Questão jurídica principal
Whether the judge had jurisdiction to decide a maintenance request for the period before the divorce action was filed.
Decisão extraída
Yes. The same judge acts as both matrimonial protection judge and provisional measures judge, and maintenance for the pre-litigation period must be sought through matrimonial protection proceedings.
Fundamentação extraída
Before the divorce action becomes pending, judicial relief between spouses is available only under matrimonial protection. The competent judge at the claimant's domicile may therefore decide such claims even if they concern a period before lis pendens. The lower court read the cited federal precedent too broadly.