Accused of Bigamy

[incogmom]

My question involves defamation in the state of: false and malicious claims.

I was married and divorced within a short amount of time almost a decade ago. The Ex-husband has maintained we are still married. He has defended every action ie. child support , paying his debts so on and so forth by saying we are still married.

Fast Forward to the present time and I have recently remarried. Prior to my marriage per the laws of my state I researched, garnered a certified copy of and presented said copy to the clerk to obtain a license to marry and signed this under oath of perjury.

The ex- husband and his mother are making claims of Bigamy on my part and openly and publicly questioning the validity of my marriage to mutual friends, family and pretty much anyone who will stop and listen.

Can I make them stop? Does the law provide a way to enforce and punish them if they continue to slander and defame me and my husband. I concerned specifically because:
1.)This can and will hurt our credibility and could impact the business we own and operate.
2.) Thier claims will hurt and impact our credibility within our religious community
3.)I feel the intent of these claims is to hurt our relationship as a whole and were meant maliciously to cloud and make it impossible for us to enjoy our honeymoon, which we did have to cancel and go home early from
4.) The most important factor to me above hurting our credibility with our clients-- the impact on my eldest child, who was born to me and my ex husband. I feel their claims to be maliciously damaging to the integrity of our famility unit and an attempt to alienate my daughter.

[Mr. Knowitall]

You either were divorced or you were not. If you were not, then accusing you of bigamy is not defamation because it is true.

What does "I researched, garnered a certified copy of and presented said copy to the clerk" mean? A certified copy of what? Why would you need to do research to figure out if you were divorced?

How in the world would somebody saying, "I think you're still married" affect your honeymoon or necessitate its cancellation? How are your customers hearing these rumors and why do they care? How are members of your religious community hearing these rumors and why do they care?

Incidentally, "false and malicious claims" isn't a U.S. state. In what U.S. state is all of this occurring?

[incogmom]

Mr. Knowitall,
I was divorced. I have the long form and short form of the divorce paperwork, signed by the magistrate. The state is Colorado. The gossip has been bouncing through mutual friends of the exs family and my self, some of whom work in the same industry as we do. I understand that essentially pissing in our cheerios and killing our honeymoon may not stand up legally, however as stated in my original post, my intent is to stop the rumor mill from damaging our professional reputation and hurting us in our spiritual communities and to protect my children from hearing these lies.

ETA:
The reason research was needed was that in changing our files over (paper to microfische annd back) the original divorce paperwork as misfiled and was not with my master file at the court house when we last looked for it in 2005. I worked with our clerks for 2 days this last may to locate the filing under a misspelled name so that I could present our clerk with the certified copy to obtain our marriage license.