Paternity and Child Support Claim Seven Years After Birth

[Mena]

My question involves child support in the State of: Texas
I hope I am in the correct forum. Sorry if I am not posting correctly. However:

My husband just found out that he has a son. The child is now going to be 8. He went to get a DNA test done because he needed to know if it was true as he was only being told by the ex's sister that he looked like him. DNA test proved he is the father. Currently the presumed father (girl thought he was the father) is under child support as she is no longer with him. What will happen? The presumed father does not know he is not the father. Once he does, can child support be dropped by him and be turned on my husband? What rights do we have? What can the mother expect from us after it being 8 years?

[aardvarc]

What will happen depends on who does what. If no one does anything, nothing changes. The man currently presumed to be the father and paying support apparently didn't challenge paternity during his own legal split and child support case, so until someone ELSE challenges it, things are likely to remain status quo. Either mom or your husband could bring a paternity case to establish your husband as the legal father, along with both the parental rights and child support obligations that would entail. Texas does not have an ending time limit on when a biological parent can be established as the correct legal parent, however, given that the child is 8, the court COULD find that it's not in the child's best interest to entertain "springing" a new parent into the child's life. Lots of factors could impact whether the court would find it in the child's best interest to make that significant change, including the nature, extent, and depth of the relationship between the current father and the child.

If your husband wishes to establish himself as father to his child, he should speak to a family law attorney about the specifics to get a feel for what the court may find as being in the child's best interest, about the standard visitation plans usually ordered by local courts, and about Texas's child support guidelines BEFORE he files a paternity case. If MOM chooses to bring a case, hubby will want to work with an attorney on these same issues.

Just out of curiosity, how did hubby get access to get the child tested? (Is mom aware?)