South Carolina Divorce and Family Law » Child Custody

5 Child Custody Tips

Tripp — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 02:21:19 +0000

When you are involved in a case regarding custody of your children things can get crazy and out-of-hand very quickly. So, here are a few tips to help you out in your child custody case.

Really try to work with your spouse to parent together regardless of the custody arrangement. When you are going through a divorce (or you are already divorced and you are fighting over custody) things can really turn ugly, and I mean fast. What almost immediately happens is that the parents cease communications with one another and therefore cease parenting together and consistently. This causes confusion for the children and can lead to problems for you in the lawsuit. Just a few weeks ago I was in a custody hearing and each party was talking about “my son this” and “my son that.” The judge quickly lashed into them and reminded each of the parties that this was “their son” and they had to parent together.
Don’t bad-mouth your spouse in front of the children. Let’s face it, kids talk. I never know what is going to come out of my two year old’s mouth, but it is almost always something he heard his mother or me say. I’m sure your kids are the same way. When you talk to you kids about their other parent you really put them in a bad predicament. You confuse them and you cause them to lose respect for their parent. Depending on how mature they are, they may even lose respect for you.
Don’t bad-mouth your spouse in front of the Guardian ad Litem. In any contested custody matter, the court is going to appoint a Guardian ad Litem to represent the best interest of the minor children in the case. It is the Guardian’s job to investigate the circumstances surrounding the children and present a report to the hearing judge about his or her findings. During the litigation, the Guardian ad Litem is likely to meet with you several times to discuss the case. During these meetings it is your job to make sure you build up yourself as a good parent and not spend the entire time bashing your spouse. That never works for winning a custody case. It just shows you are bitter and angry and that takes away from your ability to be a good parent. There are almost always concerns about the other parent’s ability to be a good custodial parent, so bring those up and move on. Don’t dwell on them.
Help your children. When you are trying to win a custody case you should be spending quality time with your children. Too often parents think trips to the park and arcade are all the quality time they need. On one hand you will probably win the heart of your child if all you do is take them out to do the fun things and buy them nice gifts, but you are probably not doing your custody case chances any favors unless you are also doing the “hard stuff.” Parenting requires you to punish, help with homework and projects, teach, have fun, cry, and everything in between. If you’re just doing the fun stuff you’re only part of the way there.
Stabilize your life. Do you move around a lot? Do you change jobs often? What’s your lifestyle like? When you are involved in a custody dispute you should try to stabilize yourself. Make sure you have had a stable place to live for a while and that your home has ample room for your children. If you have teenager and their are opposite sexes they should probably have separate rooms. Can you hold down a job? Having a stable job history shows that you can provide for yourself and your children and that you are loyal and consistent. Good parenting attributes. Do you party? Do you stay out all hours of the night? During a custody dispute don’t be surprised to find out your spouse has had a private investigator following you. If someone was documenting everything you were doing, would that help or hurt your custody case? If that PI went on your Facebook or Twitter page would they find that you have been out partying and drinking all night the last week?

Do You Get a Free Lawyer for Your Child Support Contempt Hearing?

Tripp — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 21:04:01 +0000

One question I hear frequently is whether you can get a court-appointed attorney in your divorce or child support case. The answer is no. There is no constitutional right to have an attorney provided for you in a private family court matter like there is in a criminal prosecution or even in a DSS abuse and neglect case. This issue recently was before the South Carolina Supreme Court in Rebecca Price v. Michael D. Turner.

In this case a father had previously been ordered to pay child support for his children and had not made a payment in over a year and a half. He was over $6,000.00 behind in his child support payments and the Court “ruled him in.” Basically, when a non-custodial parent is ordered to pay child support through the family court the clerk of court monitors the cases and requires any person not paying on time to come to court and tell the judge their reason for not paying as ordered. Mr. Turner’s excuses were that his failure to pay was due to incarceration, drug addiction, unemployment, and injury. At a hearing like this the defendant could be sentenced to one year in jail for civil contempt of court. In Price v. Turner, the defendant was sentenced to one year in jail, but he could get out of jail sooner if he paid the total child support arrears that he owed. Mr. Turner appealed this ruling because he did not have an attorney present at the hearing and he asserted that he has a constitutional right under the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution.

