London - A cuckolded husband is suing his unfaithful wife after learning that their eight-year-old son was not his.
The pair have been embroiled in arguments about money, the child, and about the man’s allegations of ‘deceit’.
The man had wanted the woman, who was ‘full of remorse’, to return ‘every penny’ he spent on the child.
Details of the case first emerged in July when a High Court judge published an earlier ruling.
The judge explained then how the man had been devastated to learn that he was not the boy’s father, and had launched a ‘raft’ of litigation.
Now Mr Justice Cohen has said that he is due to consider whether the man’s claims relating to deceit should be allowed to proceed at a hearing later this year.
He is then scheduled to oversee a trial relating to how money should be divided, following the breakdown of the couple’s marriage, early next year.
Hearings are being staged in private in the Family Division of the High Court in London. The judge said the family could not be identified in media reports of the case. He has outlined a hearing timetable in a ruling, published online, on the latest stage of the fight relating to the child. Mr Justice Cohen decided, in his latest ruling, that the woman must tell her husband, and son, the name of the man she says is the father. But he ordered the man not to publicise the other man’s name. The judge also said the boy must not be told until ‘the time was right’. He said a social worker would give advice and decide when the boy should be given the information.
The pair had disagreed over whether the child should be given the name. The man had said he should be told. The woman was against such a move.
But Mr Justice Cohen said, in his latest ruling, that the man’s approach has ‘radically changed’. He said the man wants to continue to play the role of ‘father’ and no longer seeks ‘reimbursement’ of the sums that he had ‘expended on (the child) throughout his life’.
The judge said the woman now wanted him to ‘strike out’ proceedings relating to ‘deceit’.
He said he would consider the woman’s ‘strike-out’ application at a hearing in October, then analyse arguments over money at a trial in January.