Generally, a man that is the biological father of a child can seek parental rights. Relatively recent advances in reproductive technology can result in situations in which it is necessary to determine whether a man is a child’s father or merely a sperm donor. For example, in a recent Florida…
This past January was an important anniversary to many gay and lesbian couples in Florida. Five years ago on January 6, same-sex couples were, for the first time, legally able to marry in the Sunshine State. With that event, and with the U.S. Supreme Court’s marriage equality ruling the following…
Whether you’re just a fan of the works of William Shakespeare, or are having flashbacks to high school English literature class, you may recall the famed lines, O, be some other name! What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet…
You may have heard phrases like “due process” or “equal protection” on the news or in a courtroom TV show, but you may not imagine them having a substantial impact on your divorce case. You may assume that your divorce case will involve, primarily, an assessment of the factual evidence…
Pursuing a family law case can be expensive. Attorneys’ fees and costs can be very costly. Sometimes, the fear of the cost of pursuing your legal claims may work as a barrier to filing. Concern about costs should not make you surrender your legal rights. In certain cases, the law…
In any family law case, it is important to keep your case moving forward. Depending on the details of your case, a failure to take action within a specific period of time can have disastrous consequences. As a respondent, it can result in a default judgment against you in which…
Not everyone’s family is destined to look like a “traditional family” from a 1950s “sit-com.” Some fathers will find themselves in the position of having children with women who are not their wives. These fathers may, like any other fathers, still desire a close relationship with their children. The level…
One of the more “buzzworthy” and headline-grabbing family law cases of recent days came from Texas, where a court in that state recently ordered a man to pay $65,000 in child support for a 16-year-old girl despite unrefuted scientific proof (in the form of DNA testing) that the girl was…
If you are familiar with daytime talk TV shows, or maybe just pop culture in general, perhaps you’ve witnessed the scene. The baritone-voiced talk show host, with all the appropriate dramatic pauses, tells the man sitting on stage the results of a DNA paternity test. “You are… not the father,”…
In television’s daytime soap operas, familial relationship dynamics can be complex, and tracing one’s family tree sometimes is… challenging. In the real world, when your child is the product of a non-traditional situation, this can sometimes greatly heighten the hurdles you face when it comes to obtaining and exercising your…
