Couple lived in the Netherlands. Daughter born and raised there.

Father sometimes allegedly violent and Mother unhappy.

Mother’s mother becomes terminally ill.

Mother and daughter return to New Zealand, reportedly with Father’s permission.

Father maintains that it was agreed that Mother and Daughter were to remain in New Zealand only until Mother’s mother passed.

Mother maintains Father knew that the move was permanent.

After a few months, Father followed Mother and Daughter to New Zealand – but reportedly lived separately from them.

After about 6 months, Father was ordered to leave New Zealand as a result of a new domestic violence allegation (eventually dropped).

A trial court in New Zealand found that the Netherlands was Daughter’s habitual residence, and that she must be returned there for a custody determination.

On appeal, the decision was reversed under an exception, under the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, where the other parent and child left the former habitual residence to escape domestic violence.

Although the Court did not make such a ruling, arguably the child’s place of habitual residence changed after 6 months anyway.

Read more in this New Zealand Herald article: Court revokes order to send girl back to Netherlands.

When all is said and done, for some spouses, the absolute worst part of divorce is the prospect of property division, called equitable distribution in Florida.

And so it apparently was for a Long Island father and husband who had been married for 9 years but together with his wife for 20 years in total.

According to his wife, the man was abusive and controlling. In the end, his wife said, it was all about “greed and control” for him.

In an effort to avoid having to part with any of his assets, the man allegedly attempted to hire a paid hit man to murder his wife. He reportedly tried to schedule the “hit” for a time when their children would be out of the country with him.

Under arrest, the man now probably has different concerns, such as the possibility of 25 years behind bars.

And his wife says she lives with fear as her constant companion. And the stress of trying to protect their kids from the knowledge of what their father allegedly did.

Amazingly, the man’s sister tried to pick up one of their kids from school after the man’s arrest. She wasn’t successful.

The man’s lawyer now says the man later had a change of heart and tried to back out of the contract killing.

Before or after his arrest?

Read more in:

• this Newsday [Long Island] article: Wife in fear after husband charged with hiring hit man
• this New York Post article: I’M SCARED EVERY DAY BY ‘HIT PLOT’ HUBBY and
• New York City’s CBS TV News article: Attorney says accused tried to cancel planned LI `hit’

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A (male) Utah editorialist (who also happens to be an MD) strongly endorses joint physical custody of minor children – also known as equal timesharing.

Of course, there are a lot of perfectly good reasons why one might advocate for equal timesharing.

But why did this particular editorialist do it?

For the most part, because, he contends, it would counter the impact of having to pay unfair amounts of child support, which he maintains, in substance, oppresses noncustodial parents, usually fathers.

That’s the primary reason cited in support of equal timesharing.

Secondarily, he argues, the prospect of equal timesharing would eliminate what he perceives as the economic incentive that he believes motivates most divorces, which, he reports, are initiated by women.

Thirdly, he remarks, joint legal custody actually results in enhanced collection of child support. “Believe it or not”.

Near to last, and apparently least, joint physical custody better reflects (whatever that means) modern family life, especially among Utah residents who may be disproportionately Mormon.

Read more, if desired, in this Deseret [UT] News article: Joint physical custody has many advantages.

Until recently, legal challenges to paternity which were not promptly filed were denied, in the best interests of the child in question.

A concerted hue and cry from father’s rights groups has diverted focus from the best interests of the child to the catchphrase paternity fraud.

As a result of the diversion, this year the Florida legislature passed a statute permitting alleged fathers to prove scientifically that they are not the biological fathers of their alleged children. Accordingly, they will be able to avoid any future child support legal obligations and just “drop” their alleged child.

It is projected that the statute might let about 30% of alleged fathers off the child support “hook”.

The lynchpin of establishing or disestablishing paternity is DNA testing, which is generally inexpensive and reliable.

The new statute does impose certain restrictions on its availability to support a paternity challenge, however.

1. The alleged father cannot have acknowledged paternity, signed the baby’s birth certificate, adopted the child or otherwise voluntarily assumed responsibility for child support for the child after discovering that they are not biologically related.
2. The alleged father cannot have previously blocked the true biological father from assuming parental responsibility.
3. The alleged father cannot have ignored previous notices or orders to take a DNA test in connection with legal proceedings concerning the child.
4. The alleged father must be current on his legally established child support obligations (unless truly unable).
5. The challenge must result from new evidence coming to light.

Read more in this Miami Herald article: Florida men get a break on false paternity.

In Ohio, when a custodial parent seeks child support from a non-custodial parent, the government collects evidence of parentage.

Evidence such as DNA test results, photos of the parents and child, current residence addresses of the parents and child, etc.

And the government produces the evidence to both the custodial and non-custodial parents.

An Ohio prison inmate reportedly received such a packet about his child and the custodial parent.

The inmate was incarcerated for allegedly raping the custodial parent, who was described as a “young girl” at the time of the incident in 2003.

