Commissioner Alan B. Clements (Ret.) was the first commissioner ever appointed by the San Diego Superior Court (1988) and served as a commissioner for 21 years, exclusively in family law assignments. He has conducted in excess of 2,000 trials and 10,000 motions/orders to show cause. He was selected by the Court to conduct a pilot program for direct calendaring in San Diego County. The program was so successful that after six months it was adopted by the Family Law Court for all departments.
ADR Experience and Qualifications
Family Law Dispute Resolution Experience
- Supervised the settlement calendar for seven years at the east county branch of the San Diego Superior Court, and has conducted hundreds of settlement conferences during his judicial career
- Taught and lectured extensively in all areas of family law to a wide variety of groups including the CEB, Rutter Group, California Center for Judicial Education and Research, American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, Certified Family Law Specialists of the San Diego County Bar Association, and local bar sections
Representative Matters
The following are representative of the family law issues in which Commissioner Clements has participated to resolution while serving as a settlement judge within the Court:
- Characterization, valuation, and distribution of stock options
- Validity of pre-marital and post-marital settlement agreements
- Determination of date of separation
- Determination of community v. separate property, including 2640FC reimbursements and Moore-Marsden formula
- Credits and charges per IRMO Epstein, IRMO Watts, and IRMO Frick
- Business valuations, including date of valuation, capitalization rates, and ultimate distribution, considering offsets against other community assets and debts
- Deferred sale of family residence
- Characterization, valuation, and distribution of numerous types of community property
- Valuation and distribution of household furniture, furnishings, and appliances
- Valuation and distribution of art, coin, jewelry, and gun collections
- Breach of fiduciary duty issues
- Characterization and distribution of personal injury awards
- Child custody and visitation issues, including “move aways” and “difficult” cases that required supervised visitation
- Determination of income, including W-2 employees with commissions and bonuses, self-employed spouses, imputation of income and stock options
- Determination of child support, including the most effective use of dependency exemptions
- Determination of spousal support, including short-term and long-term marriages, amount, duration of payment, trade-off of spousal support waiver in exchange for a greater portion of community assets and “buy-out” amounts
- Attorney fees, including appropriate allocation to each party, and generation of liquidity to pay said fees