Can a Judge Hear a Custody Case Involving a Member of a Prosecutor's Family

In a small town with one prosecutor (a position previously held by the current judge), would it be odd for the Judge to hear a case involving that Prosecutor's immediate family concerning a custody dispute? Note; a motion for Recusal/Disqualification was filed but quickly denied.

I guess, I am just wondering if my dad being the PA and the judge being a lifelong family friend could help my ex in appeals? (I did receive a very favorable ruling that I hope will stick beyond appeal).

Just curious as to any opinions, thank you!

Well, put it this way. In every courthouse in the country, the Judge is going to have some familiarity with various attorneys.

I doubt an appeal would go anywhere; simply being friends with the Judge and/or knowing the plaintiff/defendant is not just insufficient cause, but actually must be expected to at least some degree in a small town.

The other party would have to have some sort of evidence of a clear bias.

Of course it would be another thing entirely if the Judge had represented either side in a previous matter - since that doesn't appear to be the case, it's probably moot.

(I bet the other party would be keeping their mouths very tightly shut if the decision went in their favor...right?)

Ha Ha, I'm sure they would... Someone had made me worried saying that since the Judge and my dad have worked together on cases almost daily for the last 30 years it was impossible for him to be impartial. I guess as long as they never became family, then it doesn't matter. I know they were in a firm together (partners maybe, don't recall) but that was like when I was a baby or at least very young.
Next time, my ex will know better than to mess with me and my family!!! :) Thank you So much!! I feel much better and will start enjoying my new income!

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Quoting Tryin2

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Ha Ha, I'm sure they would... Someone had made me worried saying that since the Judge and my dad have worked together on cases almost daily for the last 30 years it was impossible for him to be impartial. I guess as long as they never became family, then it doesn't matter. I know they were in a firm together (partners maybe, don't recall) but that was like when I was a baby or at least very young.
Next time, my ex will know better than to mess with me and my family!!! :) Thank you So much!! I feel much better and will start enjoying my new income!

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Ok...that is where you may have a problem. "Next time, my ex will know better than to mess with me and my family". "will start enjoying my new income".

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The other party would have to have some sort of evidence of a clear bias.

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You obviously believe that there was bias in your favor, and if you believe it, an appeal might very well demonstrate that, particularly since the other party asked for a recusal and the judge denied it.

Yeah, that one left a bit of a dirty taste in my mouth.

Must be the week for it :/

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Quoting llworking

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Ok...that is where you may have a problem. "Next time, my ex will know better than to mess with me and my family". "will start enjoying my new income".



You obviously believe that there was bias in your favor, and if you believe it, an appeal might very well demonstrate that, particularly since the other party asked for a recusal and the judge denied it.

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Ok, I agree that I should not have said anything about enjoying my new income. That was tacky. Sorry, but it's like I won a nice prize and I don't want to wake up and find it gone. I care about my kids and my New Income is to help them. This truly was for the right reasons, it was just scary because I didn't think I had a case. I mean, the kids agreed with me that it would be better and more fun if they could spend every other weekend with me (they used to spend 3 of every 4 weekends with the ex in a joint custody arrangement). Since I am now remarried, it's just more of a pain and I want the kids to bond more with my new spouse and my new step child (Not to mention, I don't particularly like the weekends with only the step child so I wanted everything more in unison). The funny thing is, I make more money than my ex. I only asked for child support to entice my ex to settle out of court.

I understand what you are saying about the bias and there is no doubt that the Judge is bias. I mean, he has known me since I was born. He and my dad have worked pretty much side by side for as long as they have been in the area (30+ years), so how could he not be biased? However, he clearly stated that he could be fair and that he is simply looking out for my children, so there is no reason to recuse himself.

Now, understand, he is not at our house for dinner every week or anything. I am not sure that he and Dad even spend much time together outside of the courthouse, but they work together on every criminal case in town and or any civil maters that my Dad is involved in. But since my dad took the Judges position of PA when the judge became judge, it was an "elected" position. Even though it was an unopposed election, it shouldn't matter.

