So, you and your ex have split up and you are going through custody and visitation issues. At some point, you may decide you do not want your ex’s new Boyfriend or Girlfriend around your children. This is often a difficult court order to get unless you are able to show evidence that the new Boyfriend / Girlfriend is harming your children in some way.
For example, we once had a case in which we represented dad. Mom and Dad were in a custody battle of an 11-year-old daughter. Mom had a new husband, and the new husband was acting “very weird” towards the daughter. There was no blatant sexuality, but inappropriate touching and extreme discomfort for the young girl. Mom still remained married to the new husband and would not admit to the problems that were obvious to everyone else involved. She stuck with the husband. After a drawn out battle, we were able to get our client (dad), sole physical custody.
We were able to prove this through many different avenues and by the use of several different forms of evidence, including text messages and photographs. We were also able to get the child’s own testimony into court, which is sometimes extremely difficult to do. We were able to do this because the judge agree with us that the child needed her own counsel and her atty came into court and presented the child’s opinion of what was going ion to the court. Each parent may have their own attorney and under certain circumstances, a judge will often appoint an atty to represent a child. In fact, if there are multiple children, each child can have their own attorney. This can be necessary when the children have a different opinion of what they want or what is going on in the home. Although that can become expensive, it may be the best thing to get past a serious custodial issue.
In short, you can believe that your ex’s new significant other is not a good person, and even believe that they may be harming your child, but if you don’t have any evidence of it, then you’re not likely to be able to exclude them from your child’s life.
If you suspect that your ex’s new Boyfriend / Girlfriend / Spouse is a danger to your children, start immediately gathering any evidence you can to prove this in court.
And the child’s opinion may matter as well. If they say, “I don’t want to spend time around this guy”, or “I don’t want to spend more time at mom’s home,” you need to figure out why. Don’t interrogate your child, but talk to them subtly about what d=goes on over at the other parents home to determine if they just don’t like the person, or if there really is some for of danger.
If you suspect your child may be in danger at the other parent’s home and you need advice about it, or you want to hire an atty to help you remove the children from that situation, feel free to call us about it. We have decades of experience fighting exactly these types of issues.
