Mother not allowing court ordered Easter visitation

[gemini79]

Okay, here's the story.

Last June we took the mother to court because she was denying visitation between my husband and his daughter. The judge told all parties to follow the state guidelines until an actual court order was written up and signed.

THe mother gave my husband a list of all the weekends she thought he was supposed to get and at the top of the paper it said "Visitation will be from 7:00 on friday until 6:00 on Sunday." We were to look it over and get back to her on if those weekends worked. Well, because of other issues, nothing had been done. So at the beginning of February, we get a letter from her lawyer. It outlines the weekends again and at the top says AGAIN "Visitation will be from 7 on friday until 6 on sunday." It also says "Mrs. xxx wants this figured out before SUMMER vacation." So we had not responded yet. But ever since last summer, we have been following this schedule.

So last night (friday) we go to pick up his daughter at 7. No one is home. My husband calls the mother and she says "You're late.  You were supposed to be there at 6 not 7." My husband says "I thought I was supposed to get her at 7."

The mother says "The lawyer gave you until today to respond to her letter. You didn't so she entered what the judge verbally said. THat is the new CO and it says to pick her up at 6. You are late so I don't have to let you take her."

THe last two things we have recieved have said pick up time is at 7. Now suddenly the mother says she has a new court order that we don't have. SHe told my husband that until he has this supposed court order, he can't see his daughter.

So...she's going by whatever she has and we were going by the last thing we received. Although it's not signed by the judge (what we have) that's what we were going by and that's the last we knew of anything.

If we take her to court, do we have any grounds for contempt? Since she apparently has something saying we have to be there at 6 but we don't, will it matter? Should we take her to court for contempt?

We are calling the court house on monday to get a copy of the transcripts from our hearing and calling her lawyer to have a copy of the CO faxed to us. WHat else can we do? WHat steps do we need to take? HELP!

[Kitty C.]

If the judge said back last June that you will follow state guidelines and those guidelines say pick-up is at 6 pm, then neither of you have been following it all along.

Regardless, you haven't responded to her requests, one by her and one by her atty.  And since they asked you to respond to their requests and you failed to do so, they reverted back to what the judge originally said.  

I would assume you would have to wait until you get a court date to establish a permanent visitation schedule to get this resolved.  If you have an atty., I'd talk to them first.  He/she will have a copy of the order from June...actually so should you and it's strange that you don't.  What her atty. has is NOT a new CO, just their admission of actually following the order written by the judge in June.

[gemini79]

The state guidelines actually say 5:30. But that didn't work for either party. SO we've been doing 7:00 which worked just fine. Then suddenly she says it's supposed to be 6 and wants to follow that. But we had no idea that things had changed to 6:00.

Isn't there anything to be done? No matter what piece of paper anyone looks at, EASTER WAS SUPPOSED TO BE WITH US!

The mother said Easter was ours. Her lawyer said Easter was ours and going by the guidelines, EASTER WAS OURS!

So we have a piece of paper saying 7 and she 'supposedly' has one saying 6, why does hers overrule ours? Is a judge really going to say that her keeping their daughter from her father because of a screw up with the pick up time is okay? That is was perfectly fine that she isn't letting their daughter come over when she's known for weeks that it was supposed to be spent with us?

 And NOW, the mothers says that we can't see my step daughter until we have a court order in our hand even though the judge said to follow the guidelines no matter what until we had a CO?

THere's nothing we can do? No contempt, nothing?

[Kitty C.]

You can try, but it's really hard to say whether the judge would agree with the contempt.  She can't arbitrarily change dates and times on her own.....a court order is needed that both parties agree to in order to make any changes.  the problem is, lyou're still not going to get Easter, because even if you file contempt, that can't be done until she's actually IN contempt, which means you can't file until after the fact.

If you have a court appearance coming up, I'd add a contempt to it, but you will want to talk to your atty. before you do anything.

[ocean]

Next time take your papers with you....(we keep them in the car) and call the police to document that you were there at that time. Then file contempt. Sometimes you will get an officer that will call her and maybe scare her into coming home.

Document...Will she e-mail you? Every week verify the times and dates with her or her lawyer. I would also call her lawyer tomorrow and tell them she kept the kids from you. They may call her and tell her that was not in the best interests of the child. Ask for make-up time this weekend with child through the lawyer since you missed Easter.

Good luck!

[MixedBag]

go take a look at what's in your file and IF there is anything there that's newer than what you have.  Don't trust a phone call to the clerk IF you can go look personally.

Now -- about that exchange time...

How far geographically apart are you two?

See, if you're close I'd suggest one thing.  If you're far, I'd suggest another.

Close -- say within a total of 3 hours.  I would have gone to mom's house since she was not there at 7 and was there instead at 6 pm, and picked up my child.  

ALWAYS keep a copy of your most recent order in hand in the glove box.

FAR away -- I'd double check what's on record and then file for contempt and make-up time.  You might not get the contempt part, but still make up time.  And since time is what's important, that will be a win for your child.

Put yourself in her shoes -- if she believes the time was changed to 6 pm, just how long was she supposed to sit there before returning home?

I think she's wrong in saying she doesn't have to allow the time, but at some point in time she's allowed to leave an exchange point and go back home.

HOW LONG?  Million dollar question.

[gemini79]

Pick up is at her house. We were at the house at 7:00. She was out eating with their daughter. She said they were hungry so they left to go eat. I understand not wanting to wait if she really thought we were going to be there at 6:00. But geez. We called, said we were sitting at her house and she says "Well too bad. You're an hour late so you don't get her at all. We're eating."

She even acknowledged that she KNEW our papers said 7:00 pick up time. But she said "That was a typo." Um...how were we supposed to know that? We had been going at 7:00 so why would it suddenly be different?

Husband is SUPPOSED to be calling the courts today to see what the most recent thing they have on file says. The last thing we got was from her lawyer saying pick up at 7:00. The lawyer said in the letter "Mrs. XXX wants this resolved by SUMMER break. If you don't respond, I will have a CO entered that reflects the judge's oral judgement from XXX date."

Well, what the judge said was to go by the state guidelines. We hadn't responded to her lawyer because first of all, she said she wanted it done by summer vacation. It's just now SPRING vacation. And second, we wanted to talk to BM about some dates but because we had only seen her once for a couple seconds, since we got the letter from her lawyer. And since the mother won't answer any phone calls, we hadn't had a chance to talk to her. Now she says that her lawyer gave us until March 21st to respond. There was NO DATE on that letter.

BTW, we are 30 minutes from them. So, not far. And make-up time. HA! The mother has another daughter that goes with HER dad EOW as well. So the girls are both with their fathers on the same weekends. So if my husband doesn't get to exercise his weekend, the mother won't let him take the next weekend because her other daughter will be with her that weekend. Even though the mother has custody of both girls and they are both home schooled so they see each other 24/7...