Legal Question in Family Law in Virginia
Enforcing Child Support Order
Mother, father and maternal grandmother have joint custody of 2 children with grandmother being the custodial guardian. Mother moved to neighboring state (hence the cust. arrangements) but continued to receive child support from father for 5 years. Last year, mother petitioned the court for an increase in C.S. Increase was denied and an agreement was made among all parties and ordered by the court for C.S. to be issued to grandmother. Almost 1 year later, father discovered that C.S. was still being issued to mother and she was trying to transfer case to neighboring state. Father contacted DCSE and received documentation from them that payments will now be re-directed to grandmother's address, and as soon as father completes application for C.S., mother's case would be closed and grandmothers would be opened. Why does father have to complete application for C.S. when it was court ordered 1 year ago for payments to be forwarded to grandmother? Shouldn't the DCSE be held responsible for not complying with a court order? What was the point of the court order? And can mother be held responsible for receiving C.S. for 6+ years with no children living with her? What can be or needs to be done?
1 Answer from Attorneys
Re: Enforcing Child Support Order
The father of the children must complete a new
application for services with DCSE because their administrative regulations require it.
It would've been the father's responsibilty to notify DCSE about the new arrangement to pay the
grandmother. (The courts do not routinely notify
DCSE of modifications in support orders.) DCSE
cannot be held responsible for something that the
father should've done, but failed to do, because he, like so many others, just assumed the correct
adjustments would happen automatically.
An action against the mother to recover monies
that were supposed to have gone for the support of the children---and may not have---could be possible, but who in reality would pursue this, the grandmother?
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