My question involves a child custody case from the State of: Florida
This is a big mess and I'm so sorry. We have an attorney that has been with us through the entire thing. Unfortunately, our attorney is away on a sabbatical, he will be gone for more than 2 weeks and we just got served with a motion this morning.
My wife and I take primary residential custody of our 13 year old daughter. We might be primary residential, but the custody is joint right now. The biological father wants to increase his visitation to 50/50, and he wants to pay less child support. The problem is the following: My wife and I have raised her almost all of her life. She's my stepdaughter but I've had her since she was 5. He's been on and off all of these past years. Fastforward all these years, and bio father has not paid any child support, has been emotionally abusive to my kid, has interfered with medical diagnoses simply because he doesn't agree, has harassed, gossiped and dragged our name through the mud to anyone who will listen. In his petition, he claims that our daughter has told him she wants a lot more visitation. When we ask our daughter about that, she becomes distressed and swears that she never said that.
Bio father has been found "wholly not credible" by two different family judges. He has been caught lying several times by almost every judge that tries our case. He's lied about child support, about how often he visits her, about what the Department of Revenue has done to him; it's all a big joke to him. He currently has a writ of arrest on him for contempt of court, and he also tried to pass off a fraudulent check as "proof" that he paid the purge amount.
Our daughter might be 13, but we feel she is a little immature for her age. When she tells us about all the things that happen over there, I have no doubt in my mind that she is being emotionally abused and will suffer for the rest of her life for it. She has told us several times that she "hates it there", but when asked about why, she doesn't articulate very well. She says "they don't respect me over there", "I can't use the computer for homework" and "they treat me like the red headed stepchild, using me like the maid".
I know that her statements don't really divulge a lot of info that a judge might need, but I know that it's in her best interest to go over to her father's house less. Her schoolwork is suffering drastically, and I think all children need structure. Our child was diagnosed with ADHD, so she needs more structure than most children, and the bio father's current visitation is two weekdays a week and one half day on the weekend. This arrangement was done because he doesn't work a traditional schedule, but it's killing our kid's school work and social life. She can't really have friends because her bio dad will come and pick her up whenever he feels like it.
Speaking about the ADHD. She was diagnosed by a very reputable psychologist, and bio dad got so insulted, he went to a new doctor and "proved" she "didn't have anything wrong with her". Even the psychologist himself asked us to not allow bio dad to bring our daughter with him, because bio dad sits in on the sessions and does nothing but bash us nonstop, hampering the session and preventing our daughter from getting therapy.
We definitely want to subpeona the psychologist so that he can say this in front of a judge. There are a thousand different instances I could bring up about bio dad of less than normal behavior, but I don't want to waste any more of your time.
Sorry for being so longwinded, our question is basically this:
What can be/should be mentioned at this upcoming modification hearing? Can we mention how we suspect emotional abuse? Is it better to have our 13 year old testify (probably privately in judge's chambers) even though she really isn't very specific about why she feels so mistreatd over there? Can his contempt and subsequent fraud be mentioned as proof of his irresponsibility?
Ideally, we would like limited visits (our daughter wants no visits at all). If at all possible, we believe the visits need to be supervised and that bio dad needs to be psychologically evaluated.
This is a big mess and I'm so sorry. We have an attorney that has been with us through the entire thing. Unfortunately, our attorney is away on a sabbatical, he will be gone for more than 2 weeks and we just got served with a motion this morning.
My wife and I take primary residential custody of our 13 year old daughter. We might be primary residential, but the custody is joint right now. The biological father wants to increase his visitation to 50/50, and he wants to pay less child support. The problem is the following: My wife and I have raised her almost all of her life. She's my stepdaughter but I've had her since she was 5. He's been on and off all of these past years. Fastforward all these years, and bio father has not paid any child support, has been emotionally abusive to my kid, has interfered with medical diagnoses simply because he doesn't agree, has harassed, gossiped and dragged our name through the mud to anyone who will listen. In his petition, he claims that our daughter has told him she wants a lot more visitation. When we ask our daughter about that, she becomes distressed and swears that she never said that.
Bio father has been found "wholly not credible" by two different family judges. He has been caught lying several times by almost every judge that tries our case. He's lied about child support, about how often he visits her, about what the Department of Revenue has done to him; it's all a big joke to him. He currently has a writ of arrest on him for contempt of court, and he also tried to pass off a fraudulent check as "proof" that he paid the purge amount.
Our daughter might be 13, but we feel she is a little immature for her age. When she tells us about all the things that happen over there, I have no doubt in my mind that she is being emotionally abused and will suffer for the rest of her life for it. She has told us several times that she "hates it there", but when asked about why, she doesn't articulate very well. She says "they don't respect me over there", "I can't use the computer for homework" and "they treat me like the red headed stepchild, using me like the maid".
I know that her statements don't really divulge a lot of info that a judge might need, but I know that it's in her best interest to go over to her father's house less. Her schoolwork is suffering drastically, and I think all children need structure. Our child was diagnosed with ADHD, so she needs more structure than most children, and the bio father's current visitation is two weekdays a week and one half day on the weekend. This arrangement was done because he doesn't work a traditional schedule, but it's killing our kid's school work and social life. She can't really have friends because her bio dad will come and pick her up whenever he feels like it.
Speaking about the ADHD. She was diagnosed by a very reputable psychologist, and bio dad got so insulted, he went to a new doctor and "proved" she "didn't have anything wrong with her". Even the psychologist himself asked us to not allow bio dad to bring our daughter with him, because bio dad sits in on the sessions and does nothing but bash us nonstop, hampering the session and preventing our daughter from getting therapy.
We definitely want to subpeona the psychologist so that he can say this in front of a judge. There are a thousand different instances I could bring up about bio dad of less than normal behavior, but I don't want to waste any more of your time.
Sorry for being so longwinded, our question is basically this:
What can be/should be mentioned at this upcoming modification hearing? Can we mention how we suspect emotional abuse? Is it better to have our 13 year old testify (probably privately in judge's chambers) even though she really isn't very specific about why she feels so mistreatd over there? Can his contempt and subsequent fraud be mentioned as proof of his irresponsibility?
Ideally, we would like limited visits (our daughter wants no visits at all). If at all possible, we believe the visits need to be supervised and that bio dad needs to be psychologically evaluated.
Modification of Custody: Advice on Ongoing Battle
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