Dedicated
to Family Law
In June we tried another contested custody case which also involved a primary parent mother who was charged with assault 4th degree and whose visits with her children were limited to professionally supervised visits at the outset of the case. A GAL was appointed and the temporary protection order was dismissed, but the GAL left the children primarily in the father’s care. At trial, the GAL was recommending that the father be the children’s primary parent and the mother have 4 overnights out of 14. The trial judge did not adopt the GALs parenting recommendation and instead ordered that the parents share an almost equal parenting plan, giving the mother 6 out of 14 overnights, from Tuesday to the following Monday every other week. The father was ordered to pay the mother child support and to pay $49,000 in her attorney’s fees. The court also awarded the mother 24 months spousal maintenance but reconsidered that decision after the father argued he could not pay all of the community debt he was ordered to pay, child support, attorney’s fees and spousal maintenance.
