BM not following court order at all

After 7 1/2 months of only receiving 4 phone calls to talk to the 2 boys, she decided to call Sunday night asking what is going on with her visitation this summer. SO lives in MD, BM lives in TN. This is after her telling the kids the last time that she called that it is up to my SO to contact her to make arrangements for the summer.

She has not paid child support, so her license is suspended
The CO states that she is to take care of setting up transportation and paying for them to visit her in TN. The CO actually specifies TN, not any other state
CO states that both parents need to provide reasonable communication so the kids can talk to the other parent
She had moved a while back, and never updated my SO on her new address
She got rid of her phone and uses someone elses the few times she has called
She no longer has her own vehicle
she doesn't respond to emails
she stated in court that the kids would stay on her insurance, but she hasn't been paying the premiums, so my SO has had to pay (tricare so very cheap)

So during this phone call, she states that she wants to pick them up saturday, but she is not coming back into MD to get them. Asked if SO would meet her in VA and wouldn't take no for an answer. Asked if their mutual friend could take them to VA for my SO (i guess this is technically her arranging transportation). SO asks her for her new address before agreeing to anything. She also states that apparently MD is not following the law about child support payments. The funny thing about this is that TN has basically the same enforcement steps as MD. She thinks that since she lives in TN (or KY, who knows) that the custody and child support should be by TN law. Nothing was agreed on during this conversation.

The next day my SO emails her with 3 requirements:

her new address
that she have someone drive her to get them
that she allow the kids to have a prepaid flip phone provided and paid for by him

She calls later that night and basically doesn't agree to meet any of those 3 things at first, but then agrees to see if her dad can come with her to pick up the kids, and that she would email later with her address.

Today, she sends the email. The address she provided was her parents address, in KENTUCKY. SO knows it is the parents house and is also section 8 housing. Don't think she is legally allowed to live there with them, as she is not poor enough to qualify. Email had a long rant of other stuff too, and still no word on if someone else will be driving her, and if she will allow the kids the phone provided by SO.

Also found out through the kids and her that her parents are closing on a house soon, and that she just closed on 8 acres of land (who knows if this is true or not, or if it is the same property or 2 different properties) Don't have any idea if these new house/properties are in TN or KY.

So now the questions are: since the CO states that she is to provide transportation to her home in TENNESSEE, does my SO have to let them go with her since she gave an address that is NOT IN TENNESSEE?

He will not let her take them if she is driving, since that is illegal.

He still doesn't have HER actual address.

The child support office is still trying to garnish her VA payments. hopefully they are successful soon.

My SO plans to drag her back to court, he is just waiting until he has the money for the lawyer again, plus enough time off work to deal with court again. At this point, it would be better to just wait until Jan 1st.

my state has a child support calculator that anyone can use to estimate how much child support will be owed. it takes into account both parents incomes, daycare expenses, and health insurance premiums. Not sure about deductible though. Since the kids will be in a new school, they will be in a new daycare too. The daycare at new school is almost twice as much. Since she isn't paying her insurance, SO is going to put them on his during the next open enrollment (december) for 2019. With these extra expenses that my SO will have, her child support obligation will go from 430 a month up to almost 600 a month. If she wants to play these games, she can pay for it by paying more child support.

If the deductible can also be included in CS calculations, then she will owe even more (deductible and out of pocket max will be met each year because youngest son is autistic and requires a lot of ABA therapy and other appointments.) Even if they only use the difference between the deductible for SO and SO+kids, then she would owe 700+ per month.

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As I said in the last post,

As I said in the last post, file yourself now. Get the lawyer later. But it will be 2-3 months before the hearing anyway. You will be on record for filing.

I would not send the kids. She isn't following the court order. She can't move states without telling the courts about it, this isn't even about her not just telling you. Keep the child support aspect out of this equation, I know how hard that is, because of the effect it has on your home, but CS being paid does not have corelation to visitation-- as much as that sucks. She let health care lapse for them too, the judge won't be happy.

