Going to court

[Becki C.]

state: tn

hi. i've been here before and have always received good advice. if anyone can assist me, i would appreciate it.

my husband has custody of his children from a previous marriage since his divorce in 1995. the bio mom has been on supervised visits since 1995 as well. the bio mom's mother was the "supervisor" ofthe visitation, but that arrangment has gone south due to inappropriate comments made about me or my husband to the children. also, the bio mom continued to emotionally and mentally cause harm to the children with the "supervisor" even joining in at times. as the original divorce order says "the mother shall have supervised visitation only", my husband decided to tell his ex that she would have to visit the children at a local facility especially designed to supervise visitation.
this was also recommended by my step-children's therapist who thought it would be for the best after the children let her know about the types of things being said and done in their presence while visiting their mother. the children are 13 and 11 years old at this time.

the bio mom has willfully refused the visit the children since the first week of july 2004. my husband just got a judgment against her in jan. 2004 because she is in excess of $20,000.00 behind in child support. we also have copies of her arrest record (she violated a restraining order that a former boyfriend issued against her) and a police incident report detailing her harrassment of another ex boyfriend. further i have copies of judgments against her totalling over $16,000.00 where she has skipped on on paying for two cars and a medical bill that she has not satisfied. i also have an e-mail her maternal aunt sent me saying that the bio mom is inflicting mental abuse on the kids. i also have 6 audio taped messages she left me telling us if we didn't "leave her alone" about child support that she would call the local children's services and file abuse charges with them.

now, last week the bio mom actually went to juvenile court and filed a petition without an attorney alleging my husband and i were physically and mentally abusing the kids. she is seeking full custody. she even called children's services and reported abuse allegations. a representative of children's services went to my step-son's school and spoke to him. i had no idea this happened until the representative called me the next day. he said "someone" had filed abuse charges, but after speaking to my step-son, he "didn't see or hear anything that supported those claims" and he was "un-filing" the charges with children's services. he even said my step-son said he "didn't care" if he ever saw his bio mom again or not.

here are my questions:

all this happened just in the last week and we have an appt. with an attorney, but not until another week from now. with all the documentation of the bio mom's questionable character, should we be concerned? i feel we have more than enough evidence to show she's the one causing the children harm, not us. can you ever have enough evidence though?

thanks in advance.

 

[Ambr]

Quick question -

You mention that the visitations are supervised only. Does the order mention who they will be supervised by?

Just asking because if the order reads that her mom is to supervise the visits and dad is refusing them by his choice (because he wants them at the center), then he could be in trouble with the courts for denying visitation.

If.....they just mention supervised and does not specify by who then he could request the center instead of mom. It would be moms choice rather she was there or not. BUT....dad would need to have the kids there, ready and accessible. Rather mom showed or not.

Is the center easily accessible to Mom? Distance wise? Is there a fee to the center for its use? If yes, can mom pay it or is dad willing to pay it?

 

[Becki C.]

state: tn

there is no mention in the court order of who supervises the visitation.

the facility is about 20 minutes from the bio mom's house and 35 minutes from ours.

there is a fee of $35 each time the bio mom visits and my husband has agreed to pay for it.

the facility is designed so that we do not take the children there unless the bio mom goes for an "intake process", which she has refused to do. until that happens, the facility won't allow us to just show up with the kids because appointments have to be scheduled for the visitation.

 

[Becki C.]

state: tn

so are my husband and I in a fairly decent legal position?

 

[Ambr]

Not a lawyer.....I just try to ask questions and offer an outsiders comments / advice.

You might try having your husband write her a letter, stating that he has checked into XX facility and believes that XX facility would be a good choice to provide the supervised visitations (as required by CO) and that he has made contact with XX facility and made payment arrangements for their services. As a requirement for their services MOM needs to meet with XX facility before visitations can begin there. Give her the contact information and request that she contact them to make an appointment.

Be sure to make it clear that it would be at NO COST to her. Takes away any chance of being able to say she can't afford it. Also let her know that if this arrangement is not agreeable that you are open to her suggestions for a substitute service, but due to XXXX reasons (detail them out) dad feels that visitations under her mothers supervision are no longer appropriate.

Now.....she can take this back to court and fight it. Since you have allowed her mom to do it in the past. So be sure that the reasons behind changing it now are legit.

 

[Becki C.]

we already sent her a letter in july 2004 and gave her all the contact information, the adress of the facility and our reasons behind choosing that facility....not the least of which was the recommendation of the children's therapist and our own concerns. we detailed our plan to pay for any costs associated with the facility. the bio mom left 6 messages on my voicemail saying that basically she "wouldn't be seeing the kids" if it had to be at our chosen facility. she even told me she called the facility itself and toldthem they wouldn't be seeing her anytime soon. she calls them once every 5 to 6 days and talk to each children for about 2 to 4 minutes depending on the call. that's all the contact she has with them. she's welcome to send e-mails or regular mail, but has declined to do so. we also detailed in the letter why her mother is no longer a fit choice to supervise the visitations since it was a verbal arrangment to begin with and nothng in writing. we explained that since her mother was making inappropriate comments such as she would like to chop off my arms and legs and bury me in a shoebox and making negative coments about the kids being in therapy, among other things. her mother has even spoken to the kids and told them she is "not going to be confined to a room and watch by other people to see you two".

in your opinion, do we have enough documentation to support our decision of moving the visitation or not? i mean, i think with the documents we have (as described in my oringinal post), we can certainly show the bio mom is lacking in good judgment, she is financially irresponsible and lacking in her concern for the best interest of the kids. i believe we can show she can't support their emotional or financial needs. would you disagree? if so, why?

 

[Becki C.]

bump for reply

 

[LdiJ]

we already sent her a letter in july 2004 and gave her all the contact information, the adress of the facility and our reasons behind choosing that facility....not the least of which was the recommendation of the children's therapist and our own concerns. we detailed our plan to pay for any costs associated with the facility. the bio mom left 6 messages on my voicemail saying that basically she "wouldn't be seeing the kids" if it had to be at our chosen facility. she even told me she called the facility itself and toldthem they wouldn't be seeing her anytime soon. she calls them once every 5 to 6 days and talk to each children for about 2 to 4 minutes depending on the call. that's all the contact she has with them. she's welcome to send e-mails or regular mail, but has declined to do so. we also detailed in the letter why her mother is no longer a fit choice to supervise the visitations since it was a verbal arrangment to begin with and nothng in writing. we explained that since her mother was making inappropriate comments such as she would like to chop off my arms and legs and bury me in a shoebox and making negative coments about the kids being in therapy, among other things. her mother has even spoken to the kids and told them she is "not going to be confined to a room and watch by other people to see you two".

in your opinion, do we have enough documentation to support our decision of moving the visitation or not? i mean, i think with the documents we have (as described in my oringinal post), we can certainly show the bio mom is lacking in good judgment, she is financially irresponsible and lacking in her concern for the best interest of the kids. i believe we can show she can't support their emotional or financial needs. would you disagree? if so, why?

Ok...in the first place the fact that you have audio tapes of the mom threatening to make false abuse charges if you didn't leave her alone about child support...and she has actually DONE that...is going to seriously hurt her in court.

Its possible that you could get some flack for arbitrarily changing the visitation arrangements, however you haven't violated your court order so you can't be found in contempt.

The children are old enough that their wishes will be given some weight. Realistically I think it would be next to impossible for mom to win in a situation where the children (of those ages) want to stay in their established custodial arrangement.....and there are no valid fitness issues.