Hello everybody, thanks for letting me be part of this venue and for any advice in my difficult situation.
My case is quite complicated. Me and my husband got married in 2004 in NY. He was mentally, emotionally and sexually abusive since the very beginning, but he did it in such an insidious, passive and covert way that I could not realize the extent of the damage done until it was too late. I have always loved him with all I had, and to this day, I cannot bring myself to see him for the monster he truly is, and have no ill wish toward him. I can just pity the empty shell he has become.
At the time of our separation we were in my country. He had never worked a single day of our life together, alleging mental issues. I always carried and supported him, for good and bad. At some point, we decided that he would come back to America, get settled about certain government benefits that he was entitled to (but never bothered to claim while we were married, since I was the one footing the bill), settle residency and financial stability, and I would join him upon finishing my studies. Never once the word "separation", much less "divorce" was in our vocabulary. He departed to Florida on May 2014.
Our relationship continued going on at distance (we were married for over 10 years at that point) through Internet chats. He seemed to be happy to finally get his life on track and I couldn't be anymore happy at seeing him so motivated. Or so I thought. I could never in a million years have suspected what was coming.
On May 2015, I found out through some random let's call it "woman" that she and my husband had been involved in an adulterous relationship for months. Any attempt to have my husband talk to me and give me any explanation has been completely unsuccessful. He abandoned me, leaving me for dead in another country, fully convinced that I would never be able to come back here.
But I did. I made it back, and all I wanted was to see him again, to face our issues like a husband and a wife should, face to face. Any attempt to talk to him had been met with his silence and the threatening words of some random meretrix with a penchant for married men, in her continuous search for a baby daddy to foot the bill for her multifathered bastards.
I was devastated and scared (I am still, to this day, and I highly doubt I will ever recover). I had no place to stay, no work, no driving license, nothing. So I did the only reasonable thing I could do. I had some good friends in Utah who sheltered me and helped me to get back on my feet, so to Utah I came.
My then husband started digging himself in a deeper and deeper pit of debt. I had to talk to a lawyer about my situation. I always told him that I didn't want to get divorced without having talked to my husband face to face first. He PROMISED me, over and over again, that he would have my husband come to Utah, and he recommended me that the best course of action was filing for divorce, something I never wanted to do.
But hey, what do I know, right? I follow his legal "advice", in order to "protect" my interests, according to this scoundrel. Husband had never set foot in Utah before, and of course, hired a Utah lawyer to represent him, but never showed up. The scoundrel I hired then pushes me into mediation, reassuring me over and over again that my husband HAD to come to the mediation. Another one of his lies to get my money.
Husband never shows up, and at some point during mediation my "lawyer" basically pushes me to sign this ridiculous agreement in which my husband agrees to pay me a certain amount for 3 years, and a final lump sum at the end of those 3 years. I signed, my husband's lawyer signs it for him, and that's the end of it. My "lawyer" withdraws from the case the following day.
I had to fight on my own to get the grounds for divorce stated in the final decree, which I successfully did.
Now, the problem: ex-husband hasn't been abiding by the agreement for a few months. He moved from Florida to Iowa with the homewrecker and her whole offspring. How do I go on recovering that money?
I recently started reading upon the differences between case jurisdiction and personal jurisdiction (only in America!!!!), and after that I have serious doubts. Is that one-paragraph mediation agreement even enforceable? In case it is, would it be enforceable by Utah court, or should I domesticate the decree in Iowa? Am I better off suing the scoundrel I hired for blatant malpractice? No wonder he left with his tail between his legs. He gives a bad name to any serious practitioner of Law, and should be stripped of his license.
Any advice is greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