The simple answer to BM is - No. She doesn't have to power to agrue a NO. She can follow the court order or she can hear NO. Your SO is the custodial parent who is worried about the safety of his children. BM's wishes don't matter.

PS- I would call the section 8 housing authority office and give them a little tidbit of info. Do it in your best " I am so confused and I just don't know what is going on here" voice. Let them know you are worried about the girls staying there if BM isn't supposed to be.

TN vs KY is semantics, IMO.

TN vs KY is semantics, IMO. It seems petty. Maybe you'll get lucky, but most judges would frown upon a parent denying parenting time over a petty technicality. She is the kids' mother, she needs to see them.

Moving states- not sharing

Moving states- not sharing her location until threatened with not having them, not having a drivers license, not having transportation legally, refusing to agree to allowing phone acess... I think they have a really good case to be seen.

I already previously stated

I already previously stated that BM has to give her address. She is entitled to parenting time regardless of where she lives. Having the specific state hardcoded into the CO was a stupid oversight. She shouldn't have to have the CO revised every time she moves. "Oh, you moved to KENTUCKY??? Digusting!! You are not a parent anymore, no parenting time FOR YOU!!"

It is the CP's moral and legal duty to facilitate a relationship with the NCP, not find excuses and nitpick reasons why the NCP should not see their child. It is disgusting to me when anyone kicks the NCP when they are already down. No one here enjoys being on the receiving end of it, so why condone it? Having PC doesn't mean you get to jerk the other parent around. She is still one of the parents to this child.

If this BM is an idiot and attempts to keep the child, she would not get away with it, and it would be dealt with harshly. Parental Kidnapping is a felony. BM doesn't have the resources for flight to Argentina. The court can't preemptively violate someone's civil rights without due process. OP's spouse is HC. He got custody, be grateful and go on with your lives. You can't just invent new loopholes and make BM jump through them. Withholding the kids over phone access is a great way to be found in well-deserved contempt. CP isn't a judge, he doesn't have that power.

The CO stated TN for a reason

The CO stated TN for a reason. SHe needs to provide transportation to get them, and SO needs to provide transportation to get them back to MD. I know TN/KY are right next to each other, but TN was specifically stated so that she cannot move to say Oregon and expect my SO to provide transportation from Oregon to MD when it is time to pick the back up. It could also be that the judge considered her a flight risk, so would only allow her to take them to TN where she was living.

The phone was also part of the CO. Both parents must provide reasonable phone access, including skype. All SO asked for here was that she follow the CO, and SO would provide the phone (which was not required by the CO).

The third thing, SO has full legal custody. He has the power to tell anyone that they can't drive the kids with a suspended license. He wouldn't let me drive them if I had a suspended license, or his parents, or anyone else. Why is BM special and gets a pass on this?

SO is not high conflict. She emailed a whole bunch of rants in her last email (she is the high conflict parent) and all my SO did was point out the 3 legal requirements for her. Yes, all 3 are legal requirements.

how would it look to a judge if SO just gave her her visitation knowing she was not able to follow the CO? "Well it seems like you didn't care if she was able to follow those items(state of TN, reasonable phone access) in the CO, so I will just take those parts out when I rewrite the CO" Then she would be able to take them to Alaska without phone access and then just expect SO to pick them up from Alaska at the end of her 6 week period.

BTW, her providing her parents address as her address is not true. She told my SO specifically "i VISIT my parents almost every day" and then when asked for her address, she uses theirs? So which one is it? do you visit them almost every day, or do you live with them? So he still doesn't have the address that she and the kids will be staying at while in TN/KY.

And she doesn't have the resources to take them out of country? True, because she is not able to get a passport due to not paying child support, but she apparently got money from some type of inheritance as she claims to just bought 8 acres of land. (wheres the address for this?)

