Articles Posted in Custody/Time-Sharing

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Marital and family law in Miami-Dade and Broward, judges and divorce attorneys have relied upon the OurFamilyWizard® website for high conflict child custody, parenting plan and time-sharing cases. This website has become one of the most effective shared parental responsibility tools to remove parental conflict and to assist parents in doing what is in the best interest of the minor children.

After nearly ten years of helping separated families communicate, the OurFamilyWizard® website has added yet another revolutionary tool to its repertoire. Earlier this year the OurFamilyWizard® website announced the release of OFWpay™.

The OFWpay™ system allows parents to make and receive electronic payments to their checking or savings account. OFWpay™ transactions allow parents to send payment for expenses like unreimbursed medical, extra-curricular activities or even child support payments where permitted.

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Dwyane Wade was in a marital and family law court today while his former wife testified during child custody proceedings in Chicago. Lawyers for the Miami Heat star tried to establish that his former wife has erratic behavior based upon her relationships, confrontations and parenting decisions. Prior to the trial, the divorce judge requested that the Miami Heat basketball player and his former wife attempt to resolve their child custody litigation. However, the parties quickly reached an impasse.

Divorce lawyers for Miami Heat’s Dwyane Wade argued that the former wife has bizarre behavior and interferes with his time-sharing. On the otherhand, lawyers for the former wife argued that Mr. Wade is too busy to be designated as the sole custodial parent.

The guardian ad litem has recommended that Dwyane Wade be granted custody. Dwyane Wade is scheduled to testify in court later this week.

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An extended family member such as a relative in the third degree by blood or marriage to the parent of a stepparent of a child currently married to a parent may have a lawyer file an action under Florida law to seek temporary custody of a minor child in Broward. This is intended to provide a legal means for a statutorily defined family member to acquire the necessary legal documentation to permit them to provide for the minor child under for whom they are caring for by allowing them to consent to medical treatment, to obtain copies of school records and to enroll the minor child in school.

In a recent case from the Fourth District Court of Appeal, Mohorn v Thomas, the grandmother appealed an order entered by Broward marital and family Judge Marina Garcia-Wood. The trial court denied her petition for temporary custody. Judge Garcia-Wood found that the father’s name on the birth certificate was insufficient to establish paternity and that the father was required to file a paternity action to establish or ratify paternity before temporary custody of an extended family member could be sought by an extended family member.

The minor child’s birth certificate listed Sylenia Danielle Thomas as the mother and Ronnie Kennedy as the father. One year after the minor child was born, the mother and father executed a document that gave all rights and legal guardianship of the minor child to the paternal grandparents.

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Many times Broward divorce attorneys receive telephone calls from a parent who claims that the other parent has abducted their child. However, many individuals are unaware of the Hague Convention, a multinational treaty that provides an expeditious method to return a child taken from one member nation to another.

The Hague Convention insures the prompt return of children who have been abducted from their country of habitual residence or wrongfully retained in a contracting state not their country of habitual residence. While the Hague Convention only applies to children under the age of 16, it preserves the status quo time-sharing and child custody arrangement that was in place before an alleged wrongful removal or retention deterring a parent from forum shopping to a more sympathetic court.

The United States of America would like Japan to sign a global convention on international parental child abduction. This would assist foreign nationals who are denied contact, access and time-sharing with children by their Japanese former spouse. Japan is one of seven nations that have not signed the Hague Convention.

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Many men and women from Broward that are enlisted in the military may find themselves in need of a Fort Lauderdale divorce lawyer. According to an article published in the USA Today and Sun Sentinel, divorce rates for soldiers enlisted in the Army increased for the seventh year. 10,000.00 married G.I.’s divorced during the fiscal 2009. It is also being reported that 4% of marriages among soldiers failed.

The Army has found that an increasing number of U.S troops in Iraq complain about troubled marriages as a result of long and multiple deployments to Iraq. While the pressures of being away from family is more prevalent for young soldiers, there has been recent affect on senior enlisted soldiers as well.

The Air Force is also reporting a 4.3% divorce rate this years. However, the Army has 100,000 more married troops than the Air Force. The Marines is reporting a 4% divorce rate that has remained steady from 2008 to 2009. While the civilian divorce rate in the USA was recently 3.4%, the total divorce rate for the U.S. military has increase from 3.4% to 3.6% in 2009.

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Once your Broward divorce lawyer has finalized your divorce, you may seek to relocate . Some parents move closer to family and friends. Others find better employment offers outside of the Fort Lauderdale area. In addition, you may meet someone new and decide to relocate from Florida. Whatever the reason may be, a parent relocating after a Broward divorce can be traumatic for children. It is important that your children maintain contact and access with you in order to comply with the parenting plan and time-sharing arrangement.