The SC Supreme Court held that there is no right to legal counsel for a civil contempt case. The difference between civil contempt and criminal contempt is that the person sentenced to incarceration for civil contempt can purge their prison sentence by doing the activity that they previously refused to – in this case, pay child support. In the case of criminal contempt, you cannot purge your jail sentence – you must serve the sentenced time in jail.

If you find yourself in the position that you are behind on child support and you are going to a Rule to Show Cause (contempt) hearing in the Family Court, you will not be offered to have a court appointed attorney represent you so you should either be prepared to represent yourself or retain a lawyer to defend you prior to your hearing.

Is Your Facebook Page Going to Be Used Against You in Your Divorce?

Tripp — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 15:01:30 +0000

A few weeks ago I attended a continuing legal education seminar and one of the topics of discussion was finding information about a party using the internet. Now this isn’t any deep private investigator stuff this is using public information like someone’s public Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn and Twitter profiles to learn about a person. The speaker was really more experienced in using these sites to gain information about parties to injury cases, but I have seen it used in divorce and child custody matters as well.

There are tons of stories out there of old high-school sweethearts rekindling their relationships on Facebook with current marriages left in the dust. But, how can Facebook or Twitter be used against you in a divorce or child custody case? I’ve even seen a newspaper article from the UK where a wife found out that her husband was divorcing her because he changed his marital status on Facebook.

If your spouse suspects that you are cheating on him/her they could go to your social media accounts and print out the conversations and photographs you have put up there for the world to see. Those conversations can be pretty damning – especially if they are pulled out of context. The photographs can also be pretty harmful. Last year, I worked on a child custody case and represented the father. The mother tried to use photos and comments on his Facebook and MySpace accounts showing him partying and drinking to prove that he was a bad father. I have used Facebook conversations and photos to help prove adultery in divorce cases.

One way to find information about your spouse is to use an online tool called Flowtown. Flowtown lets you enter an e-mail address and it shows you where that person is interacting with social media online.

Is there evidence that can be used against you on your Facebook page?

If you use Facebook or other social media sites and you are facing divorce, a child custody suit or other legal matter, here are some resources for you to check out form other legal blogs:

Facebook No-No’s for Divorcing Couples by Ben Stevens at www.SCfamilylaw.com
How to Find the Opposing Party on Facebook by Lee Rosen at Divorce Discourse
Using Social Networks to Gather Evidence by the Trial Technologist’s View
Social Networking Sites can Provide Key Evidence by Dan Berexa at Dan Berexa’s Tennessee Law Blog
Florida Couples try to Sway Divorce Proceedings with Evidence from Facebook by Keith Maynard at the Jacksonville Divorce Lawyer Blog.
Here’s a great video by Lee Rosen about this topic as well:

Can I Modify My Child Custody Order?

Tripp — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 12:18:56 +0000

Most court orders are permanent. If you were to be sued for some harm you caused to another person or their property or if you are involved in some property division in your divorce case, your court order would be permanent. That means, no matter what happens down the road, no matter what change of circumstances the order will not be changed.

Family court orders dealing with children are different. The aspects of a family court order in South Carolina that deal with children such as custody, child support and visitation can be altered and modified after the order has been entered. In order to modify your child custody, visitation or support order you must file a new action and request that the previous order be modified due to a substantial change in circumstances. So, if the circumstances surround custody, visitation or support have not changed since your decree was entered, then you cannot seek to have the order modified.

Working Parent’s Work Used Against them in Custody Trial

Tripp — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 22:40:07 +0000

Can your work be used against you in a custody case? I read an article at WorkingMom.com entitled Custody Lost where a working mother was in a deep custody battle with her husband who had been unemployed for several years. I have seen this from both sides: a dad tries to take custody away from the mother because of her job; and, I’ve also seen it the other way where moms try to use a dad’s job to say that he is withdrawn from the children’s life and should not be granted custody of them.

So does your work play in to the custody determination? Unfortunately, yes, it does. Your work is a part of who you are. You spend a considerable amount of time there each week and it removes some of your flexibility in life. A family court judge trying to determine a custody case in South Carolina must decide what is in the child’s best interest. That is really the overarching concern in the case. Your job is not going to be the be-all, end-all, but it is a factor that will be considered. In my experience, most judges are not going to be swayed in one direction just due to a job because a judge is going to expect the parents to work to be able to provide for their family. Where the rubber meets the road is whether the job materially impairs your parenting. Are you constantly late getting your children to school or picking them up from day care, are your children doing poorly in school because you are working so much that you do not have time to assist them with their studies, are they acting out because they are spending more time with a baby sitter than with you because you work until after they have gone to bed for the night? Keep these in mind if you are facing a custody battle and your spouse is going to try to use your work against you. While it sucks, you should definitely be realistic about the demands of your job and how you prioritize things.

