The Rhode Island military affidavit

How Rhode Island handles it

Rhode Island bundles the military statement into a three-page District Court packet rather than publishing it alone. Page 1 of DC-36 (revised January 2023) is the Application to Clerk for Entry of Default. Page 2 is an Affidavit reciting the filing date of the complaint, that the court record shows service of the summons and complaint, and how many days have elapsed. Page 3 is captioned AFFIDAVIT AS TO MILITARY SERVICE AND COMPETENCY and is the document a servicemember would look for. The clerk’s Entry of Default sits at the foot of that third page.

That third page asks for two things in one sentence. You swear the defendant is not an infant or an incompetent and state where the defendant presently resides in Rhode Island, then check one of two boxes. The first says the defendant was not, at the commencement of the action or now, in military service as defined by the SCRA, "nor is the Defendant an American citizen serving with the forces of a United States ally or a reservist/draftee called to active duty." The second says that despite exercising due diligence the plaintiff lacks sufficient information and has been unable to determine whether the defendant is in military service.

Family Court has its own sheet. FC-52, Affidavit of Non-Military Service (revised July 2023), opens with an investigation clause: the affiant swears to having investigated the defendant’s whereabouts and to what that investigation showed about where the defendant resides. It then asks you to certify both that the defendant is not in federal military service and that the defendant is not "a member of the national guard on state active duty for a continuous period exceeding ninety (90) days as defined by G.L. 1956 30-7-10." A footnote reprints the statutory definition of military service across the bottom of the page.

Small claims work differently again. Under the District Court Rules of Small Claims Procedure (February 2024), the military statement is part of the Small Claims Notice of Suit itself, in the section titled Proof of Claim and Military Service Affidavit and Waiver of Right of Appeal. Rule 1.06 lists the grounds on which a small claims filing may be rejected, and the first one is failure to include a notarized signature on that portion of the Notice of Suit. Rule 6.01 then provides that if the defendant fails to answer and defend after proper service, the court enters default and judgment automatically, without further notice.

What trips filers up here

• The ninety-day state duty question on FC-52 has no federal answer. A DMDC certificate says nothing about a Rhode Island Guard member on a governor’s orders, and the form makes you swear to it anyway.
• Both District Court and Family Court forms still cite the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act at its pre-2015 address, 50 App. U.S.C. 521 and 50 USC App. 501 et seq., in revisions dated 2023.
• In small claims, a missing notary stamp is not a defect the clerk fixes later. It is an enumerated reason for the e-filing system to reject the whole Notice of Suit.
• DC-36 prints the addresses and phone numbers of the Newport, Warwick, Wakefield, and Providence judicial complexes on its face with a checkbox for each, so the form doubles as the filing address list.

Signing it: notarization required

Every Rhode Island version is notarized, and the notary block is unusually detailed. It requires the notary to check whether the signer was personally known or "proved to the notary through satisfactory evidence of identification," to describe that identification, and to print a notary identification number along with the commission expiration date.

This form carries a notary block, so budget for a notary before your filing date. Federal law sets a floor, not a ceiling: 50 U.S.C. § 3931(b)(4) permits an unsworn declaration under penalty of perjury, but a state is free to require more on its own form, and this one does.

Rhode Island law on top of the federal rule

R.I. Gen. Laws § 30-7-10: National Guard members on state active duty for a continuous period exceeding ninety days get the rights, protections, privileges, and immunities of the federal SCRA, expressly including the six percent interest ceiling, insurance continuation, eviction protection, lease termination, and continuance or stay of civil proceedings. Jurisdiction over alleged violations is exclusive to the Superior Court.

Getting the military-status answer right

The affidavit is only as good as the search behind it. The Defense Manpower Data Center runs the free lookup that courts and creditors rely on, and since 2026 it requires a free account even for a single record. Our guide to the DMDC SCRA website covers the search itself, what a "no information found" result does and does not prove, and the batch route for high-volume filers. The federal rules behind this form, including what happens when you genuinely cannot determine status, sit on the hub page.

If one was filed against you

A false affidavit is not a technicality. In May 2026 the Justice Department settled with a Florida property manager that swore a Navy sailor was not on active duty, took a default eviction judgment, and left him with an eviction on his record that a dozen landlords then refused to rent around: $60,000 to one servicemember plus a civil penalty . If a default judgment was entered against you while you were serving, it can be reopened; the default-judgment shield walks the deadlines.

Serving in Rhode Island and looking for what the state adds to your own protections rather than court procedure? That is a different page: Rhode Island SCRA benefits.