Legal Question in Family Law in Virginia
Can we move away?
My wife and I are recently married. She is from Northern VA and I from
Central VA. She has joint legal custody of her children and is the
custodial parent. Her ex never takes any extra time with the children
outside of what is mandated in the court order. We would like to move
approx. 90 miles from him. We originally kept the children in the area and
enrolled in a daycare a few miles from his home thinking that it would make
them available for him, but he never picks them up or visits them (he works
out of his house and doesnt begin work until 10 am). Being that he does
not ask for extra time or visit his children outside of the agreement,
would he be able to challenge the custody if we moved? Is there a magic
number of miles that one can move away from the non-custodial parent
without a huge legal battle? The little caveat is that he does have
Wednesday night dinner visitation, which would have to stop if we moved.
My wife is very open to making the dinner visitations up to him through
longer summer visits.
1 Answer from Attorneys
Re: Can we move away?
Yes, the father would be able to challenge the current custody order giving your wife residential
custody if anything was done with the children which would impair the father's ability to exercise his right of joint custody which, presumably was granted in the same order or decree. Your wife in fact, could conceivably be found in contempt of court, if she willfully violated the court's order or decree. Moving the children 90 miles away would very likely impair their father's right to exercise his right to join custody. The fact that he now hardly appears
to be actually exercising it at all is another matter, but gives you no right to act unilaterally without the court's permission.
Perhaps, an agreement between the children's father and your wife could be worked out that would avoid the need for adversarial court action,
which could then be incorporated in the order or final decree.
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