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If a contestant in a divorce case aggressively requests an annulment instead of a divorce, then the court will have to accommodate the request by holding hearings and taking legal argument on the issues. This is one big reason why the divorce between Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries has dragged on since Oct. 2011. Humphries is asserting his right to an annulment of what he claims was a sham marriage. In Michigan, as well as elsewhere, it’s far from easy to obtain an annulment of a marriage that on the surface appears to have been entered willingly and voluntarily.
A divorce is a decree by an appropriate court declaring a permanent dissolution of marriage with respect to marriage that was duly consecrated and legally valid. By contrast, an annulment is a court declaration that the marriage itself was never legally valid. Because of a substantial legal deficit, the marriage was never consummated.
For example, a marriage can be annulled if one party is a minor or committed fraud or misrepresentation. An annulment may be granted if a party withheld some significant fact from the other, such as a venereal disease, the existence of children or even drug addiction. Other reasons include if a party lacked mental capacity or was sufficiently drunk to not know what was happening.
Humphries may be intending to prove that Kardashian perpetrated a fraudulent scheme to lure him into a marriage solely for publicity and even television ratings. Although that appears at first blush to be extremely unlikely, viewing the Kardashian antics on cable television can make those nefarious accusations appear entirely believable. Because divorce is forbidden in Catholicism, there is the unlikely motive that Humphries is also a Catholic who wants to remarry someday as a Catholic.
Despite the list of reasons for annulment, it should be understood that this is an extremely difficult remedy to obtain. In Michigan and in virtually all other states, annulment orders are scarce, and divorce decrees are granted in almost all instances. The courts are reluctant to start a pattern of easily-obtained annulments, which could increase general disrespect of the institution of marriage. However, this may be one of the few instances where there is a substantial enough showing of egregious fraud to justify an annulment.
Source: YourTango.com, “Annulment Vs. Divorce: What’s The Difference, Anyway?” Diana Marie Collins, April 10, 2013