Legal Question in Family Law in District of Columbia
Establishing Child Custody
My brother is going through a situation that I would like some legal help.
He has a 4 year old daughter w/a woman (not married). Their relationship has dissolved and now the woman is using my brother's daughter as a pawn for their relationship.
My brother has custody of the child during the summers w/the mother having her on the weekends. During the school year, it's vice versa. However, whenever the mother feels the need to upset my brother's life, she does. Whether it's taking the child from school w/o notification or coming to my brother's house unannounced.
My brother also pays the mother a certain amount of money each month and he pays for the child's school tuition and anything else the child needs.
He feels like his daughter is suffering at the hands of the mother. The mother has been arrested for criminal offenses, leaves the child unattended when in her care and is just an all around unfit parent.
My brother would like to know how does he go about starting custody procedures in the District of Columbia. He is raising the child 90% and he would like to continue 100%.
Please advise.
1 Answer from Attorneys
Re: Establishing Child Custody
Your brother would be well advised to arrange a consultation with an attorney knowledgeable in D.C. family law issues and in particular issues involving custody and how these matters are currently being dealt with in the recently reorganized D.C. family court system.
One might further note that as a general proposition in the law, proving parental unfitness, and, in particular, the unfitness of a mother to care for her natural born children, is quite a high hurdle to get over in terms of the proof required in order to make this showing in a suit for custody.
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