What is the name of your state? IL & TN
I am trying to get advice for a friend. She lives in Illinois. Her son's paternal grandmother lives in Tennessee and has filed a protective order of custody and a petition for custody in Tennessee. The history follows:
Her son is 9 years old. He was born and has lived in Illinois with is mother and brothers. She was not married to his father. His father was killed in Tennessee before the son was a year old. The father did not claim or see his son before his death. After his death, my friend encouraged the paternal grandmother to get to know her grandson. There was a paternity test done at the grandmother's request. Since that time my friend has been very generous with visitation. She feels it's important for her son to know his father's family, since he will never know his father. Before her son started school he would stay with his grandmother in Tennessee a few times a year for a month or so at a time. Since he started school the visits have been limited to summer vacation, and the week between Christmas and New Year's.
This year when it was time for her son to come home at the end of the summer, the grandmother asked that he be allowed to stay longer due to the fact that the great-grandmother was dying and she wanted him to have a chance to get to know her better. The son also said he wanted to stay awhile longer for the same reason. My friend allowed this.
A couple months later when she was going to pick him up the grandmother convinced her to allow him to stay until Christmas break, that way he would be between terms at school when he switched.
The problems didn't start until she was making plans to pick him up before Christmas. She spoke to them early in the week and made plans to meet the following weekend. A few nights later they spoke again to finalize plans, and the grandmother told her she wasn't going to give her son back. She had filed an order of protection, and my friend would be getting papers.
Early the following week when she hadn't received any papers she called the courthouse in Tennessee and they told her they couldn't find anything filed recently regarding her. They advised her to file kidnapping charges in IL, and then the authorities in TN would help her retrieve her son. That is how she found out that it was a protective order of custody and a petition to grant custody that was filed. As far as I know she still has not received the official paper work. All she has are copies of two pages that were faxed to the deputy in IL from an official in TN. The protective order was filed on the same day they made their initial plans to meet, and the petition on the following day. The papers say that the child has been with the grandmother that length of time because the mother was unable to care for him. (She has other children that live with her and she cares for). And the mother has taken the child with her to the bar against his wishes. (She has gone out with her husband and left the kids with a sitter against his wishes, but she hasn't taken him to a bar.)
My friend has been quite upset about all of this. She trusted this woman and now thinks she probably had this planned all along. Apparently the grandmother has done something like this before involving a niece's child and she ended up winning custody because the mother could not afford to fight her. So the grandmother knew about the six month residency law, my friend did not. She never thought to worry about it as they had been in touch the entire time with the understanding her son would be coming home.
My friend did go to a heroin detox/rehab center this past summer and the grandmother knows about it and has known about it. It was voluntary (she saw a problem and fixed it before it got too far hand). She has never been arrested for heroin. She has been recently arrested for driving on a suspended license. She owns her home and has lived there for several years. She is married and has two other children that live with her and a step-daughter that visits on weekends.
Is it possible that this grandmother will win custody? I'm pretty sure she thought my friend would not be able to afford a lawyer to fight her (had she not gone to the local police she still wouldn't know the hearing date). My friend is trying to find an attorney, but it is difficult since we are working from a different state and it is the holidays. The hearing is the first week of January and the lawyers she has contacted so far have either not been in or have asked a varying number of questions then told her they will call back and have not. We have found them all on the internet.
Any thoughts or advice is greatly appreciated.
I am trying to get advice for a friend. She lives in Illinois. Her son's paternal grandmother lives in Tennessee and has filed a protective order of custody and a petition for custody in Tennessee. The history follows:
Her son is 9 years old. He was born and has lived in Illinois with is mother and brothers. She was not married to his father. His father was killed in Tennessee before the son was a year old. The father did not claim or see his son before his death. After his death, my friend encouraged the paternal grandmother to get to know her grandson. There was a paternity test done at the grandmother's request. Since that time my friend has been very generous with visitation. She feels it's important for her son to know his father's family, since he will never know his father. Before her son started school he would stay with his grandmother in Tennessee a few times a year for a month or so at a time. Since he started school the visits have been limited to summer vacation, and the week between Christmas and New Year's.
This year when it was time for her son to come home at the end of the summer, the grandmother asked that he be allowed to stay longer due to the fact that the great-grandmother was dying and she wanted him to have a chance to get to know her better. The son also said he wanted to stay awhile longer for the same reason. My friend allowed this.
A couple months later when she was going to pick him up the grandmother convinced her to allow him to stay until Christmas break, that way he would be between terms at school when he switched.
The problems didn't start until she was making plans to pick him up before Christmas. She spoke to them early in the week and made plans to meet the following weekend. A few nights later they spoke again to finalize plans, and the grandmother told her she wasn't going to give her son back. She had filed an order of protection, and my friend would be getting papers.
Early the following week when she hadn't received any papers she called the courthouse in Tennessee and they told her they couldn't find anything filed recently regarding her. They advised her to file kidnapping charges in IL, and then the authorities in TN would help her retrieve her son. That is how she found out that it was a protective order of custody and a petition to grant custody that was filed. As far as I know she still has not received the official paper work. All she has are copies of two pages that were faxed to the deputy in IL from an official in TN. The protective order was filed on the same day they made their initial plans to meet, and the petition on the following day. The papers say that the child has been with the grandmother that length of time because the mother was unable to care for him. (She has other children that live with her and she cares for). And the mother has taken the child with her to the bar against his wishes. (She has gone out with her husband and left the kids with a sitter against his wishes, but she hasn't taken him to a bar.)
My friend has been quite upset about all of this. She trusted this woman and now thinks she probably had this planned all along. Apparently the grandmother has done something like this before involving a niece's child and she ended up winning custody because the mother could not afford to fight her. So the grandmother knew about the six month residency law, my friend did not. She never thought to worry about it as they had been in touch the entire time with the understanding her son would be coming home.
My friend did go to a heroin detox/rehab center this past summer and the grandmother knows about it and has known about it. It was voluntary (she saw a problem and fixed it before it got too far hand). She has never been arrested for heroin. She has been recently arrested for driving on a suspended license. She owns her home and has lived there for several years. She is married and has two other children that live with her and a step-daughter that visits on weekends.
Is it possible that this grandmother will win custody? I'm pretty sure she thought my friend would not be able to afford a lawyer to fight her (had she not gone to the local police she still wouldn't know the hearing date). My friend is trying to find an attorney, but it is difficult since we are working from a different state and it is the holidays. The hearing is the first week of January and the lawyers she has contacted so far have either not been in or have asked a varying number of questions then told her they will call back and have not. We have found them all on the internet.
Any thoughts or advice is greatly appreciated.