I guess I was most concerned because I really had to just kind of create a case. I mean, the kids now agree that hanging out with me and the new spouse is better and they have more fun because of friends and such. I just didn't have anything on the ex. Believe me, I tried. So we just put together a case basically stating that the ex was being difficult and that is was causing the children to miss out on sports and church and such (and there were a couple of times that the ex actually did make one child miss a church event and the other child missed a couple of sporting events a few years back)... I even had a long list of witnesses that we told the ex would testify to the ex being the cause of basically messing up the kids lives (but we didn't bring them in because we weren't really sure as to what they could testify to)... Like I said, most of this was just to scare the ex into giving me what I wanted. I never dreamed this would go to court. Then the ex shows up with emails and documentation and specific examples of the ex trying to be overly accommodating and quite honestly, it made me look like I was just being a pain to work with.

In the end, the Judge (thank goodness he's so smart) was able to come up with the fact that the ex moved 2hrs away more than 8 years ago and even though I agreed to it and we had been exercising visitation fine, that was more than enough grounds for material change because it was not written into the original order and thus I got all that I wanted and even a little more. The judge not only reduced the ex's time to every other weekend, the judge also took away the ex's ability to have dinner with the kids when in town, gave me full child support and then even gave me the both kids as tax deductions (the dinners and the tax deductions I didn't even have to ask for)... Oh and the best part of all, the ex gets to pick the 5 weekends of summer visitation, but I get to pick what the kids do all summer and if the kids are doing anything during the ex's time (you know camps, clubs, etc) then the ex has to come here to have visitation or give up that time.

Like I said, there is little doubt that there is a bias, but that's the beauty of the system. The judge knows me and knows I am a good parent. The judge knows that my new spouse is at least as good if not better than my ex. I want what's best for my kids and I got it and I am very confident now that there is simply no way that anyone can take it away!
Thanks to everyone's thoughts and or opinions. And while I know that some may think I am gloating, I am sorry, but I am. I can not tell you how happy I am to keep my kids with me the extra time and now spoil them with some much appreciated but unexpected extra dollars each month!

I am having a hard time believing you are for real...but if you are, I think that you had better take any appeal that dad makes very very very seriously. Not about the child support, but about a lot of the other stuff.

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Quoting llworking

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I am having a hard time believing you are for real...but if you are, I think that you had better take any appeal that dad makes very very very seriously. Not about the child support, but about a lot of the other stuff.

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Why would you think I'm not real? And more importantly, why could there be any issues with the appeal? I am sorry if I am coming across poorly. I am not a bad person. Believe me, I am very well known and very well respected in the community. I am a good person and very good parent. I may have gotten a really good ruling, but that's not grounds for an appeal. Please understand, I would NEVER say any of these facts around town. Heck my spouse and I don't really even talk about what happened because I don't want to jinx it. I just like the ability to put everything out there and see if anyone can come up with "legal" grounds that I should be concerned with. Bias is not something that can be proven. If any of the other things could have come into play, they should have before we ever went to court. Right?

I appreciate your comments and I am fine with anyone feeling like this shouldn't have gone this way (if I'm honest, I don't fully disagree) but yours and my opinions are simply not legal arguments. (I guess mine could be if I were stupid enough to say them out loud in court or to the wrong person)

Thanks again for your input.

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I have a few other questions that I thought I would ask here vs starting a new thread.

1. Does anyone have a good idea of how to research state appellate rulings? My state has a judicial site that you can find most everything, however, it is cumbersome at best. I find many rulings just off Googling but then I get too much stuff. Or, save me the time and give me assurances that my ruling is good:)

2. Will my new court order be available to the public, ever? Right now, our local county records are not posted, but I notice that many other counties are. Would custody orders? I am guessing not because children are involved.

3. Why did the title of my Topic change? Did I mistitle it originally?

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Quoting Dogmatique

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I doubt an appeal would go anywhere; simply being friends with the Judge and/or knowing the plaintiff/defendant is not just insufficient cause, but actually must be expected to at least some degree in a small town.

The other party would have to have some sort of evidence of a clear bias.


(I bet the other party would be keeping their mouths very tightly shut if the decision went in their favor...right?)

