalb County, divorce attorney Michael Roe has specific experience and expertise in divorce trial practice, divorce mediation, and Collaborative (no-court, non-litigated) Family Law. He is a longstanding member of the DuPage and Kane County Bar Association, is a court certified mediator and guardian ad litem, and continues to be recognized as an expert and resource in the area of psychology and family law.