JACOBS V. DUDLEY, 2021-NCCOA-571 (19 October 2021). Child custody can be hotly contested. Often people will have third parties (i.e., not the parents or guardians of the child) involved in some custody disputes. These people include teachers, doctors, therapists, and extended family members. Such individuals are often asked to come…
The trial court awarded Plaintiff-Father Issac Munoz primary physical custody of the parties’ daughter. Defendant-Mother Cassandra Munoz appealed. The parties married in 2012 and the minor child was born in 2015. Mother was, and still is, a member of the United States Army. In 2016, the Mother was stationed at…
Alaska’s Supreme Court recently decided an issue revolving around custody of a minor child born through artificial insemination to a same-sex couple. As same-sex marriages and reproductive technologies continue to be more commonplace, we are seeing an increase in cases that involve such parties. The law, as always, lags behind…
Blackwell v. Blackwell 2021-NCCOA-537 Facts: Mother and Father began a child custody action. Mother subpoenaed numerous mental health documents from healthcare providers. These documents would have purportedly been used at trial to establish Father’s mental health and substance abuse. In 2016, the parties had consented to a custody schedule in…
There is a mess of a custody case in Massachusetts (MA) that arose from a very reckless surrogacy situation. Apparently, a same-sex couple posted to social media asking for help having a baby. A friend then offered to conceive with her boyfriend (read: the baby would be biologically unrelated to…
Snowden v. Jaure, (Wyoming Supreme Court) With Covid-19 raging for over a year now, many families have been affected and often negatively. Job loss is just one consequence of the pandemic. This has caused a loss in income for many individuals. In families going through a custody case, it means…
There have been phones and computers around for decades now, and in the child custody context they have been instrumental in providing access to children for noncustodial parents. But since Facetime has come around, we are beginning to see some court documents, specifically custody orders, reference Facetime when crafting custodial…
WALTER V. WALTER 2021-NCCOA-428 The language contained in a consent order should be unambiguous and clearly state what each party is required to do under the order. When the reading of the order leads to multiple reasonable interpretations, it may become impossible to enforce through contempt. Below is a custody…
Madar v. Madar, No.COA20-28 (Dec. 2020). In North Carolina, court ordered child support can only be modified by further order of the court. Before modification is allowed, the court must find that there has been a substantial change in circumstances that warrant the modification. There is an automatic presumption built…
Angelina Jolie recently experienced a small victory in her contentious custody dispute with Brad Pitt. The California Court of Appeals has disqualified the private judge, John Ouderkirk, from further ruling on the matter. Jolie and Pitt selected Judge John Ouderkirk to handle the custody dispute in the hope that a…