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To: Dogmatique and anyone else that would like a challenge,
I felt great about your response, but then a little doubt crept in when I read llworker's comments. Now, I think I may have come of as offensive and that might be why the negative comments. However; I really want to challenge any strong minds on here that, given all of the "truths" and/or "facts" that were discussed in court, to find a way that I could ever lose this in an appeal. How could anyone come up with "evidence of a clear bias". I'll give anyone, any details of the case and I challenge you to find fault with it. (I want to plan our Christmas, spring break and summer and I don't want to have to worry about a stupid appeal along the way)

And by all means, if the ruling went the other way, would they be screaming foul? I don't think so!

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Then the ex shows up with emails and documentation and specific examples of the ex trying to be overly accommodating and quite honestly, it made me look like I was just being a pain to work with.

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Evidence that your ex was the injured party.

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In the end, the Judge (thank goodness he's so smart) was able to come up with the fact that the ex moved 2hrs away more than 8 years ago and even though I agreed to it and we had been exercising visitation fine, that was more than enough grounds for material change because it was not written into the original order and thus I got all that I wanted and even a little more

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Indication of a potential abuse of discretion...this is NOT something that any other judge I can imagine would use as a basis against dad. Why? Because it was EIGHT years ago.

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The judge not only reduced the ex's time to every other weekend, the judge also took away the ex's ability to have dinner with the kids when in town

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Again...NOT something a judge would normally do. Reducing it to every other weekend often does happen, but removing his opportunity to have a dinner visit if he is in town is unprecedented.

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gave me full child support and then even gave me the both kids as tax deductions (the dinners and the tax deductions I didn't even have to ask for)... Oh and the best part of all, the ex gets to pick the 5 weekends of summer visitation, but I get to pick what the kids do all summer and if the kids are doing anything during the ex's time (you know camps, clubs, etc) then the ex has to come here to have visitation or give up that time.

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All of that is WAY unprecedented.

The things I have quoted above are all very suggestive that the judge acted with bias and abused his discretion.

Changing it to every other weekend instead of three weekends a month is not unusual....and giving you guideline child support is not unusual. However, all of the rest of it is unusual enough, particularly since there seems to be evidence that YOU were the problem rather than dad, means that an appeal has the chance of succeeding.

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Quoting llworking

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Indication of a potential abuse of discretion...this is NOT something that any other judge I can imagine would use as a basis against dad. Why? Because it was EIGHT years ago.

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I thought that a judge had the right and maybe even the responsibility to point out evidence (material change) even if it was not presented. Actually my attorney did question my ex about moving and addressed that it was not part of the original order. We just didn't file the law suit based on that. That was just part of a list of many things we were going to hit the ex with on the stand and see what had teeth. and the judge clarifies the 8 years part I'll mention that later.

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Quoting llworking

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Again...NOT something a judge would normally do. Reducing it to every other weekend often does happen, but removing his opportunity to have a dinner visit if he is in town is unprecedented.

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oh this was easy, in the original order my ex was awarded one weekday evening each month (like the 2nd tues of each month or something) and my ex couldn't recall having exercised that visit on that specified day each month so because of not ever really exercising it, the judge felt there was no need to put it in the new order (my challenge was that a few times the ex would travel to town and go to parent teacher conferences or school events and would want to take the kids to dinner which was ok for a while but then it became burdensome when it was expected and it was turning into almost a monthly thing if not every 2-3 weeks)... It wasn't fair for me, my new spouse and the kids to have to rearrange our schedule just because the ex was making a trip to town, I had cut that out at least a year or two ago. The ex never used the "2nd tues Rule" so I didn't have to mess with it. As it turns out, that helped us.

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Quoting llworking

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All of that is WAY unprecedented.

The things I have quoted above are all very suggestive that the judge acted with bias and abused his discretion.

Changing it to every other weekend instead of three weekends a month is not unusual....and giving you guideline child support is not unusual. However, all of the rest of it is unusual enough, particularly since there seems to be evidence that YOU were the problem rather than dad, means that an appeal has the chance of succeeding.

