Need help for a 15 year old girl.

[Lasoldier]

What is the name of your state? Texas

Hello I am a soldier that is stationed at Ft Hood Texas. My wife has a family friend that is going through some problems. She is 15 and at age 1 her mother signed over her rights to her mother and father, the grandma passed on in Oct of 04 and the grandpa passed this week. We would like for the child to come live with us so that she can have some normalcy in her life instead of geeting bounced around from family memeber to family memeber. No one wants her and since Oct she has been bounced to Kansas back to Texas and back to Kansas and now back in Texas. Thats 4 school changes with in a 6 month period, thats not healthy for anyone. Her biological father is still alive and living in Washington and wants nothing to do with her at all. Just wondering what type of actions if any can we take for saving this girl from a life that has no future, except to follow in her families footsteps of drugs and jail.

Also on a side note I not sure if this will help or not but before her grandpa died her told my wife that when he died that he would like to have her come live with us instead of being put back into the family. Now there are witnesses besides myself that were present at the time but I am not sure of the legality of verbal commitments in a case such as this.



I thank you very much for taking the time to read this and any help that you could provid would be GREATLY appreciated.

Thank you

Pfc John Clancy

 

[djohnson]

Who is shuffeling her around? Is she in the 'system'? If she has no legal guardian then she should be or the father has say so at this point. You really need to get an attorney and file for custody. If there is no one that will fight you on it, then it should be pretty simple.

 

[Lasoldier]

Her family is are the ones doing the moving around. And she gets 100 bucks a month from a father that has never even seen her and what they do is whoever needs the money for that month gets her, it is really a messed up deal. And i would get an lawyer but contrary to belief the army doesnt pay that good special only being a PFC with 2 kids already. I kind of just need to know if i do this on my own do i have a leg to stand on. And the family is gonna fight just for that 100 bucks.

 

[djohnson]

Can you contact father? The easiest way would be to contact him and see if he would sign rights over to you. As long as he hasn't signed rights away and still lives, it doesn't matter what grandparents want. Maybe hint to him that if someone else gets her they may try to raise the support and you won't or something. Chances are he may help you. Other than that she has no legal reason to be at any of those other homes. Does she want to live with you? They can't make her leave your house without an order. Try talking to her also.

 

[Lasoldier]

She does she is a freshman this year and has been in 4 different schools in different states since Oct. I have been looking all night and i am about to go to the library to see if I can find out at what age in Texas can you choose to live where you want. The father thing is hard because she doesnt know any info and her mom wont tell her anything and if they find out what we are trying to do we feel they will just take her away. If I was back home in louisiana this would be so much easier but i have know idea what Texas laws are.
Thank you for your help though it is always god to get a fresh pair of eyes to step back and take a look form their point of view.

 

[djohnson]

No matter the state she can't live where she wants until she 18 or gets emancipated. She can't get emancipated from what you have said. She can tell a judge what she prefers and he take that into consideration. He is still going to do what is best for the child or everychild would be living at disneyland and no parents would have the child. The other people she is living with still has no legal claim to her and they can not just come get. The only person that can do that is a legal parent or guardian. If she doesn't know anything about him, how is she/them getting her checks? How if she has moved that much has the checks found them so well? Why can't you go to mother and get her to sign over rights? You will have to go through one or both of them either way you go.

 

[Lasoldier]

From what i understand about the money it goes into a bank account, I dont think that is a court order payment to my knowledge. Her mother signed over her rights to the deceased when the girl was 1. And if the dad no longer has rights and her grandparents are dead then where would that leave her?

 

[djohnson]

If the dad is the legal dad, then mother could have only signed away custody. She couldn't have been legally adopted without dad's ok too, with it, he wouldn't be paying money. So that means right now legal custody goes back to legal parents. So no one can legally take the girl without one or both of their approval's. No one can legally do anything.

 

[Lasoldier]

Ok thank you for pointing me in a direction. Thank you so much.

 

[BelizeBreeze]

You need to contact the father and, in the meantime, contact JAG or the base legal officer to file an emergency Petition for Guardianship with the court.

Until the father is found, I agree that the child needs a normal life. The problem is that moving from station to station isn't that different than what she has already faced and since you are legal strangers, you have as much of a chance as I do of adopting her.

 

[Lasoldier]

You need to contact the father and, in the meantime, contact JAG or the base legal officer to file an emergency Petition for Guardianship with the court.

Until the father is found, I agree that the child needs a normal life. The problem is that moving from station to station isn't that different than what she has already faced and since you are legal strangers, you have as much of a chance as I do of adopting her.

I only have a year left on my contract and then I am out so that is not an issue. I have contacted JAG and they said that they do not handle family cases like this since we are not family relantion to the girl.

 

[Lasoldier]

Just wanted to bump it back up in hopes of maybe some more info to help me out. Is this something i can do with out a lawyer, I have worked with a friend in his office before so I know alittle bit but not alot.

 

[djohnson]

It's possible to do without a lawyer, but not advised. Your first obvious step is to try and talk to both real parents. It could be as easy as that. If they are going to fight you on it, then doing it without an attorney would be dumb. What any of the other people think doesn't matter at this point. She has bio parents with legal custody.