Many observers of marital politics know dishonesty ignites scores of divorces. Hidden lovers, hidden addictions, hidden pasts — all contribute mightily to today's divorce culture.

But once you flip over the rock and shed light on some of these vices, the real hiding begins. That's when a spouse, fearful of a divorce court's retribution, may begin hiding financial assets that see the light of day again only well after the spouses have parted and the lawyers have left the building.

That's when the real pain can begin. Tens of thousands of dollars in hidden credit-card debts, decimated bank accounts and/or squandered investment portfolios are only a few of the horrors that have befallen unwary spouses who didn't keep an eye on the books during their marriage years.

"Hiding assets is not that uncommon," says Byron Moldo, a founding partner at the Los Angeles law firm Moldo, Davidson, Frailio, Seror & Sestanovich. "Often, to get the financial records you need, you have to hire a private detective to trace the ex-spouse and see where they go and how they spend their money.

"People tend to get secretive when they start thinking about divorce. But if you can manage to pry credit-card receipts and phone bills out of them, you're on the right track."

So where to start?

Robert Fitzgerald, a divorce investigator with the Lorenzi Group, a Boston-based security and investigations firm, says when it comes to finding out what money your ex-spouse does or

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doesn't have, there are quite a few things to consider.

"You really have to be careful about doing things right," Fitzgerald says. "For example, we recently had a guy who wanted to investigate his wife's work laptop. But that's illegal — the employer, not the wife, owns the computer. We can look at a home computer but not an employer's computer. We could have faced criminal charges, but clients don't want to hear that."

What information — legal, of course — should you focus on?

"What e-mail addresses does the spouse have? Typically, that means work or home address. What's really important is the sum of all the parts. You can never fill in every answer. It may just come down to what kinds of credit-card statements do you see coming through the house. Some spouses I see don't even realize there is another credit card or another e-mail address."

Fitzgerald also spends a lot of time checking Web histories and seeing where spouses went in cyberspace.

Be prepared to look overseas — divorced men and woman sometimes try to park money overseas in secure, private accounts outside of the prying clutches of the Internal Revenue Service.

"Offshore funds are very difficult to find," says Jeffrey Leving, founder of Dads Rights.com. "Even a good lawyer may not help here. I'd hire a detective who specializes in financial fraud."

You might need to get the courts involved, as well.

"Sometimes, you need to go before a judge and get permission to get access to bank or brokerage records," Fitzgerald says. "Then, we go in and see what is there and what is deleted. In most cases, all data on computers, like e-mails or text messages or Web sites or credit-card transactions, stay there for years. It's a treasure trove."

RED FLAGS

If you suspect your spouse is involved in some financial shenanigans, or if you notice your asset values are too low or the checking account doesn't square, don't panic and don't confront him or her just yet. Instead take the following steps:

1. Get the last three to five years of joint tax returns. If you can't locate them, call the Internal Revenue Service at 800-829-3676 and ask them to send Form 4506. For $23, they'll send you a copy of each return.

2. Check any safe deposit boxes you have in both of your names and record the contents.

3. Make copies of the past year's worth of bank statements, brokerage accounts and other investments.

4. Scrutinize all credit-card statements from the last year.

5. Review all insurance documents — homeowners, auto, life and personal property.

6. Call a major credit bureau and ask for a copy of your credit report: Try Experian, 800-682-7654; Equifax, 800-685-1111; or Trans Union, 800-888 4213. They're the major players in the industry.

It's also a good idea to contact your bank and check out your ATM receipts. Has your spouse changed his withdrawal habits? Has he or she taken out money from ATMs nowhere near your home? Most important, has he or she changed any of your joint accounts to individual ones? These might be signs your ex-spouse is trying to hide something from you.

— Brian O'Connell

GETTING HELP

If your worst fears are realized, contact a private financial investigator or matrimonial lawyer to dig up any financial dirt for you. For $100 to $350 per hour, a trained investigator will dig even deeper and trace bank accounts and other financial records, analyze the financial circumstances and the records behind them and search share registries to trace assets. A good place to start is the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers. The article, "Knowing Your Marital Finances," covers marriage and money issues in detail.

— Brian O'Connell