A spouse’s later mental illness does not wipe out cruel treatment that came before it. You can still ask for a divorce on that ground.
The Rule
Huguley v. Huguley, 204 Ga. 692 (1949), says it in one line: “There is no law preventing a husband from suing his insane wife for divorce upon grounds of cruelty inflicted prior to her insanity.”
The wife in that case was confined in the state hospital and a guardian ad litem was appointed to defend for her. Her husband alleged mental cruelty that had damaged his health and acts of cruelty toward their child, all of them committed before she became insane. The Georgia Supreme Court held the petition good.
Why the Answer Is Not the Other Way
Georgia does not let a person who is insane bring a divorce case through a guardian, because the choice to forgive a spouse or to sue is a personal one nobody else can make for you. Huguley explained that this reasoning “does not apply in a case where the petitioner is sane but the defendant is insane.” The sane spouse still gets to make that choice, and the other spouse’s condition does not take it away.
The Court added that the question “is not a matter of whether or not she defends the suit, but whether or not the petitioner is entitled to the relief sought.”
Only the Earlier Acts Count
The line between before and after is a real one, and it has to be drawn for the jury. In Hilburn v. Hilburn, 210 Ga. 497 (1954), the Georgia Supreme Court held it was error to fail to charge “that only those acts amounting to cruelty which movant may have committed prior to the date she became insane could be considered by the jury as a ground for divorce.”
So build the case on what happened before, and be ready to show when the illness began.
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This post is a quick overview of the law and is not intended as legal advice. Please feel free to contact our office for a consultation if you have questions about this or any other legal aspects regarding your case!