[ellenbogen]

My question involves paternity law for the State of: CALIFORNIA

Hello,
I'm the biological father of my 3 years old son.
When I lived in France 3 years ago, the mother lived with another man in California and this man has been registered as father on the Birth Certificate. (I couldn't do anything about that, I even didn't know where they lived)
I arrived in California 2 and 1/2 years ago and wanted my son back. I also married the mother 2 years ago. So together, we went to the court and obtained a court order.

We followed the document: adjudication of facts of parentage

We sent the documents in 11/2007. The pdf document says "Our processing time for adjudication documents is approximately 12 months."
We didn't have news until we called in 11/2008, they said that it wasn't recorded on their computer and they probably lost the documents. They asked us to send them again.
We sent the documents for the 2nd time in 12/2008, my wife called today and they still say that it wasn't recorded on their computer.

The pdf document says "Once your request has been received and evaluated, we will send you either:
. A postcard letting you know your request has been accepted and
reminding you of our processing time.
. If your request is not accepted (e.g., due to insufficient fee,
insufficient information, etc.), we will return your request to you
with a letter explaining what needs to be corrected.
Please allow about 6 weeks to receive the acknowledgement postcard.
Rejected requests can take up to 10 weeks to be returned."

We didn't received anything and they said on the phone that they don't do that anymore...

We don't know what to do. I need to register my son to a school soon and I'm not the father officially. DMV doesn't want to give an ID with his real name without the birth certificate.
I can't get a passport for him, can't go to France to visit his grandparents. I can't give him the French citizenship or obtain money from the embassy for school...

Thank you for your help

[ellenbogen]

My question is regarding the process of name change and adjudication for the State of: CALIFORNIA

Hello,
I have had many problems dealing with the procedure filing the adjudication petition

On 11/07 I submitted the petition and to my horror I learned a year after that the department didn't received my files but I have the signed proof from the post office that it got delivered. So they told me I had to resubmit the petition.
So I resubmitted the petition on 12/08 but now I have the same problem. They don't have the petition registered on their database and they haven't sent me the confirmation post card.

In their document (see the link above) it's stated

How will I know if my request has been accepted?

Once your request has been received and evaluated, we will send you either:
* A postcard letting you know your request has been accepted and reminding you of our processing time.
* If your request is not accepted (e.g., due to insufficient fee, insufficient information, etc.), we will return your request to you with a letter explaining what needs to be corrected.
Please allow about 6 weeks to receive the acknowledgement postcard.
Rejected requests can take up to 10 weeks to be returned.

They told me they don't do that anymore... so how am I supposed to know if the request has been accepted and processed?

These changes in the birth certificate are now urgently needed since my son who is 3 years old now needs to be registered at school, needs a passport...



If you already made this kind of changes in a birth certificate in California, how long did you have to wait?

What can I do? The people in Sacramento don't want to do anything to solve this problem.

Thank you

[aaron]

So you went to court on a paternity petition, and obtained a court order stating that mom's ex-boyfriend is not the child's legal father and that you are the child's legal father?

[ellenbogen]

Yes
The court order is not the problem
The problem is that we sent 2 times the certified court orders to Sacramento to have the name changed and the father changed but they ignore us, we never received a confirmation letter and they also lost our documents, we had to send them again after 1 year of waiting

[CourtClerk]

I had this exact same thing happen to a friend of mine that came through my courthouse.

Here's what you did, because here's what I did for her. Call back the hotline number. Be sure to call at 8am on the dot because the hold time is ridiculous. Ask to speak with a supervisor and let him know what is going on... ask if it would be at all possible to overnight the documents directly to him so that he can track them. The supervisor I spoke to was more than willing to oblige.

She received the birth certificate in about 8 weeks, much faster than the original 12 month processing time.

Did either of the checks you sent get cashed?

Although a certified copy of the court order should be sufficient for the school. In her case, she was able to get new social security cards, change school information and everything else LONG before the birth certificate came.

[ellenbogen]

Call back the hotline number. Be sure to call at 8am on the dot because the hold time is ridiculous. Ask to speak with a supervisor and let him know what is going on... ask if it would be at all possible to overnight the documents directly to him so that he can track them. The supervisor I spoke to was more than willing to oblige.

We followed the exact same process the 2nd time.

We don't have any confirmation from them since we sent the documents; it's been 4 months now. The supervisor told us he gave the documents directly to the department that deals with adjudications and he couldn't track them anymore. He gave us the number of that department which is an automated answering machine. We have left numerous messages but have gotten no call back from them.

None of the checks have been cashed yet.

[ellenbogen]

we called the office yesterday, we spoke to the person taking care of this kind of documents. She has to call us today whether she found them or not.
I'm 90% sure she won't find them because these people are retarded...
Let's wait, I'll give you news tomorrow.

[ellenbogen]

of course she didn't call back, we had to do it and you already know the answer. She didn't find the documents.
She said that she asked another department to find them. I think it's just her way to avoid the responsibility.
So the documents are lost for the 2nd time.
I don't want to send them a 3rd time, they would lose them again anyway.
Now I would like to sue this retarded office, they lost 2 times sensitive personal information, they make us waste our money and a lot of time and they don't do their job.

New question: how can I sue this government office?