court papers

Are you talking about a divorce decree?? Unfortunately this type of order has is not enforceable. Say you have a credit card and the judge assigns it to your spouse. If the spouse refuses to pay, you can still be sued for that debt. The court order has no bearing on the ownership. To enforce the judges order, you would have to haul the spouse back into court and let the court that made the ruling deal with him...

So the moot point is that a divorce decree for joint debts are useless entirely?

Correct. The only benefit you have is that you can haul them back into family court....they could be charged with contempt of court which could involve jail time for violating the judges order

I learned this the hard way.

You can also pay the debt and then sue your ex for repayment.