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FAMILY COURT SHOULD NOT HAVE GRANTED GRANDMOTHER’S PETITION FOR VISITATION, THE PARENTS WERE FIT AND THEIR TESTIMONY SHOULD HAVE BEEN GIVEN WEIGHT, INSTEAD FAMILY COURT IGNORED THE PARENTS’ TESTIMONY (FOURTH DEPT).

The Fourth Department, reversing Family Court, determined the record did not support granting visitation rights to grandmother. The parents of the children were deemed fit and the relationship between the parents and the children was deemed to be loving and supportive. Therefore the wishes of the parents were to be given weight, Family Court ignored the testimony of the parents. Grandmother is an attorney who practices in Family Court. After a minor argument at her home between father and his brother, grandmother instituted litigation, which the Fourth Department characterized as using her position in the legal system to undermine the parental relationship:

It is well established that a fit parent has a “fundamental constitutional right” to make parenting decisions … . For that reason, the Court of Appeals has emphasized that “the courts should not lightly intrude on the family relationship against a fit parent’s wishes. The presumption that a fit parent’s decisions are in the child’s best interests is a strong one” … . …

Because the parents are fit, their decision to prevent the children from visiting the grandmother is entitled to “special weight” … . …

[The] evidence makes it difficult to draw any conclusion other than that the grandmother “is responsible for escalating a minor incident into a full-blown family crisis, totally ignoring the damaging impact [her] behavior would have on the [family relationships] and making no effort to mitigate that impact” … . Matter of Jones v Laubacker, 2018 NY Slip Op 08822, First Dept 12-20-18

 

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