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Son's father filed for injunction after refusing to return child to mother

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tiffanywong

Junior Member
What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Georgia/Florida

I am actually inquiring on behalf of my best friend. This is somewhat complicated so I will try to make it as simple as possible!

They have a son together who is two years old. They lived in Florida together with the father's father and grandparents for 5 months, then she moved to Georgia with the baby in January of 2008. He is on the birth certificate but has not been through the legitimation process. They made a verbal agreement to equal timesharing, exchanging the baby every 6-8 weeks. They did this up until the end of 2008.

Christmas 2008- She goes to visit for Christmas and stays for one week. On the day she leaves, he apparently goes out and gets drunk, comes back and gets into an altercation with two family members and goes to jail. He was already out on probation for a felony, so he cannot be bonded out. She is on the bus back at this point and has no idea this is going on. When she gets home, no one will answer her calls and we finally find out that he is in jail. My husband takes her at the beginning of March to go pick up the baby.

June 2009- Father's family calls and asks if the baby can come to visit for a week for the summer. She agrees and they come pick him up. They end up not bringing him back for 2.5 weeks because they say they don't have the money to travel.

July 2009- Father's father calls and says that the courts have given permission for special visitation so that the father can see his baby for two hours on July 3rd. He promises to have him back by the 5th. The baby gets to Florida and she once again cannot get anyone to answer her phone calls. Two weeks later she finds out that the father had actually gotten out of jail and was refusing to return the baby to her. He said he hadn't seen him for six months and it was his time to have him now. He eventually said that he would have him home by the beginning of August for his birthday.

Mother is still trying to call everyday to talk to her son and cannot get a response. Finally she calls the father's father, who accidentally answers the phone so she overhears the conversation about how they are never bringing him back and they have all of the paperwork filed. She immediately calls the local police.

Police in Georgia fill out an incident report and direct her to the Special Victims Unit. The detective tells her that she needs to notify him first that he is breaking the law, because most fathers don't realize it is a felony. The detective speaks with the father's attorney, who says she is wrong. She sends him the paperwork, he speaks to the father and then admits that he is in the wrong. He states that the father will return the child immediately.

The mother calls to set up a time and date to get the baby back, and the father says he will not be bringing him home and that she can not come get him. This goes back and forth for several weeks, with the attorney saying she can come and the father saying that she can't. The police can't continue with a warrant because he isn't "technically" keeping the baby from her anymore. She makes arrangements to pick him up on 8/17.

She calls the father when she is 10 minutes away and he says that is fine. She gets to his home and no one is there, but ends up being approached and served with custody, paternity and child support papers, as well as a temporary injunction keeping her from getting her son. The father will not answer the phone after this and she ends up heading back to Georgia empty-handed.

The following day she calls the detective who immediately issues the warrant for his arrest for interstate interference with custody. He is detained on 8/20 and awaiting extradition to Georgia.

He initially filed for a protective order which was denied due to a lack of evidence. He then filed for the ex parte injunction because he said that she was threatening to take the baby and disappear. This paperwork was filed on 8/4, which was 10 days after he was contacted by the police and informed that he was breaking the law. His attorney was setting up a meeting for the parents to exchange the baby, while at the same time filing paperwork alleging that she was a threat.

They have a court date set for 9/2 for the injunction. She can petition for an emergency hearing within 5 days though. She has to ask off two weeks in advance for her job and does not have a car at this point. She has to ask friends to bring her back and forth to Florida.

Does the injunction still stand since he filed it under false pretenses and is currently in jail? Can she go get her son? He is with the father's family at this moment and they are very angry with her for calling the police. Should she be looking for a Georgia or a Florida attorney?

I have already found the forms she needs on the flcourts.org website to respond to the injunction and the custody paperwork. I am an intelligent person and have had no problem helping her fill them out and researching the law in the state of Florida. It seems like it would be a pretty simple custody case, however, my own ended up really complicated and dragged on for a year, so you just never know!

The father is a two time convicted felon with one felony and two misdemeanor battery charges. He has no driver's license, did not attend past 8th grade and has never in his life held a job. He lives with his father (also a convicted felon) and grandparents who support and care for his son.

She has always held a full time job, has her own place and has no criminal history. The only thing she does not have at the moment is a car because it was stolen. But she is working on saving up the money to buy another one.

We do have a legal aid office in our county but they are only available for calls six hours a week. She has been trying to call for several weeks but cannot get through because the lines are always busy.
 


Ohiogal

Queen Bee
The injunction stands until it is dismissed. Dad did not kidnap the child nor break the law because mom did not have a court order for custody and he is the father. Quite frankly I look for the charges against dad to be dismissed if he doesn't plead.
 

tiffanywong

Junior Member
He was not arrested for kidnapping, he was arrested for interstate interference with custody. Both Georgia and Florida law state that when dealing with a child born out of wedlock, the mother has full rights and custody until the father has paternity established and petitions for custody.
 

tiffanywong

Junior Member
Florida - The mother of a child born out of wedlock is the natural guardian of the child and is entitled to primary residential care and custody of the child unless a court of competent jurisdiction enters an order stating otherwise.

Georgia - Only the mother of a child born out of wedlock is entitled to custody of the child, unless the father legitimates the child as provided in Code Section 19-7-21.1 or 19-7-22. Otherwise, the mother may exercise all parental power over the child.
 

Ohiogal

Queen Bee
He was not arrested for kidnapping, he was arrested for interstate interference with custody. Both Georgia and Florida law state that when dealing with a child born out of wedlock, the mother has full rights and custody until the father has paternity established and petitions for custody.
And mom gave him permission to have the child. There was just a dispute regarding for how long. He still may find charges dismissed.
 

tiffanywong

Junior Member
Does it not matter that Mom did not give him permission for this visit, only his family to take the baby to visit him in jail? And that he filed false paperwork to keep her from getting her child back? Or that he is refusing to answer her calls to let her speak with her child? I would think all of that would qualify as "interfering" with custody.
 

LdiJ

Senior Member
Does it not matter that Mom did not give him permission for this visit, only his family to take the baby to visit him in jail? And that he filed false paperwork to keep her from getting her child back? Or that he is refusing to answer her calls to let her speak with her child? I would think all of that would qualify as "interfering" with custody.
In my opinion that is where dad messed up. Although you have been sharing custody you and the child are also legal residents of GA, and therefore FL does not have jurisdiction over the child...and of course the grandparents have absolutely no right to hold the child.

You need an attorney ASAP. You need an order of emergency custody from the courts in GA, and then need to hightail it to FL to get your child. You may also need an attorney in FL to help fight the jurisdictional issue.

To be honest, once the grandparents kept the child longer than agreed the first time, the second time never should have happened.
 

tiffanywong

Junior Member
Thanks for all of the input. I am just trying to figure out for the life of me how someone with no legal right to a child can keep him from his mother and have a court order to do so! The father did lie on the paperwork he filed with the courts, stating that the mother has never been around and has no job, no money and no place to live. He also stated that the baby has always lived with him in Florida. I just thought they would need to verify something before they just make an order barring her from having her own son!
 

LdiJ

Senior Member
Thanks for all of the input. I am just trying to figure out for the life of me how someone with no legal right to a child can keep him from his mother and have a court order to do so! The father did lie on the paperwork he filed with the courts, stating that the mother has never been around and has no job, no money and no place to live. He also stated that the baby has always lived with him in Florida. I just thought they would need to verify something before they just make an order barring her from having her own son!
Unfortunately it happens...now you need to act quickly to get it reversed.
 

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