Articles Posted in Custody and Visitation

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Texting is the most widely-used and frequently used app on a smartphone, with 97% of Americans using it at least once a day.  Not impressed…Over 6 billion text messages are sent in the U.S. each day, making it the most common cell phone activity for more than 80% of adults.

Everyone sends text messages.  They are quick, fast, and effective, especially when a full phone call is not necessary. For all of the benefits of texting, there are serious downsides.  Texting is more impersonal than a real phone call.  It is much easier to deliver bad news or to say something in anger via a text than it is in person or on the phone.  Also, you tend to respond quickly and without thinking.  This can have serious consequences.  Continue reading

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With summer right around the corner questions about summer vacations should begin coming soon.  Inevitably one of the questions will be about the children traveling abroad.  Whether you are the parent who wants to take the children abroad or you are a parent concerned about the children traveling abroad, this blog should help to explain what issues you will face, what concerns are valid and how to go about getting an order allowing or preventing travel abroad with the children.

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In a previous post, we gave an overview of what parents can expect from the contested child custody process in California, from the filing of the Petition until the time the Court makes its first orders. In this post, we will go beyond the Court’s first orders and discuss the process from that point until a child custody trial that results in a judgment.

Again, remember that parents can agree to custody and visitation arrangements without getting the Court involved, except to approve the agreement.  This post is mostly about cases where the parents can’t agree.

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If you are a parent who is anxious about the child custody process in California, you are in good company. These feelings are perfectly normal. After all, the decisions on custody and visitation are so crucial and most parents know so little about the process. I thought I would explain the process in a general sense so parents have a better idea of what to expect. This post will explain the process from the filing of the Petition until the time the Court makes its first orders. The process from that point forward until trial will be explained in a subsequent post.

Keep in mind that parents can agree to a custody and visitation arrangement and the Court will almost always rubberstamp it.  This post is mostly about cases where the parents can’t agree.

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There are some orders that we feel are underutilized by Judges in Custody cases. One of the reasons we list them here is because the judges in this county tend to not have egos: if you ask them to adjust an order they just made and they like the suggestion, they won’t have any qualms about doing so. So if a judge in your case doesn’t make an order listed here, feel free to tell them why they should!

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California has one of the most complicated child support laws of any state. Sometimes, the complications don’t end once you have an order: a parent sometimes has to deal with the other parent not paying the Court ordered child support. Here are 5 helpful tips Continue reading

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Coldplay singer Chris Martin opened up in an interview published in The Sunday Times on March 20th about his 2014 spilt with Gwyneth Paltrow. He described his divorce from Paltrow as a “weird one,” their split having been referred to as a “conscious uncoupling” rather than a “divorce,” where they remain close and continue to take vacations together with their two children. But even as smooth as their split has seemed, Martin admits that it led to a year-long depression, and he continues to struggle daily.

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At a recent continuing education seminar for San Diego family law attorneys, a family court judge was asked what, if anything, the court tries to do to minimize the harmful impacts of divorce on children. The judge responded that she often refers families in her courtroom to a program called Kids’ Turn San Diego, and that she has found the program to be very beneficial for children whose parents are going through a divorce. I began to do some research on the program out of my own curiosity, and I’ve decided to share a bit about the program in case any of our readers with children are also interested in knowing more about what they can do to help their child cope with divorce or separation.

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Let’s be honest shall we? I am a custody attorney, and there is only one kind of custody case that I take to trial; the high conflict custody case. (Okay…To be fair I take other custody cases to trial that are not “high conflict”, but those are generally move away cases that almost always require a trial.)

But just as a robbery detective does not do his job because he loves theft, as a custody lawyer I do not do my job because I love high conflict cases. Quite the opposite is true. My favorite case is the “low conflict” custody case. The problem is those cases do not get talked about.

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Last week, we wrote a post with some tips about child custody and international travel. This week, we will look a little more closely at the provisions in the Family Code that help the Court prevent international child abductions. Although the relevant provisions apply to domestic as well as international child abductions, we will be focusing on the international aspects in this post. While domestic child abduction is still a concern worth writing about, it is much more difficult to undo the harmful effects of an international abduction.

Before a Court can make orders intended to prevent the risk of abduction, the Court first must find that there is such a risk.

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