It is important that your children keep in touch when you relocate. The children should visit with the relocating parent during long weekends and holidays. Time-sharing in Fort Lauderdale or your new home should be made in advance. Make a note of the time-sharing that your children will spend with you so that you can look forward to the time that you will spend with your children.

In between time-sharing in Broward, text message and e-mail your children in between telephone calls. Your Fort Lauderdale divorce lawyer can include other means of communication between your children and you including a web camera and videoconferencing.

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When you hire your Broward divorce lawyer, you will most likely discuss your house, your furnishings, alimony, child support and custody and time-sharing with your children. During a Fort Lauderdale divorce, everything can become contentious. A common questioned asked to marital and family law attorneys in Fort Lauderdale relates to which spouse will ultimately get custody of the dog or cat.

In Miami-Dade and Broward, who gets the pet is a common point of contention in the office of divorce attorneys and mediators, and even sometimes in the courtroom. Most spouses manage to work out pet arrangements without the need of the Florida marital and family law judge. In Florida, judges have to follow the law related to pets. The law and case precedent state that animals are property, and that means that neither party can have custody, time-sharing, visitation or shared parental responsibility with the dog or cat. Insofar as a pet is property, it is subject to equitable distribution like all of your other assets

Just like your pension, furniture and car, pets are considered personal property, and legally, it can only be awarded to one person. If a pet is acquired during the marriage and is not a gift to one party from another person outside of the marriage, it is an asset subject to equitable distribution. In awarding the pet to one of the parties, the court will look at who spent time with the pet, fed it, cared for it, and had the closest bond with it.

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In Broward County and Florida, the judge can grant temporary custody to an extended family member such as an aunt, uncle or grandparent. Your divorce or paternity lawyer in Fort Lauderdale will explain to you that minor children can live with and be cared for by extended family members who are better able to care for them. By granting temporary custody to an extended family member, the marital and family law judge in Fort Lauderdale can ensure that family members are able to give complete care to the minor child, consent to all necessary and reasonable medical and dental care, secure copies of the minor child’s records held by third parties, enroll the minor child in school and do all other necessary things for the care of the minor child.

In Dubois v Leon, the Fifth District Court of Appeal reversed the trial court’s order that granted temporary custody of a minor child to the maternal grandparents. In reviewing the evidence, the trial court applied the best interest of the minor child standard rather than the clear and convincing standard. The Court reasoned that when one of the minor child’s parents objects to the granting of temporary custody to an extended family member, the court can only grant the petition upon a finding, by clear and convincing evidence, that the child’s parent or parents are unfit to provide the care and control of the child. The trial court must find that the parent has abused, abandoned or neglected the minor child.

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During your divorce in Broward County, it is important to speak with your lawyer about removing your child from Florida during and after your case. The marital and family law judge in the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit Court can issue an order or temporary injunction prohibiting the removal of your child from Fort Lauderdale, Florida. During contested custody and time-sharing cases, the divorce judge can also issue an order prohibiting the issuance of a passport or requiring you or your spouse’s Fort Lauderdale divorce attorney to hold your child’s passport in trust to prevent your child from being abducted or kidnapped from the jurisdiction.

The United States Supreme Court recently agreed to hear arguments in a child custody dispute between a Texas mom and British dad. The court will examine how American authorities handle the Hague Convention on child abduction which prevents one parent from taking a child to other countries without the other parent’s consent. The United States is amount 80 different countries that follow this treaty.

In this case, the father accused the mother of violating a court order issued in Chile by taking the minor child, a U.S. citizen born in Hawaii, to Texas without his consent. The father asked the American court to order that the minor child be returned to Chile based upon the Hague Convention. The mother felt that she had exclusive custody of the child and that the U.S. courts can not order her to return the child to Chile.

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Peter Loftin, owner of the former Gianni Versace mansion on South Beach, Casa Casuarina, has been served with a paternity lawsuit by a former Miami Dolphins cheerleader. The lawsuit was filed on June 5, 2009 in the Miami-Dade county marital and family law court. The case is assigned to Miami-Dade Circuit Court Chief Judge Joel H. Brown, who presides over child support, divorce, alimony and paternity cases south of Fort Lauderdale.

Any woman who is pregnant or who has a child, any man who has reason to believe that he is the father of a child or any child may file a paternity action in circuit court to determine the paternity of a child when paternity has not previously been established. The court can require the child, mother and alleged fathers to submit to DNA testing that are generally acceptable within the scientific community to show a probability of paternity. The DNA test is conducted by a qualified technical laboratory.

A Final Judgment of Paternity generally will address child support, including but not limited to, a monthly amount, uncovered and out-of-pocket medical and dental expenses, hospital and medical expenses, costs of confinement, bills for pregnancy and child birth and any other expenses incident to birth. In addition, a Final Judgment of Paternity may also address shared parental responsibility, time-sharing schedules and a parenting plan so that both parents can have a meaningful relationship with the minor child.