Can Grandparents File for Custody and Visitation in North Carolina?

In custody and visitation cases, grandparents are considered third parties. North Carolina does not allow third parties to seek custody or visitation unless certain conditions are met. First, filing for visitation requires that the child’s family is not intact, which means there must be an ongoing issue like an open custody case or adoption proceedings.

North Carolina courts distinguish a grandparent’s standing to request visitation from their standing to seek custody. In custody matters, a grandparent must establish that the parents have acted inconsistently with their protected parental rights or that they are unfit.

Deanes v. Deanes

In Deanes v. Deanes, the North Carolina Court of Appeals heard a case involving grandparents’ right to seek custody of their grandson. In this case, the grandparents filed a motion to intervene in an ongoing custody issue. They alleged that Mother moved in with them after separating from Father, and they became the primary caregivers for the child. They further stated that Father went over three years with no contact with the child, and Mother left the child with them when she moved in with her girlfriend. The grandparents’ position was that Mother had ceded decision-making authority and parental responsibilities to them, but the trial court refused their motion to intervene. Grandparents appealed.

In their appeal, Grandparents argued that the trial court did not make sufficient findings of fact to support its determination that they lacked standing to intervene. The appellate court stated that non-parents have no authority to pursue custody of a child against the parents unless they can overcome the presumption that parents have the right to the care, custody, and control of their child. Simply providing assistance and support for a parent and child in a time of need does not prove a parent is unfit or that they have ceded their parental role to the person providing the assistance.

Examples of behaviors that North Carolina law states would lead a parent to lose their parental rights include:

• Abuse or neglect
• Willfully leaving the child in foster care for over one year
• Willfully abandoning the child for over six consecutive months
• Convicted of voluntary manslaughter or murder of a child in the same home

There was insufficient evidence in Deanes to prove that Grandparents’ claims about Mother and Father were true. Even if they were true, the appellate court stated that the claims were insufficient to establish that parents had ceded their rights or that they were unfit.

The Court of Appeals determined that Grandparents, as third-party intervenors, failed to establish that Mother and Father were unfit or acted inconsistently with their rights as parents. The trial court’s ruling on the motion to intervene was affirmed.