My fiance's custody sitch - NEED feedback

[ChateauDreamer]

My fiance's custody sitch - please help

What is the name of your state? MO

Okay, (deep breath...)

When my fiance' (J.) and his ex-wife (A.) were divorced, the papers
stated a temporary visitation plan for their son. It stated that J. would
have their son on weekends but limited to J.'s mom's house, I guess for
son's benefit of familiararity of grammie's house?

But the temp visitation paper said that "in any event the parties
will begin following the parenting plan attached as exhibit A by June..."

Exhibit A does not say one way or the other about where temp.
custody is to take place at. It does state about the revolving holidays,
who claims him for taxes on what years,ect. So, he's allowed custody
every other weekend + alternating holidays. Does this mean he is free to
have custody away from the grandma's house, right? He lives with me
and my mom currently because other bills, in addition to his child support,
has left him with just about nothing left of his paycheck.

?) Is he free to bring his son here to our house? I assumed that someone
would want to come evaluate our home or something to make sure we
are providing a good environment - but no one did.

?) He has not been excercising custody right's because of a combination
of situations. One of them is that he works all the time (6 days a
week 10+ hours a day) to afford the hour commute to work & back, the child
support, car insurance, food to eat for himself, ect. If he takes off work
two weekends a month, he'll go from breaking even to getting way
behind on bills that he has just now started to dig himself out of.
The other reason he hasn't been able to exercise custody is that
when they've planned a visit at her home - 9 times out of 10 she'll
make an excuse at the last minute as to why it isn't a good day for her.
Not what do we do about this to enforce that she cooperate?

Because of her neglect (filthy house) she is probably going to lose her
parental rights. If child can come live here with me and fiance', I am a
stay-at-home mother with a 5 year old of my own. The huge chunk of
child support would no longer come out of his checks, making it possible
for him to work normal work hours, have time to spend with his family and
work towards us getting married and moving out of my mother's house.

?) When DFS looks at his past history of not seeing his child often, will they
dismiss him as unfit also, or will they evaluate how drastically his situation
to be there for his son WILL get better if he should be awarded sole
custody?

It reminds me of the cart-before-the-horse problem. His ability to be
a great father is limited (infuriatingly) to his financial situation.

I see two things happening when the child is taken from his mother for
her parental neglect. 1.) J. is awarded full custody (good) or 2.) They
decide he's not been a good father and is unfit?!?! (should we worry????)


Sorry so long, but it should cut down in back-&-forth posts about details.

 

[ChateauDreamer]

Reposting

I need help please with what I wrote in my original post. I need to know
what my fiance' should do.

 

[jelly]

First, does he have joint custody, or does the mother have full custody? Is the divorce final? Is he allowed overnight visits or just a few hours here and there..?
As far as whether he would be in violation of the order by taking his son to your house rather than granny's, I would assume from how you describe it, the granny's house restriction was temporary, to be superceded by parenting plan "A", which does not restrict to a place in particular, which, to me it means that the parenting plan is to be executed wherever he lives, and its none of anyones business where that is, unless of course, he returns the kid back to his mom with bruises, etc.. you know what i mean. its assumed that as the parent with visitation rights he'd be able to use his judgements as to wehre to bring his kid and how to keep him.. they dont have to come evaluate your house first for visitation.

To that effect, if he does have legal joint custody and the divorce is final, he can always bring the kid to your house for visitation, you can babysit while he is at work and he can spend as much time as possible when he gets home. that should not be an issue.. but he should try to keep as many of the visitation committments as possible. it always looks bad if you miss. he needs to try harder on this. its more ok for him to pick up his kid and leave him with you while he goes to work so he can at least see him part of the day, than it is to miss visitation altogether because its not convenient.

If he is having a hard time meeting his visitation commitment because the mom is a pain, he can take her to court over that right now, and modify the order to specify date and time. i always tell people to specify which day of the week, time (from this time to this time), who is responsible for pickinmg or dropping off.. that way if she bails out or is a no show, you can take her to court or call the police on her for violating the order. being flexible is one thing, but her sabotaging his visitation is nother.. and by all means, keep record of what happens every time.
filing for full custody is a big undertaking for the very comitted. it takes a lot of $$ and discipline. (see my reply to posting "Help! My mom is trying to ...")
You being at home to support him in caring for his child could be an asset to his case, but not so much unless you have started developing a relationship with his child, in which case he cant be missing visitations left and right.
you could be in good shape to win, but you'd need REAL evidence that something is wrong with the mother. they are not gonna take her kid from her over a dirty house and low income. it has to be way worse, and you have to have proof. i suggest doing a search of public records for DUIs, evictions, etc.. and hire a private i if you can afford one. these days, most courts favor joint custody anyway, it has to be bad for that to be changed, but your boyfriend can always request for having his son more days than the mother, like 4 days out of the week, which could reduce support greatly.

 

[djohnson]

Keep in mind, you are only one side of the story. Why is mother going to lose custody? What could he provide for the child if you and him break up or have a fight? He is living at someone else's mercy and can't support himself at this point. How does he propose to raise a child. Sure he would have the child support money, but do you really think it's enough to live on solely? You may think it's a catch 22, but I see it as paying for bad decisions. It's not a free world, you play you have to pay.

