Legal Question in Family Law in Maine

Re: paternity

I don't practice in your state, so I don't know whether our statutes and administrative regulations are different. Make sure you double check my answer against your state law. That said ...

If the child support agency sent you a notice that a case has been opened for a mom and you're presumed to be the dad, the notice probably has information about establishing or disproving paternity. Don't delay in responding. You can deny paternity and wait for them to order a test or you can deny paternity and request a test disproving it. If mom has filed a motion with the court instead of using the agency, you will need to file a response right away, again you're denying paternity and denying that a child support obligation exists. Check your court rules for response time; in my state it's ten business days.

You can request that mom pay for the test because (1) you're unemployed and can't afford the test and (2) there's no way the child can be yours and mom knows it (you'd better be right on this claim; once the court thinks you've lied to it, your credibility is pretty well shot). I do not promise that your request will be granted and mom will have to pay.

Word of warning: In my state, the law states that both parents owe a duty of support. Not having a job will not relieve you of the duty. We can impute income to both parties. If I represented mom, I would impute income to you of at least $13,000, equivalent to a full time minimum wage job. If I knew you were capable of higher paying work and that kind of work is available, I'd impute the higher amount to you.