The girl and her family are traumatized that the inmate came into possession of her current photo and residence address. Frightened, she reportedly moved.

Her family questions the logic of sending photos and addresses when DNA tests pretty much tell the whole story.

Now the girl’s family is filing suit against the county to instigate changes in its potentially dangerous procedures.

Read more in this Fox 19 Cincinnatti article: Rapist Gets Picture of Victim from County.

Marital (pre and post) agreements can help assure that each spouse’s legal obligations and expectations are met – even if the new couple remains together until one of them dies.

Many people sour on marital agreements don’t really grasp that – or the legal and emotional obligations that may have arisen out of a prior marriage and/or existing children.

When embarking on a second (or later) marriage, communication and analysis before the wedding about each party’s financial situation is even more important than in a first relationship.

These may spawn individual and/or joint action plans for couples to work on before the wedding.

Read more in this Portsmouth [NH] Herald article: ‘I do’ — again: Money does matter when remarrying.

An American woman lived in France with her husband and son for an extended period of time.

When the woman divorced her husband in France, she was awarded custody of their son, but she was enjoined from taking him out of France for an extended period of time such as would interfere with his father’s visitation.

Later, the mother moved with the boy to California.

The father brought suit to enforce the French order in a California court.

At trial, the court held that, if the mother did not timely return the boy to France, custody of the boy would be transferred to the father.

The mother appealed, arguing that the trial court’s order, which conditionally modified custody, violated the original custody order of the French court. Since the French court had continuing exclusive jurisdiction under the UCCJEA, the California court did not have jurisdiction or authority to modify the French custody order by ordering that the boy be returned to his father’s custody in France.

On appeal, the court reversed, agreeing with the mother. The court then ordered that the boy be returned back to his mother’s custody in California.

There was no report as to whether the father had taken any enforcement action in France, which retained jurisdiction over the boy.

Read more in this Metropolitan-News Enterprise article: C.A.: Courts May Not Modify Foreign Child Custody Order.

A widowed Ireland woman remarried and moved to the US with her children.

Her aging parents visited them in the US and took her youngest boy out to lunch.

When she returned after lunch to pick her boy up, they were nowhere to be found.

In an unusual move, her elderly parents allegedly abducted her boy to Ireland. That was two years ago.

Now they are wanted in Illinois for aggravated kidnapping, a charge carrying a penalty of up to 30 years in prison.

The boy’s mother reportedly doesn’t want her parents extradited and jailed.

The grandparents, relying on an old Irish order awarding them custody, previously started an application in the US for return of the child to Ireland under the Hague Convention. But the application was denied.

Communications between the two branches of the boy’s family have resumed.

Nonetheless, extradition proceedings in Ireland are expected to continue in this puzzling case.

Read more in this Irish Examiner article: Grandparents face 30 years in US jail.

Biological father pays woman to bear his child as surrogate mother.

Bio dad is reportedly sentenced to prison on unrelated criminal charges.

Bio mother informally “places” baby with a married couple for much of his two years of life.

Bio mom changes her mind and seeks return of child to her custody.

A Utah trial court ruled that the child’s ongoing caregivers could retain custody of the baby and deny visitation to his bio mom.

The Utah Supreme Court reversed, concluding that the biological parents had superior rights to permanent custody of the boy.

The state’s high court held that the couple who had actually been raising the boy were “legal strangers” to him.

The court also held that access by the bio parents could only be blocked based on a finding of harm to the boy.

The supreme court remanded for a full-blown, custody determination, as though the custody dispute was merely between two typical biological parents.

Interestingly, however, the court expressed the hope that the bio parents would reach an agreement with the couple who had been caring for the baby, in a caring, stable home.

In light of the contractual arrangement between the boy’s biological parents and the arrangement (not entirely clear) between the bio mom and the couple who had been raising the boy, other states may well have arrived at a different outcome on the above facts.

Read more in this [Central UT] Daily Herald article: Utah Supreme Court rules couple must give up boy.

Unusual circumstances often demand unusual measures.

A father allegedly murdered the mother of his three children – and then killed himself, leaving their children orphaned.

Now, what happens to the kids?

Grandparents on both sides are ready, willing and able to take the children in. And initially agreed to shared physical custody, with the kids shifting from one home to the other every three days. (Florida calls this rotating custody.)

But the oldest boy found this disruptive and wanted to stay in the school where his paternal grandparents lived.

So, what’s a court to do in this tragic situation?

On a strictly temporary basis, the presiding court continued shared physical custody, but modified the schedule. Now the kids will be with the paternal grandparents during the week and with the maternal relatives in Vermont on the weekends.

This unorthodox and not-so-easy timesharing arrangement reportedly took family members by surprise.

The maternal relatives plan to seek permanent, primary custody of the children. Among other reasons, they reportedly felt they could better counter the domestic violence influences of the children’s father.

Read more in this [Glen Fallsl, NY] Post Star article: Families clash over custody – Dawn Roberts’ children set to live with parents of her apparent killer.