Legal Question in Family Law in New York

Re: Sibling Custody Question

Like the DC attorney who responded to your post, I limit my response to my own jurisdiction - New York. From a practical standpoint, my answer is the same - absent extraordinary circumstances, you are unlikely to win custody over the natural mother and should try to work with her and the step-mother to resolve this amongst yourselves. However, in my judgment, since you are biologically related to the child, you may have "standing" to seek custody/visitation. That only means that the court would entertain a proceeding coomenced by you to determine who would serve your brother's best interests. You could best position yourself for this by involving yourself as much as possible in the care, upbringing and support of your brother. You should alsocompile and document evidence about any problems with the the care that is being provided by the natural mother and whoever else may have custody of, or parenting time with, your brother. It's important not to do anything to disrupt the realtionship between them and your brother. I need to know more details about the situation to give more specific advice, so feel free to call me at 212-367-9167 if you wish to discus this further. I do not charge a fee for the initial consultation.

Re: Sibling Custody Question

first of all... my answer is for D.C. only. In order to file for custody you need to have "standing". If I understand your situation correctly, your natural mother, who is also your brother's natural mother is currently taking care of your brother, in other words... she is the custodial parent. In your facts you also mention that the custody fight is between your mother and your brother's stepfather... well... where is your brother's natural father? In the absence of facts that make the natural parents "unfit" to take care of a child... siblings lack standing to petition the court for custody. So the quick answer to your question is that probably your mother, assuming that she is the natural mother of your brother as well, will have physical custody of the child. If instead she is not the natural mother and the natural father is no where around... then you do have standing. Please call me if you have any questions... I know that this is not easy. In addition, if possible you may want to intercede for counseling for the three of them to cope with the custody and if this fails you may want to cooperate with your mother and stepfather so that you can have some visitation with him... When I speak about visitation I do not mean that you can petition the court for visitation rights.. again in D.C. you simply would not have standing in the absence of abuse and neglect... however, in a spirit of cooperation, I have often included in parenting agreements paragraphs specifically allowing siblings and other family members to visit with the children liberally. then the parenting agreement becomes effective through a court order and you would get the same end-results as if you had petitioned the court directly for visitation rights... the key is cooperation with the parents and open lines of communication! if the situation is really bad it is also likely that a Guardian ad Litem may be appointed to represent your brother in the custody case: again.. you can try to convince the GAL that your presence in your brother's life is essential for his development.. and in turn the GAL could recommend this to the Judge.

Good luck

Tiziana Ventimiglia

202/271-5983