My question involves a child custody case from the State of: NH
My children's father will soon be moving about 100 miles away to move in with his girlfriend. He wants over night visits as a result of that rather than the few hour visits he currently takes every 5th week or so. Our court order (dated April 2008) states he is to have supervised visits in my home only unless we both agree on a different arrangement. The children are 13, 10, 4 & 2.
I allowed him a 2/3 months of over nights unsupervised on weekends which ended about 7/8 months ago due to unsafe conditions. His anger at the children was escalating, he slept in until the afternoon while the children ran around unattended, and the baby kept coming home with diaper rash every weekend. Finally, he was unsure if the younger 2 children had taken a narcotic prescribed to his son. His first ex-wife called me to tell me about it as she had overheard the 4 year old telling his son that she had taken his pill. He wasn't going to even tell me about it! I drove them to the hospital on no sleep after 2 12 hour night shifts because he refused to seek help or even call poison control. The ER told me that they would have had seizures, heart failure and could have died if they had taken the pills. They had to be treated with charcoal and the 2 year old had to be catheterized to test for the drug.
I allow him to call and make arrangements to see the children when he wishes to liberally. I have only denied him 2 times in the past 2 1/2 years due to plans I had already made. If he wishes to pick up the girls each day of the weekend he can, I see no reason that they should have to sleep on a floor, couch, or in their fathers bed when he can drop them off at bedtime and pick them up the following day if he so desires.
He has had anger/violence issues in the past with the children. He also has a son that is 16 and has a restraining order against him on behalf of the girls for his violent behavior. He wants them to be able to see him. He has hurt all of them but the youngest as he hasn't been allowed contact with her except by the father against my wishes on his overnights that he had been having.
My questions are these:
Does he stand a chance at modifying the visitation?
Does he have to prove that overnights will be beneficial to the children or do I have to prove that they are potentially harmful to them?
I honestly don't know if his petition will even make it past a judge or if it will be dismissed due to all of the other documentation already in his/our files, I would just like to know what to prepare for.
Thank you for reading this.

