Legal Question in Family Law in Texas
Non- biological father's parental rights
My friend is recently remarried and she would like for her new husband to adopt her 6 year old child. The child's father states that he will fight this all the way. He is not the biological father of the child (she was pregnant when they married) yet his name is on the birth certificate. The biological father does not know she exists as he tried to make the mother miscarry during the pregnancy and beleives this happened. There was never a legal adoption. He has been paying child support and talks to the child on the phone, and used to see her every other weekend before he moved to another state. His parent's are trying to sue her for contempt of the divorce documents because she does not want to send her daughter to another state for 3 weeks. Her daughter does not want to go, and has never been away from her mama for more than 1 or 2 nights at a time. So this is a several parted question, if the child does not want to go, do they have to force her? If the child is afraid of her grandparents (this is in a police statement from the child) does she have to go with them? If he never legally adopted her does he still have rights to her? Can her new husband (and father of her second child) adopt the child?
1 Answer from Attorneys
Re: Non- biological father's parental rights
You present a complicated (and expensive) situation.
Several proceedings are required. A termination of the parental rights of the biological father. A finding by the court, through paternity, that the 'dad' is not the dad. A stepparent adoption.
A child is presumed to be the biological and legal child of a father, when that child is born during the marriage.
The mother of this child may have represented to the court in divorce proceedings that the 'dad' was his biological child. Undoing that fraud may not be so easy.
Additionally, I had a cranky Nashville judge tell me once that he wasn't going to turn any child into a 'bastard'.
Although there are avenues available in the courts to accomplish your friend's goals, she needs to be prepared that it will be a long, difficult and expensive legal fight to get it done. (and there are never any guarantees).
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