Exactly why you go zero tolerance and full confrontation on the toxic opposition. Go loaded for bear.  Get a pit bull attorney. Make sure all documentation is filed with the court prior to the hearing.  Dot every T and cross every I (joke intended).  Keep the pressure on and manipulate the toxic opposition losing their cool in court.  Many of them are incapable of sitting and  maintaining a STFU position when under pressure.   

Not a designed strategy on my part during my divorce. It just kind of evolved and unfolded during the several months process from XW informing that she wanted  a divorce until the final divorce hearing.. 

But I was calm, respectful, and fully loaded with facts and documents for the final divorce hearing. My XW knew it.  We did a one attorney uncontested divorce but she was the one who filed. The attorney told me that since it was uncontested that I did not have to appear at the final divorce hearing. I attended anyway.  That part did not pass my smell test. 

XW and the attorney were at their table. I was behind the rail sitting in the public observers benches.  We were the only three in the court room other than the Judge, bailiff, and court reporter.  When the court was called to order and the Judge walked in, he first asked if all parties were present.  The attorney answered in the affirmative.  The Judge then asked if the other party was present since no one was at the opposing party table.  I raised  my hand and confirmed that I was the other party. I had the big hairy manilla envelope in my hand that had notarized copies of XW's serial adultery cheat diary (yes, she kept a diary of all of her dalliances for our entire relationship, dating for a year, engaged for a year, and the 27months we lived together while married until she moved out of our recently purchased home and in with her grandpa sugar/baby daddy who was a geriatric Fortune 500 executive she had been bumping uglies with for 6 or more months before moving out. The manila envelope also had the signed asset distribution agreement. She had stated that she wanted nothing but the money she had cashed out of CDs to put down on our home.  The agreement and the carbon copy of the cashiers check I had given her for the CD money was in it. And.... every paper she had turned in for the last three years of her BSN program. Rough drafts in my name, typed graded copies as well.  Each copies page notarized. 

SHe had seen that envelope and it's contents before.

She had lost her mind the first time she saw the envelope and contents when she tried to change the rules mid race a couple of months before when she engaged the business attorney that my XMIL used for the company she was the office manager for.  That attorney called for a meeting between he and his client, my XW, and me and my attorney.  I went to the meeting pro se.  Her attorney advised that I engage counsel. I refused.  He then proceeded to present that his client should get half of my business (started before we met), etc... I slid the manila folder across the table with notarized copies of her cheat diaries, her college papers, the signed original asset distribution agreement, and the copy of the Cashier's check for the down payment money on the house.  I told her attorney that if she did not return to the originally agreed asset distribution that she had proposed, that it all would become public record, I would submit it to the paper and the university.

The cashiers check and signed receipt letter for it ended up being critical because it showed intent that she did not want the house and had accepted payment for her interest in the house. When she saw what was in the envelope she blew her stack calling me every name in the book while her attorney looked over the folder contents. He then informed her that he could no longer represent her. He was an adjunct professor at the law school for the university XW had attended nursing school. Her academic fraud apparently put him at a conflict of interests and he could no longer represent her without resigning his adjunct professorship.

When XW saw me with the manilla envelope in court, she turned purple.  She got lippy withi the Judge when he considered her motion to return to her maiden name.  He indicated that he was inclined ot issue that ruling. At which point she burst out with "Thank F'ing God!". The Judge had been watching the two of us. I was clearly sad. She was clearly livid to the point she was purple from the second the Judge told me to step forward to the L side of courtroom table.  The Judge ripped her a new asshole, asked her if she was pregnant. That instandly bleached her face from the flaming purple it had been the whole hearing to that point and she went pale as a ghost.  The Judge informed her that due to her attitude he might order a envitro pregnancy test to prove paternity due to her in court bullshit. She wilted, appologized, the Judge layed into her a bit more, and then gave his ruling.  He approved her motion to return to her maiden name then .... "All listed property divided as agreed. Any property not listed is owned as possesed as of that court date."  The house was not listed. She had moved out 4mos before.  It was now my house. Which came back into play about 5 years later.

Then, my incredible teen bride who is an impeccable record keeper with a highly evolved attention to detail buried the SpermClan in highly documented facts and detail when she had to defend an attempt by them to take custody of her then not yet 2yo son.  She brought documented facts, several witnesses who could testify and confirm those documented facts.  They brought veral blather and fee fees.