 

[ChateauDreamer]

I'm pretty sure it's joint but he's considered the non-custodial parent. And
she doesn't have a dirty house, her house is not healthy to be living in at
all - it would fit in the catagory of squalor. Her landord reported it to DFS,
who surprise inspected the home and they took him away that night to
give her a chance to clean her house. She isn't poor - she just can't clean.

Her family had to help her clean (my fiance' helped too) but now it's a
second time it's gotten really bad again. The boy has intestinal worms and
is always sick. I'm pretty sure that's neglect and was told she would lose her
parental rights because of it.

So now that you know more about the situation, is it still going to be a
huge legal battle?

P.S. Thank you much for the advice about the current visitation situation.

 

[djohnson]

It can be, when they took the child away who took him? her mother? With your boyfriends current living situation and not seeing utilizing visitation, it won't be hard to make him look bad also.

 

[haiku]

What is the name of your state? MO

Okay, (deep breath...)

When my fiance' (J.) and his ex-wife (A.) were divorced, the papers
stated a temporary visitation plan for their son. It stated that J. would
have their son on weekends but limited to J.'s mom's house, I guess for
son's benefit of familiararity of grammie's house?

But the temp visitation paper said that "in any event the parties
will begin following the parenting plan attached as exhibit A by June..."

Exhibit A does not say one way or the other about where temp.
custody is to take place at. It does state about the revolving holidays,
who claims him for taxes on what years,ect. So, he's allowed custody
every other weekend + alternating holidays. Does this mean he is free to
have custody away from the grandma's house, right? He lives with me
and my mom currently because other bills, in addition to his child support,
has left him with just about nothing left of his paycheck.

***If the parenting plan does NOT address the weekly visitation, the stipulation that visitation be at grandma's house may still stand. Normally for a court order to change, it must be addressed specifically in the new order.***

?) Is he free to bring his son here to our house? I assumed that someone
would want to come evaluate our home or something to make sure we
are providing a good environment - but no one did.

***In most cases No, no one would come and "inspect" his living arrangement, and again, your boyfriend needs clarification of his orders before he can stop going to grandma's for his visits.****

?) He has not been excercising custody right's because of a combination
of situations. One of them is that he works all the time (6 days a
week 10+ hours a day) to afford the hour commute to work & back, the child
support, car insurance, food to eat for himself, ect. If he takes off work
two weekends a month, he'll go from breaking even to getting way
behind on bills that he has just now started to dig himself out of.

***Visitation is a right, not an obligation. He does not have to exercise his visitation, but common sense, and manners would say, he at least should be informing the mom of his plans.***

The other reason he hasn't been able to exercise custody is that
when they've planned a visit at her home - 9 times out of 10 she'll
make an excuse at the last minute as to why it isn't a good day for her.
Not what do we do about this to enforce that she cooperate?

***If it is stated in his court orders that he gets the child that day, (he needs to read them) and mom does not comply she is in contempt, and he should be documenting these times , and if she does it enough he can take her back to court to enforce his order.****

Because of her neglect (filthy house) she is probably going to lose her
parental rights. If child can come live here with me and fiance', I am a
stay-at-home mother with a 5 year old of my own. The huge chunk of
child support would no longer come out of his checks, making it possible
for him to work normal work hours, have time to spend with his family and
work towards us getting married and moving out of my mother's house.

***Having a dirty house is not usually grounds to lose parental rights. so slow down. It will likely not happen.****

?) When DFS looks at his past history of not seeing his child often, will they
dismiss him as unfit also, or will they evaluate how drastically his situation
to be there for his son WILL get better if he should be awarded sole
custody?

***Umm no, they don't usually take away custody, and give it to an NCP, because it will make life easier for the NCP....***

It reminds me of the cart-before-the-horse problem. His ability to be
a great father is limited (infuriatingly) to his financial situation.

***It sounds to me, like he may need to consider schooling and/or training to get himself into a better position to support the family he already had before he met you. Being a divorced dad is never easy, but it can be done without being dependant upon others to bail you out or work so much you cannot see your family. I would caution you, especially as you already are a mother,with getting to deep into this, before he has straightened his own life out.***


I see two things happening when the child is taken from his mother for
her parental neglect. 1.) J. is awarded full custody (good) or 2.) They
decide he's not been a good father and is unfit?!?! (should we worry????)

***Again, I don't know who told you mom would lose her rights, but they were wrong. Possibility that dad might get physical custody but likely,mom won't lose her rights. Even if the kid does have worms (weird things happen to even the best moms-you cannot always catch your kid munching a handful of garden soil for example...) it likely will NOT effect her custody status. After all, if mom is such a lousy housekeeper why did dad leave his child with her in the first place? And another thing, Dad cannot support himself, never mind a child at this point, either. ****


Sorry so long, but it should cut down in back-&-forth posts about details.

Sounds to me that Mom and Dad need to get thier lives together. And Dad needs to concern himself with getting himself together financially, which does not include thinking he can get custody so easily from mom.