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A couple of things to your point. First, if what you say is correct, then I am just looking at maybe having to give the dinner visits back and maybe I can't make all the summer plans even during the ex's time.. But, wouldn't the ruling be (I forget the term, part remanded part affirmed) split, so I can still keep the every other weekend and the money? They would only change the parts that seemed biased right? I mean, I have read a few cases like that. On the eight years thing, the judge clearly states that since the ex moved like merely weeks after the original order, that the "nature of the original agreement" for joint custody was never as he understood it to be therefore there never should have been such an arrangement and because of that, there really never should have been "joint" custody. He therefore had no option but to rule in my favor. Sounds pretty solid to me. Not to mention, you can't really have joint custody living 2 hrs away. Right?

I don't want to argue with you as you have been helpful in making me think and realizing that while there are opinions that could go against me, there is really no hard evidence... I mean the emails and such, but trust me, most of them are my ex asking about things and I learned a long time ago to not put things in writing. Therefore my they just have a bunch of one sided emails with no response.

More importantly, it is really important to know that when we divorced, my ex tried at that time to take the kids. Dad got me a good lawyer (of course the same judge) and we put the fear of God into my ex. There was not much of a fight as my ex knew that if we were pressed, I could have very likely had sole custody right then and my ex would have been lucky to get one weekend a month. So my ex wisely complied, packed up a couch, bed, tv, clothes and a few kitchen items and was gone to start a new life. I will admit, I thought the ex would just kind of disappear and was surprised about the constant involvement with the kids. It was cute for a while, but like I said, it becomes a little over the top when someone's messing with your plans every weekend, etc. I mean, we have a new life now too. So trust me, my ex is no victim here. I could go into the evil things I dealt with prior to the divorce and you would not dare call my ex the victim of anything. But I get it, you only have this little info to go on.

It was cute for a while? That your ex wanted to spend time with his children? Really?
Wow.
It is inconvenient for you and your kids for them to go out to dinner with their father once per month? Really?

You do realize that you are hurting not only your ex, but your children, right?

Having a good steady relationship with their father who loves them and wants to see them and spend time with them can only benefit them. But you won't allow that because of your "new life".

You really need to take a look at yourself. I'm not trying to be unkind, but I am telling you that you need to do what is best for your kids. Not what makes you the happiest. (and no, they are not one and the same in this instance.)

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Quoting mmmagique

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It was cute for a while? That your ex wanted to spend time with his children? Really?
Wow.
It is inconvenient for you and your kids for them to go out to dinner with their father once per month? Really?

You do realize that you are hurting not only your ex, but your children, right?

Having a good steady relationship with their father who loves them and wants to see them and spend time with them can only benefit them. But you won't allow that because of your "new life".

You really need to take a look at yourself. I'm not trying to be unkind, but I am telling you that you need to do what is best for your kids. Not what makes you the happiest. (and no, they are not one and the same in this instance.)

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First, I never stated who the ex is. So no reason to be concerned with "father/mother" in this discussion. This is about a parent that left their kids to move on with life.

I appreciate what you are saying and I thought similarly early on, but the kids now agree that it's just easier this way. They have come to realize that things are just much simpler this way. If they wanted to see the other parent, they would surly say so, but quite honestly, they don't even really want to talk on the phone any more.

I'm sorry you have a problem with my approach with my children. To be honest, I am here only for the legal thought's and not the parenting guidance. I do say that with the utmost respect. Regardless, thank you for your comments.

Of course it's much simpler. It's just not right. (and an unbiased judge would see through your shenanigans...as will your kids when they are old enough to understand what is going on here.)

I appreciate anyone's opinions. However, I would still like anyone to help finish out the legal debate/questions previously posed in this discussion?

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Quoting llworking

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Evidence that your ex was the injured party.




Indication of a potential abuse of discretion...this is NOT something that any other judge I can imagine would use as a basis against dad. Why? Because it was EIGHT years ago.



Again...NOT something a judge would normally do. Reducing it to every other weekend often does happen, but removing his opportunity to have a dinner visit if he is in town is unprecedented.



All of that is WAY unprecedented.

The things I have quoted above are all very suggestive that the judge acted with bias and abused his discretion.

Changing it to every other weekend instead of three weekends a month is not unusual....and giving you guideline child support is not unusual. However, all of the rest of it is unusual enough, particularly since there seems to be evidence that YOU were the problem rather than dad, means that an appeal has the chance of succeeding.

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Whoa. The fine details weren't present when I first responded! There are some MAJOR issues here.

