Legal Question in Family Law in New York

Re: What is a Lincoln Hearing? In a custody case

The way "Lincoln hearings" are conducted varies from court to court and judge to judge.

In the simplest terms, it is an event during which the child is questioned or interviewed by the judge.

The child will be accompanied by his/her Law Guardian and, one can hope, the Law Guardian will have taken the time to learn about the extent to which the child understands "what it is all about".

The extent to which the testimony of a 10 year old child will, ultimately, influence that outcome of the case also varies from judge to judge {and, of course, a key factor with this issue is the nature of the content of the child's testimony: a 10 year old's personal, historical account of events that have happened to him/her is one thing; the child's assertion of a preference that things should be one way or another is something else}.

Regards, etc.,

J. M. Hayes

>>--> The foregoing amounts to musings and observations based on some years familiarity with the 'day-to-day' operation of the law with regard to the issues involved In The Most General sense; my remarks should not be thought of as "legal advice and counsel" in the formal sense of that phrase, since there is, in fact, no 'attorney / client' relationship existing between us. <-<<