Breakdown of a Marriage Due to a Parent-in-Law’s Extreme Maltreatment

Seolnal (Lunar New Year’s Day) is coming. During the holidays, families and relatives often get together, and it is not uncommon for people to have conflicts with their spouse or their spouse’s family and decide to divorce after the holidays.

Article 840 of the Korean Civil Act states grounds for a judicial divorce and the third and the fourth subparagraphs of the Article are as follows;

3.If one spouse has been extremely maltreated by the other spouse or his/her lineal ascendants;

4.If one spouse’s lineal ascendant has been extremely maltreated by the other spouse;

Hence, you can file a judicial divorce in case your parent in-law extremely maltreats you or in case your spouse extremely maltreats your parent.

According to the court precedents, the meaning of ‘extremely maltreated’ means ‘severely assaulted or abused or insulted for a long period so it would be inhumane to force him/her to continue the marriage’. Even if there were some insulting words or a slight assault during the arguments with your parent in-law, that alone would not be considered too severe to continue the marriage.

If your in-law severely maltreated you, which resulted in breakdown of your marriage, you may request the financial compensation to them. For instance, a husband brought a woman to his house to cohabit with her and his mother treated her as de facto her daughter-in-law, and she provided the house for the woman to live with his son. She did not even inform her daughter-in-law of her husband (his father)’s death, but instead allowed the woman to act as a de facto daughter-in-law in the funeral. She had the woman attend Chuseok memorial service instead of her daughter-in-law. The family court ruled that his mother should pay 20 million KRW to her daughter-in-law as financial compensation for her emotional distress because she caused the breakdown of the marriage between her son and daughter-in-law by encouraging the woman to act as de facto daughter-in-law.   

A husband and wife shall respect each other and the other party’s parents. Parents-in-law shall not maltreat their children’s spouse if they want their marriage to continue peacefully without them being in a crisis of divorce. I hope your Seolnal will be remembered as a happy holiday, not a nightmare. Happy Lunar New Year!