Articles Posted in Custody/Time-Sharing

It is once again fast approaching the “Holiday Season” time of year. For many people, especially those with children, that can mean hosting family from out of town or making travel arrangements to visit faraway relatives. For some families, though, the holidays are more complicated. For divorced parents with minor children, reaching a workable solution for the holidays can be challenging and, sometimes, may even require the involvement of the courts, as one recent South Florida case exemplified. If your holiday visitation situation has become so complex that it seems like it may require litigation, you should make sure you have skilled Florida child custody counsel on your side.

One important thing to remember if you are going through a paternity case or a divorce case is that Florida law clearly states that both parents should receive shared parental responsibility unless the judge makes a finding “that shared parental responsibility would be detrimental to the child.” In the majority of cases, the judge is not going to make such a finding and is going to order shared parental responsibility for the child.

Additionally, courts have wide latitude when it comes to timesharing orders. A court can even order that one parent receive no visitation with a child. However, that occurs only in a small fraction of cases. In the large majority in which visitation is awarded, the non-custodial parent has certain rights when it comes to getting the children (or child) over the holidays.

In any divorce or child custody case, one of the most important preliminary decisions that must be made is choosing where to file the action. If you attempt to bring your case in a court that does not have what’s called “jurisdiction,” you may face many possible negative outcomes, including not having your case heard (and having it thrown out instead) or having your successful outcome reversed on appeal. Either way, you won’t get the relief you need if the court doesn’t have jurisdiction. When the time comes to choose the right court to pursue your case, talk to a knowledgeable Florida child custody attorney who can help you make the right selection.

An example of how this process can go wrong played out recently in a Second District Court of Appeal case. Rahul, a commercial airline pilot, and a husband and father of three, filed for divorce in Collier County in southwest Florida. Whenever you file for divorce, you have to make certain declarations in your petition in order to establish that the court has jurisdiction. One of these is that you have lived here for at least six months, which would make you a Florida resident for the purposes of a divorce.

The husband made such a declaration in his case. The wife, in her response, “admitted” everything in the husband’s petition, meaning that she acknowledged as correct all of the points in the husband’s filing, including the item of residency. She also consented to the entry of a marital settlement agreement and parenting plan that the couple had previously worked out.

One of the more recent issues in family law with which the courts in the various states have wrestled is the matter of grandparent visitation. In Florida, the law as announced by the Florida Supreme Court is relatively clear:  the state Constitution’s right to privacy includes a parent’s right to raise his or her child as the parent sees fit, and that means that the courts generally cannot order that grandparents receive visitation over a parent’s objection. As with almost any aspect of the area, there are a few exceptions, though, one of which was on display in a case that went before the state’s Supreme Court recently. Whether you’re a parent or a grandparent involved in a visitation dispute, an experienced Florida child custody attorney can go over with you the limits of grandparents’ rights and how Florida law would apply to your case.

In general, a parent has a very strong right to privacy when it comes to child-rearing under the Florida Constitution. Specifically, Article I, Section 23 of the Constitution says that every “natural person has the right to be let alone and free from governmental intrusion into the person’s private life except as otherwise provided herein.” The Supreme Court has consistently interpreted this section to mean that forced grandparent visitation is unconstitutional and against public policy. A judge telling a parent that he or she must allow his or her child to have visitation with a grandparent is exactly the sort of government intrusion into private life that Section 23 bars, according to the court.

There are a couple of ways a grandparent might be able to obtain a court order of visitation, but they are very narrow. One is if the family was involved in visitation litigation in another state that allows enforced grandparent visitation, and a court of that state entered a valid order that required the parent(s) to allow visitation with the grandparent(s). There are very few things that can trump the Florida Constitution, but one of them is the U.S. Constitution.

With same-sex marriage having been legally recognized in Florida for just over two years now, the legal system in this state will, inevitably, see an increase in family law cases with same-sex spouses and same-sex parents. Sometimes, South Florida family law cases involving same-sex partners may present unique issues. Other times, though, same-sex couples will find that their cases will be decided by the same things that influence cases with opposite-sex partners. That was the case recently for two married men, one of whom had their Florida case scuttled by the legal concept of forum non conveniens.

The couple, Marco and Han, entered into a civil partnership in the United Kingdom in 2008. That was converted into a marriage in the U.K. in 2015. Marco had dual citizenship in Italy and the U.K. Han had dual citizenship in Malaysia and the U.K. The couple shared one child, a daughter who was born in Missouri in 2014. A Missouri court gave Marco sole custody of the child.

For just less than one year, from 2014 to 2015, the family lived in Miami, residing in a friend’s apartment. Han moved back to London in the fall of 2015 and never returned to Florida. Marco and the daughter moved to New York in the following March, where they stayed. Marco filed for divorce in London in April 2016. Han filed for divorce here in South Florida a month later.

In a recent child custody and timesharing case, the mother, who had lost in the trial court, lost again on appeal. The First District Court of Appeal did not conclude that the mother was blatantly or egregiously wrong in her arguments; instead, the appeals court simply concluded that the mother did not prove that the trial judge abused his discretion, so the appeals court had no basis for reversing the lower court’s ruling. The outcome in this matter highlights an important truth about any Florida family law matter, which is the difficulty appellants often face in winning on appeal and, as a related element, the importance of making your strongest possible presentation in the trial court.

The spouses, Kemberly and Mark, were a Union County couple who were in a situation that faces many married couples:  they were divorcing. What’s more, they were going through divorce not just as spouses but as parents of a six-year-old daughter. Also like many couples, the parents couldn’t agree on the issue of custody and timesharing, so they litigated that matter before a judge.

At the custody trial, the wife presented evidence that she was the one who had served as the daughter’s primary caregiver during the couple’s separation, which had gone on for a considerable length of time. The mother allegedly was also the parent who always took the child to school during the marriage. Based upon these and other factors, the mother argued that she should receive a majority of the time in any custody and timesharing order.

In any family law case, it is important to know what proof you will need in order to succeed before you arrive in court. For example, in cases in which one spouse wants to relocate with the children, the law places certain proof obligations on each parent. In a recent case involving a Palm Beach County family, the Fourth District Court of Appeal reversed a trial judge’s decision to deny the mother’s request to relocate. The mother had adequate proof that the move was in the best interests of the children, while the father had, on his side, only promises to change his ways and be a better parent in the future. Promises of future changes were not sufficient, the appeals court stated in its ruling.

The parents, Robert and Melanie, had lived in Virginia for 15 years before relocating to South Florida in 2012. Two years later, the wife filed for divorce. As part of that legal action, the wife asked for court permission to relocate, along with the couple’s two elementary school-aged children, back to Virginia. This move would benefit the children, she argued, since it would eliminate her need to travel for work, which was extensive as long as she lived in Florida.

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