Child Emergencies in Divorce Cases
Family Court is the emergency room of the courthouse. The emotional dissolution of marriage, as well as parties who may come to the court with psychological and other familial problems, creates a crisis that may only be resolved by immediate court intervention in the legal dissolution of marriage.
The breakdown of the marriage may be caused by financial crisis which may only be resolved by immediate court intervention in the legal dissolution of marriage. However, to lay persons in trauma, everything may seem like an emergency when the law may not consider their matter an emergency under Florida law.
Clients have different perceptions of emergencies than lawyers, and lawyers have different perceptions that judges. Family matters may contain more imperative matters, but the volume of cases that a family court judge deals with more clearly separates those matters that threaten life or limb.
An emergency circumstance is one in which there is an imminent danger, a crisis or a situation requiring immediate and extraordinary action.
Your divorce attorney should know the local rules and administrative order in the circuit court and consult them before filing an emergency petition. Some circuit courts have local rules or administrative orders that define an emergency. For example, a local rule might say that an emergency is a matter in which death or manifest injury will occur if immediate relief is not afforded. Another approach is simply to recognize that judges called upon to hear the matters claimed to be an emergency in nature must determine if the law or totality of the circumstances requires immediate action.
Child Emergencies: Most family court emergencies involve allegations regarding children. Be careful in alleging an emergency and seeking emergency after emergency petition regarding a child. Courts have a duty to cause the least amount of disruption in the child’s life when considering the best interest of a child. Children should not be played as if a game of ping pong where a parent with greater resources to serve greatest number of motions wins.
Any person who knows, or has a reasonable cause to suspect, that a child is abused, abandoned, or neglected by a parent, legal custodian, care giver, or other person responsible for the child’s welfare, or that a child is in need of supervision and care and has no parent, legal custodian, or responsible adult or relative immediately known and available to provide supervision or care, must report such knowledge or suspicion to the Department of Children and Families (D.C.F.) If a %link 2% is filing an emergency an emergency motion regarding a child in which is danger of harm, the family law lawyer must report the case to 1-800-96-ABUSE. Both parents will be investigated. Not only is the alleged abuser investigated, but the non abuser will be investigated to see if that parent failed to protect the child from abuse and allowed the child to remain in an unsafe environment with the abuser.