I get that you all hate BM

But it's not your SO's job to enforce the order or to determine that she is or isn't following the court order.

If he feels that there is a significant "violation," he should file for contempt/show cause. BM can then demonstrate to a judge whether or not she is in compliance. The judge will decide if she is out.

It's not his job to question whether it's OK for her to live in Section 8 Housing with her parents. Personally, I'd be glad to have an extra set of eyes on my kid when she's with her NCP, but that's neither here nor there. If the Section 8 people find out, then it's their issue to deal with. It's not his job to decide whether she can drive or not--or to enforce that her license is suspended. If she gets caught, a judge will deal with that issue.

Do you have reason to take this back to court? Probably. The bar isn't very high to do that. But more importantly, based on what you've said and how you've said it, your SO seem to be extraordinarily engaged in maintaining the HC nature of this relationship. It's one thing when someone doesn't even try, it's quite another when they're doing their best and it's still terrible. This woman sucks, but she seems to be trying. It's not good, but she's trying. When someone isn't trying at all--or when they're actively parenting against you--that's truly awful.

She has a history of being a

She has a history of being a flight risk. She tried to kidnap her first son after custody was given to the father, she took these 2 boys on two separate occasions without informing anyone before the CO. in October 2016 she came up, took the boys out of school, and took them to TN to live there with her. She didn't have any of the school/IEP stuff set up for them or the ABA therapy when she took them out of school here. It would be pretty hard to try to get them back/find them without her giving SO her address, phone number, and her not having internet access. SO has full legal custody, i think he can decide that he doesn't want an unlicensed driver driving them.

Your SO has legal custody

But if the CO says that she gets to see them, she gets to see them or your SO will be the one held accountable. As CPs, we don't get to defy an order any more than the NCP does. As soon as they're out of his sight, she could be right back in the driver's seat. He cannot keep complete control of the situation. He has an order to comply with, too.

As far as the address thing goes, your SO can file a contempt claim and have the court hold her accountable, but they probably won't. It's an address. And courts don't tend to care about potential violations of an order (like driving illegally), they're set up to deal with actual violations, and judges are the ones who get to decide what is a violation and what isn't.

If she shows up alone. Don't

If she shows up alone. Don't necessarily refuse to send them. Instead, call the police, say that she's come to grab them unlicensed and that you worry for their safety. Then just tell her that you're waiting for them to arrive prior to sending them. Then it's documented that you had concerns, but he can't be held in contempt of court.

Agreed about asking the

Agreed about asking the police to check on an unlicensed driver picking up minor children. Also, as long as you hold to the court order- i.e. her picking the kids up from MD you should be fine. Not your fault she doesn't want to come to that state.

Your SO needs to talk to a

Your SO needs to talk to a lawyer, I know they're expensive, but that's really the only way he's going to be able to refute them going I think...

As for Section 8 housing. i do software. Since her parents already live in Section 8 housing, they have a solid place and people cam move in with them, however all income of the household has to be reported to the housing office. As she makes more that normally required within Section 8, it's likely that their payment would raise from where it is, up to contract (full) rent, and they would be discontinued for assistance. IF they didn't inform them of the change of household income, then they'll likely be required to pay it back if they do find out. However no one is supposed to be able to stay with them for more than a few days at a time without it being reported to the housing office. If they do, her parents risk losing their place in the Section 8 program, and possibly having to wait years to be re-accepted, assuming they would be.

SO is going to call his

SO is going to call his lawyer that he used in court to see about these issues. Back in March, the lawyer suggested to take it back to court due to her only calling a few times, and to get her for not complying with the CS order. SO didnt have the money at the time. Probably should have just found a way to get the money and file the motions then, but its too late for that now for this summer. The lawyer has been really good and even knocked a couple grand off the bill for paying in full.

Sounds like you have a good

Sounds like you have a good lawyer on your side who actually cares!

Keep us updated! This all definitley sounds like grounds to take her back!

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BM not following court order at all

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