Legal guardian abandons child and recants physical custody

[tara]

My fiance and I have had an "informal" physical custody of his 15 year old since he was nine. We have played active roles in his schooling, sports, discipline and have solely supported him financially. The mother has a history of instability in relationships, and employment. Her mother does not want her to have custody and has begged us to fight. Her ex-boyfriend visited her recently and called us after the visit telling us we had to get the son "out of that situation". Her phone number constantly changes. The mother who has legal custody through her divorce papers since 1991 has moved to our area in the past year. She has constantly undermined us with regard to his schooling and bringing him back to us on time because she is the "Legal" guardian. Since we had no agreement with her when she gave up physical custody informally - no paperwork- she has all of the rights and we don't. She has had 4 jobs in the last year. She has never in the last five years paid us a dime for his support. She has said "Let him live with me" and the son of course wants to live with her as he has no discipline with her and she only cares about the "bottom line" on his grades. He has lived with her for a month, he has failed 3 of his core classes this semester and is now inelegible to play sports next year. We got a notice yesterday that she wants the original amount of child support awarded her in 1991. It is possible that she has claimed the son on her taxes for the last few years even though he has not lived with her. Is it possible for her to owe some sort of back child support to us based on her earnings of the last five years. We feel she moved to this area to get a "paycheck" and even with the support, she will be unable to afford to keep him especially with her unstable work ethic. We feel it is a bad environment for a boy at such a crucial time in his life but that our hands are tied. Even though he wants to live with her, is it possible that we can get "legal custody" of him so that we actually have rights?

[aaron]

You may qualify for custody, but you would have to petition the court to award you custody. That is best done with the help of a lawyer.

If a child support order was in effect throughout the period at issue, and an arrearage has accrued, the odds are that a court will enforce that arrearage. Modification of support obligations normally occurs from the date of a petition for modification, with no retroactive modification.

[tara]

The DHR letter we just received only says that we owe support for the last month (in which she has had him). She never requested support because we had him. Can she still request arrearage even though we had him with us and enrolled in school for the past five years?

[aaron]

Modification of support obligations normally occurs from the date of a petition for modification, with no retroactive modification. If she has not petitioned, that applies to her as well.