The judge may well have shot both of you in the foot, OP.

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Quoting Tryin2

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I thought that a judge had the right and maybe even the responsibility to point out evidence (material change) even if it was not presented. Actually my attorney did question my ex about moving and addressed that it was not part of the original order. We just didn't file the law suit based on that. That was just part of a list of many things we were going to hit the ex with on the stand and see what had teeth. and the judge clarifies the 8 years part I'll mention that later.



oh this was easy, in the original order my ex was awarded one weekday evening each month (like the 2nd tues of each month or something) and my ex couldn't recall having exercised that visit on that specified day each month so because of not ever really exercising it, the judge felt there was no need to put it in the new order (my challenge was that a few times the ex would travel to town and go to parent teacher conferences or school events and would want to take the kids to dinner which was ok for a while but then it became burdensome when it was expected and it was turning into almost a monthly thing if not every 2-3 weeks)... It wasn't fair for me, my new spouse and the kids to have to rearrange our schedule just because the ex was making a trip to town, I had cut that out at least a year or two ago. The ex never used the "2nd tues Rule" so I didn't have to mess with it. As it turns out, that helped us.



A couple of things to your point. First, if what you say is correct, then I am just looking at maybe having to give the dinner visits back and maybe I can't make all the summer plans even during the ex's time.. But, wouldn't the ruling be (I forget the term, part remanded part affirmed) split, so I can still keep the every other weekend and the money? They would only change the parts that seemed biased right? I mean, I have read a few cases like that. On the eight years thing, the judge clearly states that since the ex moved like merely weeks after the original order, that the "nature of the original agreement" for joint custody was never as he understood it to be therefore there never should have been such an arrangement and because of that, there really never should have been "joint" custody. He therefore had no option but to rule in my favor. Sounds pretty solid to me. Not to mention, you can't really have joint custody living 2 hrs away. Right?

I don't want to argue with you as you have been helpful in making me think and realizing that while there are opinions that could go against me, there is really no hard evidence... I mean the emails and such, but trust me, most of them are my ex asking about things and I learned a long time ago to not put things in writing. Therefore my they just have a bunch of one sided emails with no response.

More importantly, it is really important to know that when we divorced, my ex tried at that time to take the kids. Dad got me a good lawyer (of course the same judge) and we put the fear of God into my ex. There was not much of a fight as my ex knew that if we were pressed, I could have very likely had sole custody right then and my ex would have been lucky to get one weekend a month. So my ex wisely complied, packed up a couch, bed, tv, clothes and a few kitchen items and was gone to start a new life. I will admit, I thought the ex would just kind of disappear and was surprised about the constant involvement with the kids. It was cute for a while, but like I said, it becomes a little over the top when someone's messing with your plans every weekend, etc. I mean, we have a new life now too. So trust me, my ex is no victim here. I could go into the evil things I dealt with prior to the divorce and you would not dare call my ex the victim of anything. But I get it, you only have this little info to go on.

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You honestly don't realize how truly HORRIBLE you sound. If you were in front of a non-biased judge you would honestly get your butt handed to you.

I really think that the appeal is going to total you. If you are lucky yes, it will get remanded in part and affirmed in part, but if appears as biased to the higher courts as it appears to me, its quite possible that they could just throw the whole thing out entirely.

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Quoting Dogmatique

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Whoa. The fine details weren't present when I first responded! There are some MAJOR issues here.

The judge may well have shot both of you in the foot, OP.

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Really??? Are you sure or are you jumping on the emotional bandwagon that I'm an evil parent? I mean, seriously everything that I have read may make it sound like I am an A** or something, but I don't see where any of this could truly be used against me or my case legally... I mean, this judge has been in place for many, many years. He can justify his decisions pretty clearly based on his opinion of my testimony vs the ex. How could they possibly prove his bias in my favor? Everything I've read so far is just opinion and even I know that personal opinion is not going to get play in an appellate court, if it's even recognized at all. So I just don't see the "legal" change of opinion regarding this case.

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Quoting llworking

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You honestly don't realize how truly HORRIBLE you sound. If you were in front of a non-biased judge you would honestly get your butt handed to you.

