Family Law Newsletter
| Publication year | 1977 |
| Pages | 1571 |
| Citation | Vol. 6 No. 9 Pg. 1571 |
1977, September, Pg. 1571. Family Law Newsletter
Custody to Foster Parent---After a lengthy hearing, the New York Family Court, Westchester County, held that the best interest of an eight-year-old child warranted granting custody to the foster mother who cared for the child most of those eight years over the child's natural mother. The "extraordinary circumstances" of the nearly eight-year separation from the natural mother was held to be sufficient for the "best interest of the child" test despite the absence of a showing of surrender, abandonment, neglect or unfitness on the part of the natural mother. In reaching its decision, the court was impressed with the psychiatric testimony which discussed the "psychological parent." Bennett v. Marrow, 3 FLR 2471.
Custody to Natural Parent---The Pennsylvania Supreme Court, Pittsburgh District, awarded custody to the natural mother over an unrelated third person who kept the child for all but three months of the child's four and a half years. The court held that the natural parents have a "prima facie right to custody" which can only be lost if "convincing reasons" appear that the child's best interest will be served by awarding custody to someone else. The court thus placed the burden of proof on the unrelated third persons. In Re Hernandez, 3 FLR 2576.
Both of these cases should be studied for assistance in these problems.
The Indiana Court of Appeals held that a mother's right to the debt for child support arrearage is a property right and the appropriate statute of limitations involving personalty is two years in Indiana. To determine when the statute of limitations commenced to run, the court held that the cause of action accrues when each payment for support of a child is made and the statute of limitations commences running at that time. The court continued that since the action was initiated more than two years after the youngest child became emancipated, the action was barred. Strawser v. Strawser 3 FLR 2588.
The California Supreme Court extended its long arm jurisdiction over a New York resident husband based upon significant contact with California. The contact was the husband's act of voluntarily sending his...
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