United States Third Circuit

Defendant's conviction and sentence for willful failure to pay his support obligation is affirmed over claims that: 1) the Child Support Recovery Act exceeds Congress's power under the Commerce Clause; 2) a provision in his divorce judgment requiring him to obtain an ecclesiastical divorce violated the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment; and 3) there was error in instructing the jury on willfulness.

Appellate Information

• Decided 03/06/2007
• Published 03/06/2007

Judges

• Before:  FUENTES and VAN ANTWERPEN, Circuit Judges, and PADOVA, District Judge.

Court

• United States Third Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• David E. Schafer, Office of the Federal Public Defender, Trenton, NJ, for Appellant.


• For Appellees:
  
• George S. Leone, Mark E. Coyne, Office of the United States Attorney, Newark, NJ, for Appellee.