Child Custody: Mom Automatically Wins, Right?

Tripp — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 13:11:22 +0000

It is a common misconception that the mother is automatically entitled to receive custody of the minor children, especially when the children are very young. The “tender years presumption” is an old factor that used to automatically grant the mother custody of young children because it was assumed that she was the best person to be the primary caretaker of the children.

This presumption is no longer valid. In fact, South Carolina law has abolished the tender years presumption (S. C. Code §63-15-10). Now, in order to determine who gets custody of the minor children in a custody battle in South Carolina a judge will consider what is in the “best interest of the children” along with several other factors.

The factors considered in custody cases are:

Resources of the parents
Who has been the primary caretaker
Immoral conduct of the parents
Child’s reasonable preference
Domestic Violence
Relgious faith
A Guardian ad Litem’s report

While there is no tender years presumption any more, that does not mean that the mother will not win custody. It just means that it is not an automatic decision. Mothers are winning custody of their children every day in South Carolina. Basically, in overruling this presumption, the courts are saying that this is not the best resolution in every case so all of the evidence should be considered and what is in the best interest of the children will prevail.

There are a couple of other factors that will not be considered:

No gender bias: that means that a daughter will not automatically be placed with their mother and a son will not automatically be placed with their father.
Race is not a factor in determining who the custodial parent shall be.

Changing Child Custody in South Carolina

Tripp — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 13:05:45 +0000

When you separate from your spouse or when you get a divorce there are lots of different reasons why couples agree to certain custody arrangements for their minor children. If you did not pursue custody in your divorce or you believe it is time for a change of custody of your minor children here are some things that you will need to be able to prove according to South Carolina child custody law.

In order to change or modify a child custody order in South Carolina you must show that the circumstances surrounding the original child custody order have substantially changed after the original child custody order and that those changes substantially affect the welfare and interests of the children in question (Moss v. Moss, 274 S.C. 120 (1980)).

Of course, in any case where there is a question regarding the children, the absolute most important consideration the court must make is determining what is in the “best interest of the children.”

Generally, there is no black or white answer when it comes to child custody and changes of child custody in South Carolina. The court will most likely look at the entire set of circumstances surrounding your children to determine what they feel is in the best interest of the children. Also, it is usually based on many factors, not just one – but that isn’t to say that the court could not use just one factor to make the decision to modify a previous child custody order.

Helping Children Cope with Divorce Seminar

Tripp — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:05:23 +0000

Compass of Carolina will be presenting a seminar on the topic of helping Children cope with divorce. The seminar is scheduled for October 10, 2009 and is a four hour program designed for parents who are going through or have completed their divorce and forcueses on helping parents develop a cooperative co-parenting relationship and teaches parents the skills useful in helping their children adjust to the divorce and the life changes that accompany divorce. The program begins at 9 am and concludes at 1 pm.

For more information, visit the Compass of Carolina website.

There is a cost to attend an they require you tor register in advance. The link above has all of the information about cost, scheduling, and registration.

No related posts.

When can a Child Determine Which Parent He Will Live With?

Tripp — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 13:02:33 +0000

Question: What age can a child determine which parent he will live with?

Answer: This is a question I receive quite often from parents going through a custody fight with their spouse or former spouse. There is a misconception that the South Carolina child custody law allows children who have reached a certain age to make decisions on where they should live. This is simply not true.

Children, no matter what their age, generally lack the knowledge and life experience to make a binding decision on their own. If the custody of a child is a contested matter, then the child will not get the final say on where he or she lives. This does not mean the child gets no say, but just not the final say.

In a contested South Carolina child custody matter, the Family Court will determine what is in the best interest of the child. The “best interest of the child” is the overarching consideration in any issue regarding children. The child communicates to the Court through the Guardian ad Litem appointed to represent the child and provide information to the Court about the details surrounding the children. The judge will use the Guardian’s report along with the other evidence from trial to determine what is in the child’s best interest and in whose custody they should be.