Trying to get custody of my son

[MichiganDad]

My son is 7 years old.  His mother and I have been divorced for 4 years.  We are both remarried.  Ever since the divorce I have had nothing but problems trying to see my son.  She has denied me visitation on countless occassions for no reason at all.  The court has given me back the missed time but has done nothing to show her that her actions are inappropriate and only hurt our son.  My son has on many occassions told me about his step father using excessive discipline while his mother does nothing.  He has relayed this information to anyone who will listen.  She has had child protective services called on her numerous times only to have them do nothing and accept her word that nothing is going on in the home.  She is an alcoholic which is what caused our marriage to come to an end and has now become a problem in her new marriage as well.  She has invited many different people to come live in her home with her husband and other children and in doing so makes my son give up his room so they will have somewhere to sleep.  This was also an issue when we were married.  She invited different family members to live with us all of the time, I finally put an end to it as it was very disruptive.  Her current husband has kicked her out of the house and let her back if she'll stop drinking.  This won't last long as I have already been through it with her.  I urged the court to order therapy for my son and they did nothing.  I took it upon myself to take him to a therapist as he is acting out quite often.  During one of his sessions he confided in the the therapist about his home life with his mother and talked about her drinking and the abuse by his stepfather to himself, his older sister and his baby sister as well as his mother.  When the therapist asked him to draw a picture of a happy life and a sad life, for his happy life he drew a picture of me, my current wife and his step sister and put a heart around it...for his sad life he drew a picture of his mother and a beer can with a box around it.  I have decided to go for full custody as I believe it would be in the best interest of my son to be in a stable environment where he doesn't have to worry about being "kicked out" of his home all of the time and he knows his bedroom is always his bedroom.  I believe he would do much better in our home.  There are so many other details that could be told but this is the short of it.  I would appreciate any useful information that I can get.

[DecentDad]

Hi dad,

You need to figure out a way to get organized with all that information and build evidence around it via a credible witness's testimony (e.g., that therapist) or some other means (e.g., a private investigator's video tape, snapshots, testimony on what he observed, etc).

As you've experienced, your judge doesn't take you seriously.  This is a problem, and as long as you're self-representing, this will likely be the case.  Every time you approach the court without results, you dilute your ability to ever get a REAL HARD ruling.

After you build up evidence, retain an attorney and go for a modification of custody.

Get it done.... you know that your son is relying on you.

DD

[MichiganDad]

I do have an attorney.  I actually just switched attorneys as my former attorney wasn't getting anything done and wasn't organized.  My current wife previously worked for a police dept and the detective that was there is now an attorney so she called him and we have retained him.  He is already working hard on this case and has taken pictures of the home and school and his view of the environment that my son is growing up in is "shitty".  I had my son over the weekend and when it came time to bring him back home his mother was not there and some one answered the phone and said he didn't know where she was or when she was coming home.  I then told this person that I was not going to drop my son off unless she was there.  She ended up calling 10 minutes later.  My wife dropped him off and then called to make sure she knew he was there and that he may come down ill this week as her daughter was sick over the weekend.  Her current husband would not let her speak to her and my wife just hung up. He then called me and threatened me and said he wished I would have been there to drop him off because he would have kicked my ass and said that he will get me one of these days. He then told me never to call there again to talk to my son.  He's a 26 yr old idiot that feels the need to come between my relationship with my son.  I am currently getting a PPO against him as her current husband would not hesitate to act on his threats in front of my son.  I have written the friend of the court so they are aware of this.  I just am sick of dealing with this whenever I want to speak to my son and be a part of his life.

[DecentDad]

Yeah, sounds like a mess.

Is your ex-detective friend a family law attorney?  That's critical.

Does your ex wife get drunk at home or at bars?  If the latter, your ex-detective friend probably knows some private investigators who can document her drinking at a bar then driving herself home (and doing that many times).  Or perhaps your ex-detective still has ties with the police department and be able to arrange to have your ex pulled over for DUI in such situation.

Keep your eye on the long-term ball, and try not to react to the BS going on right now with your ex wife and her husband.

Send your ex-wife a certified letter, advising her that her husband is threatening you with physical violence and interfering with your relationship with your son.  Send a copy to your attorney.

Be sure to be documenting all of this for future use too.

DD

[VeronicaGia]

go here:  http://www.michiganlegislature.org/mileg.asp?page=chapterIndex

Start with Chapter 722 - Children

[MichiganDad]

Thank you for the web site.  I cannot seem to get the school to contact me at all.  I faxed the letter that was reccommended to request my childs records and asked that the principal contact me.  She still hasn't.  I sent the letter by certified mail as well.  I just don't understand why the school cannot contact me regarding my son. I don't know if my ex has someone there that she knows or if she has told the school lies about me which wouldn't suprise me at all.  They have to supply me with his records by law.  I just feel very frustrated all around.

[Stepmom0418]

Dont give up on getting the school records!! It took Dh a while to get SS records too but now DH has weekly email contact with SS teacher!


We had to go as far as to threaten to contact the STATE board of education to finally get the school to send the records. In which we also metioned and attorney that can and will take action if that is what it takes!


It is very frusterating but keep pushing! And one other suggestion....call the school and demand to talk to the principal and or the superintendent. Maybe they dont think you are serious in your requests because you have not "made the call".

Dont give up......Let the school know that you are not one that is going to back down from this and that the law states that you can have access to the records!!

PS there is a great letter here on this site to use when the school is not wanting to give you info..

GOOD LUCK!

[MichiganDad]

She is an at home drinker.  Not easy to catch and a very good liar.  She can turn on the tears when she thinks it will help get her what she wants and unfortunately it usually works.  My attorney believes that with all of the denial of parenting time violations she has that it will help my case along with the therapists input from what she has learned from my son about his mother. I just hope it all comes together and the judge will consider everything that has happened.  The step father is violent and has a history of assault.  I'm worried that one of these days he's going to follow through with his threats and that he will do it in front of my son.  He already doesn't care what he says to me in front of him.  I did send a letter to friend of the court requesting court ordered phone calls so that I may talk to my son during the two weeks that he is away from me.

[Tunie]

How long has it been since you sent that certified letter requesting school records? They have 45 days in which to ante up.

[MichiganDad]

It has only been a couple days but you would think that they would call after it was faxed to them.  It amazes me that they would not even call back.  Should I be sending a copy to the Friend of the Court as well to make them aware of this?  I'm going to try to call again tomorrow maybe it will take letting them know that I have an attorney that will handle this as well as letting them know that I will report it to the state board of education.  It's ridiculous that it is this hard to get my son's records.  I have a custody mediation hearing in November with Friend of the Court but I know this will not be mediated and will have to go to court because she doesn't want to give up custody.  It would make her look bad if she lost one of her children.  It's always about her and how she appears in other peoples eyes.  At one point she told my former attorney that if I gave her $800 that she would give up custody. How crazy is that?