Alimony Madness on AllMovie

A wife is on trial for murdering her husband's former spouse in this inexpensive melodrama from low-budget Mayfair Pictures Corp. In flashback, it is shown that Joan Armstrong (Helen Chandler), an unemployed stenographer, is hired to act as corespondent for architect John Thurman (Leon Waycoff, aka Leon Ames) in his divorce from Eloise Thurman (Charlotte Merriam), a callous woman who cares more for her pet Pekinese than her husband and who is granted a huge settlement. Joan goes to work for John, with whom she has fallen in love, and they eventually marry and have a son. Several unfortunate events bankrupt John and he is on his way to purchase medicine for his dying son with his last 20 dollar bill when stopped by a process server acting on behalf of Eloise. Little John Jr. dies and when Joan learns that the 20 dollars earmarked for medicine instead went to pay the first Mrs. Thurman's veterinarian bills, she becomes temporarily insane and kills the greedy woman. Back in the courtroom, a weeping jury returns a verdict of "not guilty" and Joan and John are reunited.