Legal Question in Family Law in Massachusetts

Me and my girlfriend recently found out, via DNA test that I am not the biological father of our daughter. The biological father is now taking us to court to file a complaint for paternity for visitation rights. We have a Case management conference set up for september 11th. We want to settle everything on this date and avoid a trial. We are willing to grant him his visitation rights but where our daughter is only 20 months we wish that these visitation rights be supervised (He does not even know her, and has no parenting skills what so ever). My girlfriend is very easy to intimidate and gets very nervous and she is scared and unconfident that this might go wrong if we do not hire an attorney. We really cant afford an attorney let alone aren't sure if we need one because I feel like this is very straight forward. Should we hire an attorney? what are the chances of him getting unsupervised visitation?


Asked on 8/25/09, 12:53 pm

3 Answers from Attorneys

henry lebensbaum Law Offices of Henry Lebensbaum (978-749-3606)

i think this was already asked.

The father may well have the right of seeing his child.

You have said nothing that would suggest the need for supervised visits.

There are other legal issues hidden in this equation, but the facts you noted do not lead me there yet.

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Answered on 8/30/09, 1:26 pm

You should have an attorney. His ability to get unsupervied visitation will deoend upon whether or not the court feels the biological father has anything in his history to require that he have supervised visitation.

Whether he can have the child stay overnight will be dictated by his living arrangements.

You might request social services do an evaluation of him and his home environment.

Good Luck.

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Answered on 8/30/09, 1:26 pm

Unless there is a reason to require supervised visitation, the court will not impose this very serious restriction. You should consult with an attorney since there appears to be much more to this story than you were able to fit into the limited space for a question. Whether to retain an attorney is, ultimately, up to your girlfriend and her alone, however, by virtue of their education, training and experience, an attorney is likely to be better versed in the law as it applies to this case. Neither the court, the judge, clerks or probation officers, are allowed to give advice to one side or the other and are not bound to act in your best interest.

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Answered on 8/30/09, 5:30 pm


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