I really think that the appeal is going to total you. If you are lucky yes, it will get remanded in part and affirmed in part, but if appears as biased to the higher courts as it appears to me, its quite possible that they could just throw the whole thing out entirely.

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Look, I get it. Sorry for sounding "Horrible". I have obviously struck a cord. But everyone here is just getting emotionally charged and not looking at the facts. If anyone in my camp walked in and talked like this on the record, I'm done, I know. However, no one will. But given the "truth" of my situation, you still can't prove it to a higher court.

No offense, but I still await anyone to give me any LEGAL reason to be concerned. I am not here to make you understand why I do what I do for my kids I am here to get closure to being able to enjoy my ruling. From the 2 or 3 of you that have emotionally said what a bad person, you have also comforted me by showing me that you can't come up with any hard facts that could be used against me and you know the whole story... that's a lot more than they know!

Thanks and if Anyone else cares to prove me wrong, go for it! I'm feeling pretty strong with our camp.

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Quoting llworking

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You honestly don't realize how truly HORRIBLE you sound. If you were in front of a non-biased judge you would honestly get your butt handed to you.

I really think that the appeal is going to total you. If you are lucky yes, it will get remanded in part and affirmed in part, but if appears as biased to the higher courts as it appears to me, its quite possible that they could just throw the whole thing out entirely.

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You know, when I go back and read my comments, I realize, if I act humble about this all, does it change? If I played off as innocent and that I didn't know that the judge was absolutely giving me every benefit of the doubt and that I never realized that my dad and the judge spend at least 30 hours a week together, would this all be different? Or if I said that the ex didn't try to spend more time with the kids? Really? What does it matter?

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Quoting Tryin2

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Really??? Are you sure or are you jumping on the emotional bandwagon that I'm an evil parent? I mean, seriously everything that I have read may make it sound like I am an A** or something, but I don't see where any of this could truly be used against me or my case legally... I mean, this judge has been in place for many, many years. He can justify his decisions pretty clearly based on his opinion of my testimony vs the ex. How could they possibly prove his bias in my favor? Everything I've read so far is just opinion and even I know that personal opinion is not going to get play in an appellate court, if it's even recognized at all. So I just don't see the "legal" change of opinion regarding this case.

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Look, I get it. Sorry for sounding "Horrible". I have obviously struck a cord. But everyone here is just getting emotionally charged and not looking at the facts. If anyone in my camp walked in and talked like this on the record, I'm done, I know. However, no one will. But given the "truth" of my situation, you still can't prove it to a higher court.

No offense, but I still await anyone to give me any LEGAL reason to be concerned. I am not here to make you understand why I do what I do for my kids I am here to get closure to being able to enjoy my ruling. From the 2 or 3 of you that have emotionally said what a bad person, you have also comforted me by showing me that you can't come up with any hard facts that could be used against me and you know the whole story... that's a lot more than they know!

Thanks and if Anyone else cares to prove me wrong, go for it! I'm feeling pretty strong with our camp.

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You know, when I go back and read my comments, I realize, if I act humble about this all, does it change? If I played off as innocent and that I didn't know that the judge was absolutely giving me every benefit of the doubt and that I never realized that my dad and the judge spend at least 30 hours a week together, would this all be different? Or if I said that the ex didn't try to spend more time with the kids? Really? What does it matter?

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I am not getting emotionally charged at all. I am being completely dispassionate here.

The kinds of things that you are saying here almost make it look like you are the other parent trying to see how strong your appeal would be. Everything you are saying is tailor made to give the other side the advantage in showing that the judge was biased and abused his discretion. I couldn't write a more textbook case of bias than what you are presenting. I being totally serious here.

Like I said the every other weekend bit and the guideline child support were quite normal and not unusual at all, but EVERYTHING else was just unprecedented.

Plus, the way you are describing yourself and your opinions isn't striking cords, its the kind of things that we see people say who get absolutely totaled in court.

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Quoting Tryin2

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Really??? Are you sure or are you jumping on the emotional bandwagon that I'm an evil parent? I mean, seriously everything that I have read may make it sound like I am an A** or something, but I don't see where any of this could truly be used against me or my case legally... I mean, this judge has been in place for many, many years. He can justify his decisions pretty clearly based on his opinion of my testimony vs the ex. How could they possibly prove his bias in my favor? Everything I've read so far is just opinion and even I know that personal opinion is not going to get play in an appellate court, if it's even recognized at all. So I just don't see the "legal" change of opinion regarding this case.

