By Janice Morse
Enquirer staff writer

HAMILTON - An employer refused to withhold child-support payments for a former Butler County man - and got stuck paying the man's $5,350 tab, officials said Thursday.

"This company thumbed its nose to us and said, 'We're not paying,'" said Dan Cade, executive director of the Butler County Child Support Enforcement Agency.

State and federal laws require all income providers to comply with orders to withhold child-support payments, Cade said, outlining what he believes to be the county's first successful collection in an out-of-state case of this type.

In June, Butler County Domestic Relations Judge Sharon Kennedy had issued a judgment in favor of Cade's agency.

That meant Alpha Manufacturing of West Columbia, S.C., was responsible for paying $10,000 it had refused to withhold on behalf of an Alpha employee, Larry Walker, Cade said.

An Alpha spokesman did not return a phone call asking for comment.

The case sends a message to employers: Comply with orders to withhold child-support payments - and send them to the appropriate agencies - "or they have to pony up the money," Cade said.

Rather than go through a possible appeal, Cade's agency agreed to settle for a check from Alpha for $5,350.

Cade noted that the company also incurred attorneys' fees to fight the legal battle, which dates to 1999, and had to pay even though Walker, 43, is no longer an Alpha employee.

After state officials process Alpha's check, the money will go to Walker's ex-wife, Susan Blalock. The couple, formerly of Hamilton, divorced in 1997. They had two children.

Blalock, in a telephone interview from Longview, Texas, where she now lives, said she found it ironic that her ex-husband was willing to make the payments, "but the company was the one that actually literally refused to withhold the money."

While pleased at the prospect of finally receiving part of the money owed for her children's support, Blalock said the cash would have been a bigger help while the children were still young. Both children are now grown and "beyond child-support age," she said.

Blalock said she would like to see stricter interstate enforcement of child-support orders so other single parents will not face the same situation she did.

E-mail jmorse@enquirer.com