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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
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    1

    Default Parents' Rights to the Children's Property Left With a Third Party

    My question involves personal property located in the State of: Michigan

    last year my ex wife moved in with her father. the stay was short, only about three months before she packed up their clothes and left. he contacted her several times about the belongings and eventually she blocked his phone calls.

    fast forward 6 months and she hands over custody of the children to me. grandpa wanted to make sure the kids had their things so he drove across the state and gave me their beds and a handful of toys. upon hearing that he had brought the children their belongings my ex wife threw a fit started calling him up chewing him out, still not asking for her property.

    after a while, he got weary of phone calls from his belligerent daughter and her fiance. An attempt to appease her he packed all of her things put it into a storage unit and mail to the key which she received.

    now we are going back to court for custody and she is demanding the children's belongings, threatening to take her father to court. what legal grounds does she have when it comes to my children things that she left 200 miles away back in January?

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Jul 2006
    Posts
    1,421

    Default Re: Ex Wife Abandoned Children's Property with Grandpa 9 Months Ago

    She got the key. She refused to come and get it. She can sue. But the court most likely will not be happy with her. The children's belongings go with the children.

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Sep 2005
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    98,846

    Default Re: Parents' Rights to the Children's Property Left With a Third Party

    Quote Quoting Tom.Kostuk
    View Post
    fast forward 6 months and she hands over custody of the children to me. grandpa wanted to make sure the kids had their things so he drove across the state and gave me their beds and a handful of toys. upon hearing that he had brought the children their belongings my ex wife threw a fit started calling him up chewing him out, still not asking for her property.
    Is this an issue because, in your present custody litigation, mom is claiming that the beds belong to her and should be returned to her? Or are you asking to help out her father, even though the situation has nothing to do with your present custody case?
    Quote Quoting Tom.Kostuk
    An attempt to appease her he packed all of her things put it into a storage unit and mail to the key which she received.
    If he's paying the rent, then the items are there for her to take, at any time she chooses. If he didn't pay the rent, such that the contents have been auctioned and are no longer available, then that's something she'll have to work out with her father.
    Quote Quoting Tom.Kostuk
    now we are going back to court for custody and she is demanding the children's belongings, threatening to take her father to court.
    You state that you have a few toys that were from your ex's home, and also the children's beds. Are you concerned about the possibility of returning the beds or toys? She has a decent claim to recover items of furniture and, in a custody case where lawyers are involved, both of you need to consider whether it's worth fighting over furniture where the cost of legal fees could quickly exceed the market value of the furniture.

    In terms of her taking her father to court, she can do that if she chooses but such a lawsuit would be separate from your custody case.
    Quote Quoting Tom.Kostuk
    what legal grounds does she have when it comes to my children things that she left 200 miles away back in January?
    For the stuff in storage, assuming it's still there? It's hers for the taking.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Jun 2015
    Posts
    988

    Default Re: Ex Wife Abandoned Children's Property with Grandpa 9 Months Ago

    by old common law kids own own property.....but your state might differ , dig deeper :

    [A father] has no title to the property of the child, nor is the capacity or right of the latter to take property or receive money by grant, gift or otherwise, except as a compensation for services, in any degree qualified or limited during minority. Whatever therefore an infant acquires which does not come to him as a compensation for services rendered, belongs absolutely to him, and his father cannot interpose any claim to it, either as against the child, or as against third persons who claim title or possession from or under the infant. Hoblyn v. Johnson, 55 P.3d 1219, 1228 (Wyo. 2002) (quoting Banks v. Conant, 96 Mass. 497 (1867)).

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Sep 2005
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    Default Re: Ex Wife Abandoned Children's Property with Grandpa 9 Months Ago

    Of course kids can own property. That may apply to toys received as gifts, but it doesn't mean that they own their bedroom furniture, and it's not the kids who are trying to get the property left with grandpa.

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Apr 2009
    Location
    Somewhere near Canada
    Posts
    35,894

    Default Re: Ex Wife Abandoned Children's Property with Grandpa 9 Months Ago

    It's also not Mass. or Wyo.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Aug 2015
    Location
    California
    Posts
    77

    Default Re: Ex Wife Abandoned Children's Property with Grandpa 9 Months Ago

    Sounds to me like she's just blowing off steam with no grounds to do much of anything. Who has the children at this point yourself or mom? If mom has them back and you still have their items then I'd venture to say she has every right to request they be returned. If you still have the kids and are going to court to make that a permanent situation then I don't see where she has grounds to ask for it. If she's saying she "paid" for them then fooey. They belong with the kids. Period.

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