Legal Question in Family Law in Florida

My 3 yr old grandaughter has been living under my roof 85-90% of the time since her birth. My son and her mother have not been together for the last year and a half. In 2009, my son was granted residential custody but they share 50-50 custody per my sons request. This last year, my son had to leave Fla to find fulltime work in order to support his daughter. He drives from SC every weekend (unless he is required to work) to be with his daughter every Fri, Sat, and till 3 pm Sunday. Keep in mind, the childs mother lives 1/2 mile from me and spends only 12-14 waking hours with the child per week) My son is with his daughter the entire time he is here. On the mothers days off from work, she takes the child to daycare by 8am, picks her up shortly before daycare closes at 5:30pm, puts her to bed at 8pm. She is trying to get full custody based on the fact she has her Mon-Wed night. She says the law views who has the child more nights per week when granting full custody, not the amount of hrs spent with the child. Is this correct? She also never showed up at the first custody hearing to even fight for custody at all. The judge was going to grant my son full custody initially but my son wanted to give her a chance to be part of the childs life. She has a 10 yr old son who she pawns off on someone every weekend often keeping him home from school on a Monday because she doesnt want to drive 2 counties away to pick him up on a Sunday night. Based on this alone, would she be granted full custody because he works out of state? This has been a volatile ralationship. This mother also is receiving government assistance for housing, food stamps etc. She contributes nothing to the daycare expense, occasionally buys diapers for the daycare. She also uses her food stamps as a method of payment for her sons childcare by the babysitter. She filed a police report stating my son hit her, Had her son lie to the police saying he did throw her to the ground. He was arrested . Thank goodness the neighbor witnessed the arguement and wrote an affidavit that she was lying. None the less, he had to be bailed out, go to court etc. She went to the states attorneys office recanting her report and she was never charged with filing a false report. Based on this information, does it look like he has a fighting chance on getting full custody?


Asked on 12/30/11, 7:04 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys

Lucreita Becude Lucreita D. Becude, P.A.

Primary Residential Custody is no longer the standard for custody. It is now time sharing. I suggest you contact a family law attorney and have his custody reinstated as sole custody.

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Answered on 1/02/12, 9:32 am


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