I'm not quite sure how this case can be compared to the Montgomery bus situation and Rosa Parks. Terri Horman is a far cry from Rosa Parks. Maybe had Terri studied her history lessons in school, she could have learned a thing or two from Rosa Parks. I don't even see this case as setting any sort of legal precedence because it's pretty black and white (not throwing race in) from the beginning. Child goes missing, she was the last person to be seen with him. She tries to hire someone to murder her husband, he gets wind of it and boots her out of the house while keeping toddler daughter safe and away from her. She hires high-priced lawyer who tells her to keep her mouth shut although she didn't necessarily keep her mouth shut. Husband files for divorce, hearing postponed but all the while she is intent on not opening her mouth whether it costs her custody of her daughter. Judge apparently decides to retire pushing hearing back. Meanwhile Kyron is still missing but baby is safe and sound thankfully. Like I said, I'm sure she could have learned a few things from Rosa Parks and that is to tell the truth!!
~JMO~
Well, at least three attorneys here on WS have said that this case has some interesting issues concerning the intersection of civil and criminal law. I'm not a lawyer, so I'm taking their word for it that there are indeed some legal issues involved in this case which do not have obvious right or wrong answers.
Cases which do not have obvious answers in the law are the ones that tend to set precedent. So, it may turn out to be a precedent setting case or it may not.
In the Montgomery bus case, civil rights leaders wanted to create a precedent: that black people could not be arrested for exercising their constitutional right to equal access.
The city of Montgomery was far from the only city that had Jim Crow laws involving public transportation. There were a number of people who were arrested in the three years or so before Rosa Parks made her stand for essentially the same reason Rosa Parks was arrested.
Here's where the comparison comes in.
Rosa Parks was chosen ahead of time by civil rights leaders to be the test case in Montgomery because there were no other issues in her background that could distract attention from the precedent they wanted to set. The only issue would be the question of whether Rosa Parks had to move to the back of the bus or not. There would not be any other questions/issues involved.
Claudette Colvin made a considered decision, independent of the civil rights movement, to exercise her constitutional right to equal access. She was a 15 year old high school student who was learning about the US constitution in class and she realised that the Jim Crow law involving city busses was unconstitutional (bright kid!).
So why didn't civil rights leaders choose to use Claudette Colvin's case as their test case? Because Ms Colvin had other issues that could be used to distract attention from the constitutional issue. Those other issues could be used by detractors to distract attention from the real question of equal access.
In the case of Horman v Horman, there are clearly some issues that will have to be settled which have never been addressed before. Unfortunately, the case is so messy, has so many intersecting issues, that it probably won't make a good case for setting any precedents.
The issues will have to be decided but it's questionable as to whether that decision will be applied to other cases because there are so many twists, turns, exceptions and unanswered questions around Horman v Horman. I simply can't imagine another divorce that would involve anything like the same elements this one has (and I'm really glad that is so--one case like this is too many!).
I can't remember who it was in this thread who mentioned that Judge Mesenheimer may have been giving up the chance to make a precedent setting decision; the point of my response is that I doubt that he is. The case will have to be decided but that decision is unlikely to create a precedent.