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You ARE acting like an ass. You're not worried about any children - you're worried about you.

You have no idea the trouble you might have gladly put yourself in, do you?

Heck, I'd sell popcorn to go along with this inevitable trouncing :cool:

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Quoting llworking

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I am not getting emotionally charged at all. I am being completely dispassionate here.

The kinds of things that you are saying here almost make it look like you are the other parent trying to see how strong your appeal would be. Everything you are saying is tailor made to give the other side the advantage in showing that the judge was biased and abused his discretion. I couldn't write a more textbook case of bias than what you are presenting. I being totally serious here.

Like I said the every other weekend bit and the guideline child support were quite normal and not unusual at all, but EVERYTHING else was just unprecedented.

Plus, the way you are describing yourself and your opinions isn't striking cords, its the kind of things that we see people say who get absolutely totaled in court.

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Fair enough. To the point of me sounding like the other party? I am to a point. I simply want to exhaust most everything that the ex would try to throw at me. The joy of winning is as pure as gold. But the wide open description of the relationships and their potential impact on any appeal is to see if anyone can turn any of it into real world evidence to overthrow a judge's decision.

In the end, dad's buddy may have been over zealous in his ruling in my favor. As I think I stated earlier, that was possibly my biggest concern. But in the grand scheme of things, the ex might get the tues dinners back and maybe I loose full control over the summer break, but there is really no reason to believe that I loose my new time and the children don't loose the financial support.

On a side note, the one that I don't think anyone answered or I missed it, the ex being two hours away is the easiest part of ensuring I don't loose, right? There simply is NO way they could make us go back to joint with that distance correct?

Thanks again for the, yet suspicious, un emotional response to my questions.

You're incorrect.

Llworking, do you recall some years ago a poster from "down the street" who was very upfront about wanting to screw the other parent no matter how much it hurt the child?

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Quoting Dogmatique

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You ARE acting like an ass. You're not worried about any children - you're worried about you.

You have no idea the trouble you might have gladly put yourself in, do you?

Heck, I'd sell popcorn to go along with this inevitable trouncing :cool:

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Wow, not that's to the point! But you are correct, I truly don't see anything I have done to put myself in trouble. Unless someone's going to try and tie this discussion to me and present it with the appeal (which I'm pretty sure couldn't be done even if I printed it, signed it and delivered it myself)... Sorry, I'm trying to be more modest, but when you say "inevitable trouncing" I can't help but giggle because there is nothing that I have said or done that is illegal. I can say the Judge Hands Down was Completely Bias in my Favor and even THAT does not make the judge completely bias. That is simply my opinion. Everything can point that direction, but it still is only opinion...
So, if I feel a trouncing coming on, I'll buy a bag of your popcorn. :friendly_wink:

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Quoting Dogmatique

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You're incorrect.

Llworking, do you recall some years ago a poster from "down the street" who was very upfront about wanting to screw the other parent no matter how much it hurt the child?

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Who's incorrect, me or llworking?

Oh, here's one possible outcome.

Appeal goes to hearing. Judge is found to have shown undue bias. Decision overturned, remanded to same lower court, but different judge. Different judge believes CP is doing nothing except actively trying to alienate child from other parent. Judge awards custody to other parent.

Sounds fair, yeah?

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Quoting Dogmatique

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Oh, here's one possible outcome.

Appeal goes to hearing. Judge is found to have shown undue bias. Decision overturned, remanded to same lower court, but different judge. Different judge believes CP is doing nothing except actively trying to alienate child from other parent. Judge awards custody to other parent.

Sounds fair, yeah?

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This is a very real possibility. We have seen cases like this happen.

Well, hope you're wrong. I've enjoyed the back and forth.

We're not wrong.

Isn't that the coolest thing?

:cool:

I don't make friends very well, do I? It's interesting and I can only hope that it doesn't look so lopsided in black and white. It really sounds pretty good to me, how the judge wrote it up. My guess is, if they do appeal, I'll lose the few items and keep the rest. Happy holidays.