That Judge did much the same to the SpermIdiot as the Judge in my final divorce hearing did to my XW.  It was a full day  in court full of tit for tat during our defense against their custody attempt. After both sides had finished the Judge spent 10mins absolutely shredding the SpermIdiot for what he was wearing, his ridiculous hair, his crap arrest record, etc.... Then the Judge started stating his ruling. When he upheld full physical and legal custody for my wife (we had married 3 days prior) there was SpermClan grumbling. When CS was increased by $23/mo SpermGrandPa started cussing up a storm. At which point the Judge laid into SpermGrandPa, the SpermIdiot's lawyer (who was provided by SpermGrandHag) and threatened them all with contempt for wasting the courts time.  Though we won, I was pissed that my income had been used to give the SpermIdiot an income reduction credit for CS calculation purposes and that a visitation order was set.  Who orders a toddler into the unsupervised presence of a serial statutory rapist with a dozen page long arrest record?  I just bit my tongue until after the hearing was closed.

So, be righteous, be calm, be professional, and make it clear that if they even twitch out of line that their throats will be ripped out and their asses bared in court for the public record. with the promise that every bit of the facts, court records, and court recordings (no court reporter in the SpermLand court. It was all recoreded and we asked our attorney for a copy of the tapes. We lived with those ready to pounce on the SpermClan with for the next 16+ years.  An official record of the facts and every stitch of presented evidence and testimony. Ha!

No doubt the dad in this YouTube video went through months if not a year of more of hell.  He kept his cool. Kept building his wall of facts and documentation, worked with his attorney, and they ended up baring BM's toxic ass with the Judge who actually did his job and ruled on the facts sans emotion.  It has to be pretty bad when the BM's mother testifies for the BioDad.  If I saw that correctly.  Emotion has no place in court or in anything to do with the lead up to court.  Those who keep their cool and maintain compliance to the document, document, document and bare idiot ass model usually primarily triumph in the marathon of blended family court drama. It is a marathon.  Anyone thinking otherwise is pretty much going to lose.

Behave, tolerate no bullshit, and stand your ground using every legal, social, and financial weapon at your disposal.  The one who knows their CO, the supplemental jurisdictional/county rules, state regs , and every detail of their unfolding situation ultimately has a huge advantage. The good side does not always win. Sadly.  In my experience even though we always triumphed resoundingly, I have never left family law court (divorce or blended family related) without feeling completely skeeved out and needing a scalding hot high pressure shower to wash the noxious fumes from the shit side, idiot attorneys, and far too often moron bottom 10%ers of the legal profession Judges off of me.  Though I will absolutely applaud the Judge in my final divorce hearing which lasted all of 20mins.  Short, sweet, to the point.  Dramatized by a manila envelope I had in hand would motion with when I was speaking, and would move occasionally so my XW kept looking at it while the attorney was speaking.

Fortunately for this YouTube dad who obviously was playing the long game, he had a solid attorney and a wise and experienced judge who was ruling on the merits of the case rather than on the fee fees of either side or on the fee fees of the community.  Their job is to uphold and enforce the law. Fee fees don't have  any place in it anywhere. It looks like dad's attorney had filed all of the documentation with the court prior to the hearing.  The lawyer mentioned the CPS and police reports, and the investigation results which the Judge was clearly aware of.  BM did not provide counter documentation supporting her claims that the investigations were never done.

I  first learned this lesson during my divorce and we learned it together as a couple during the 16+ years of living under the CO including a number of cease and desist orders, two court hearings, and a number of nasty gram letters sent to the SpermClan under our pit bull attorney's letter head. While the documentation of the facts is the core and most critical element of these efforts. Having an effective presentation of the facts is also critical.  We learned this during the custody hearing.  The SpermClan engaged low cost bottom feeder lawyers. At least their second one was. Their first attorney fired them when the fraudulently filed case was highlighted by DW pointing out that SpermGrandHa had forged the SpermIdiot's signature on the case filing paperwork.  Our attorney was a reputable SpermLand/DW's home town attorney.  However, she was far more more focused on maintaining her reputation, professional, and social relationships in the community than she was in winning our case.  I think we likely would have won without DW's file boxes of documentation but it is that documentation that allowed us to keep our own attorney focused on doing her job. She was more interested in placating and whining about "Can't everyone just get along.". After that hearing we engaged a pit bull local attorney in our area to advise and build our strategy and send nasty grams to the SpermClan when they stepped out of line.  After that, it was pretty much game over the second the SpermClan stepped out of line.