Legal Question in Family Law in California

I have full physical custody of my 14 year old daughter. I allowed her to spend the summer with her father to allow him to maintain a good relationship with his daughter. He changed his number, moved her from me, and disenrolled her from school, which violates the court orders because all this was done without my consent. I did some research and found that she was staying with his (her father's) brother outside the allowed vicinity allowed by the court orders. She is with them because her father is incarcerated. I drove to where she was staying and brought her back home with me. While picking her up I was served to appear in court because they (my ex, her father's brother) wants custody of her. Is this even allowed? They have never been her legal guardians or had legal custody of her. She was there illegaly to begin with. What can I do?


Asked on 11/07/09, 3:42 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys

You have to respond to the papers you were served with in the court specified. It will only get more messed up if you ignore them. You should also contact the District Attorneys in both your home location and where the girl was taken. Without doing any research (this being a free answer after all) and without seeing your custody order, I think this may be chargable as a non-custodial parent kidnapping. If so, the brother should be prosecuted. But don't threaten this. Just do it. Threatening criminal charges to gain advantage in a family law case is frowned upon at best. In fact if a lawyer does it we can be disciplined by the State Bar. Either you do it or you don't, but you don't threaten. If the charges are brought, however, it is perfectly legal to condition dropping the charges on the civil action being dismissed.

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Answered on 11/12/09, 3:58 pm


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