Grandparent's Rights on Grandchildren

[rjerez]

My 19 year old sister had a baby (16 months old) and lived with our mother for the past year and a half. My sister is not married and the baby currently lives with the father. My mother does not have a good relationship with the father of the baby. He will not allow her to come over and see the baby. My sister is not really in the picture anymore. Does my mother, the grandmother of the child have any rights to see this baby? What can she do?

Thanks.

[Attorney Howard Iken]

No grandparent rights in florida.

[Upset]

for me. I am the "other" grandparent. My son is worried that his exwife's parents might go after custody of his children. He is disabled and his ex has left the children in his care for the last year as she loves drugs more than her children. He is very willing for them (her parents) to have visitation with the children but he worries that his ex will have access to them and possible take them out of their (her parent's) home.

He is trying to find the means and help to go back to court to get full custody as the ex is not really a part of their daily lives and provides no support whatsoever. He is also hoping to move closer to his support group which will mean he will have to move out of state.

I read this in the FLA statutes so am a bit worried:

(C)When a custodial parent refuses to honor a noncustodial parent's or grandparent's visitation rights without proper cause, the court shall, after calculating the amount of visitation improperly denied, award the noncustodial parent or grandparent a sufficient amount of extra visitation to compensate the noncustodial parent or grandparent, which visitation shall be ordered as expeditiously as possible in a manner

and this
1. May order the custodial parent to pay reasonable court costs and attorney's fees incurred by the noncustodial parent or grandparent to enforce their visitation rights or make up improperly denied visitation;


You said Grandparents have no rights in Florida.

[Upset]

that my son has no idea where she lives and she refuses to give him her address.

[Attorney Howard Iken]

That statute is for very special situations and does not apply when you have two intact parents.

[Upset]

For clearing that up!

[billiejosunrise]

No grandparent rights in florida.

In short, my husband's late wife died in 2005. Her mother lived with him for 3 years. Then we got married 4 years ago. We found out some things she was doing to the children that was at the very least confusing them so we asked her to move out. We set up times for her to see the children monthly - but we preferred supervised visits due to the issues we encountered with her. She moved out of state since she was not seeing the kids enough so she felt there was no reason for her to stay in Florida. We have never denied her access to the children. We just do not allow her the frequency of contact she would prefer. She insists on trying to set up visits through the children instead of coming to us directly -in which case the answer is no (which she has been informed of multiple times) 10 days ago we were served with a summons in which she has requested visitation in which she would like to pick them up 2x a year to stay with her for 2 weeks (out of state) and also on a major holiday (come and pick them up as well - no time specified but I am sure that would entail a week's visit).

She had a CA Family Law Paralegal fill forms 12.910(a) and 12.905 out for her and she has filed it with the Orange County Clerk of Courts. We have done some poking around and understand Beagle vs Beagle overturned grandparent visitation rights but do not know if ignoring this summons is a risky thing to do.I know this will not go far - if at all - but we need to know how to respond to this and dispense of it quickly.

Thanks in advance for any advice you can give.

[Attorney Howard Iken]

Once you are served with a Summons it is VERY important that you file a proper and timely response. This applies even if the petitioner has misapplied the law.

Because I have not read the paperwork I can only guess. So you do not want to act solely on my answer. An attorney needs to see the documents and respond appropriately.

It sounds like you need to file a Motion to dismiss the Supplemental Petition. Unfortunately, you must waste time and money on that. We have an attorney in Orlando, Valerie Wright who can handle this for you.

[billiejosunrise]

We have an attorney in Orlando, Valerie Wright who can handle this for you.

Thank you for your response. My husband called around yesterday and we have a meeting today (unfortunately not a free consultation). Depending how that goes, we may contact Ms. Wright as well. I was hoping regardless of the situation that the cold facts (that this petition is a violation of Article 1 Section 23 of the Florida Constitution) were enough to settle this matter once and for all.