I would appreciate some guidance here. My fiance has gone through an extremely bitter and messy divorce (yes he is divorced for more than a year) but they are still fighting over a boat. The boat was purchased by my fiance 5 months prior to their legal separation date for $1000 (it had no engines). Since then my fiance has spent much money and labor on restoring it to its present condition and worth (probably no more than $20k although we are having it appraised next week). The boat is and always has been titled in his name only. She has never put money or time into it, nor has she even been on it (well, she did break in once to steal the registration tags to try to prove ownership). She has a long history of identity theft, fraud, car theft, embezzlement etc and was in jail for the first year that the boat was actually owned. According to what I'm reading in the CA law practice guides, the boat is an exception to community property rules, since it is titled in my fiance's name, and it should be viewed as sole and separate property, with the burden of proof on her to show that there was the intention for it to be communal not separate (this burden of proof being above and beyond . Obviously my fiance's position is that she was not involved in the purchase, never put a dime into it, nor has she ever been on it so she doesn't deserve proceeds from the sale. The financial settlement has dragged on now for close to 3 yrs with us forbidden from selling the boat so he's had to bear the full burden of monthly slip fees, insurance, property taxes etc w/no input from her. Does she have any community interest or should be viewed as sole and separate property? (My fiance has had to let his attorney go after 4 years of her stall tactics which accomplished nothing and ran up huge bills so we're trying to figure this out on our own).

