UPDATES IN MICHIGAN FAMILY LAW

How protective is an order of protection? The short answer is: It depends.

How protective is an order of protection? The short answer is: It depends. "A personal protection order is merely a piece of paper," I explain to my clients. To be really safe, you need to take extra precautions.

Thanks to Paula Aylward, Michigan family law attorney, for calling to my attention a New York Times article: Case Revives Debate Over Protection Orders, published online on 2/26/2010. Alan Feuer writes:

While experts on domestic violence say orders of protection can clearly forestall harm — they point out that 87 percent of the victims of family-related killings last year in New York City did not have one — a piece of paper, even one bearing the imprimatur of a court, is certainly no guarantee of safety. This is especially true if the paper in question is delayed, ignored or never served.

"Disappearing Ink" a/k/a "TigerText" a/k/a "Your cheating heart"

Time Magazine (at Time.com) wrote today:

"Tiger Woods, if you're reading this, remember that you've been through what mothers call a 'valuable learning experience' and you're probably a 'better man for it' and so on. Having said that, an iPhone app that launched on Feb. 25 could totally have saved your hide."

Time writes about an iPhone app that is aptly called TigerText. This app allows users to use virtual "disappearing ink" -- in other words, to set a time limit for a sent text to hang around after it has been read. This is sort of like Mission Impossible. (Am I dating myself here? Yes). "This mission, should you choose to accept it . . . was the message that was delivered on a magnetic tape recording (when did we last see one of those)? The message "will self-destruct in 5 seconds" . . . Ah, but I digress.

Kidnapped boy home with his father

Finally, little Ricky Chekevdia, the child in Illinois whose mother kidnapped him and hid him in a secret room that was 12 feet long, five feet wide and three feet high to prevent his father from finding him and exercising parenting time with him, is going to live with his father on a permanent basis. I first wrote about that story here: "Parental kidnappping: An effective response."   

Mike Chekevdia was awarded temporary custody of his seven year old son, Ricky this week, according to reports on WSILTV. (02/21/10). 

Women and children | Report about increased health concerns

My readers know that children's health is a major concern with me, as is teen pregnancy and maternal health. The following Comment, published in Journal Watch, raises major concerns about the increasing birth rates, increasing infant mortality, increasing teen pregnancy and increasing incidence of cesarean section for women. If these aren't your issues, now is the time to hit the delete key.

Grandparent visitation | To be or not to be?

Michigan parents are far more fortunate than parents in many other states when it comes to preventing interference in the parent/child relationship by grandparents or other third parties. The Michigan Family Law Section and many other proactive non-profit agencies* [See below] supported strict limits to how third parties, including grandparents can use the court system to obtain grandparenting (or other third-party) access to children when the biological parent(s) object. Sometimes a parent has died, and the surviving parent may object to court-ordered access, Sometimes, it's divorced parents who object.

Marital infidelity | The fallout after a spouse has an extra-marital affair

Tiger Woods, Governor Mark Sanford, John Edwards . . . serial infidelity or simply an affair with one other person . . . what does this mean for the spouse who is betrayed?

High profile cases make the news. [E'gads, just look at the covers of those tabloids when checking out at the grocery store.] However, most family lawyers aren't dealing with celebrities. The pain suffered by the spouse who has been cheated on can be very real and very devastating. The Christian Science Monitor this week explores the issue of marital infidelity and its affect on marriage and on children who are caught up in the pain of divorce. The report is worth reading and it can be found here. Marital affairs: What happens after spouses cheat.

Palindrome - From AARP for all generations

A palindrome is a word that may be spelled the same backwards and forwards. My last name "Hannah" is a good example. AARP has published a video on YouTube that is a little different. It is named "Lost Generation" and begins with with sentences written on a blackboard, read aloud by a teenager. This video reads the exact opposite backwards as forward.  Not only does it read the opposite, the meaning is the exact opposite. It is a brilliant assemblage of thoughts and values.

This video was submitted by a 20-year old in a contest sponsored by AARP, and titled "u @ 50"  I'm told that this video won second place, but what could possible top this? The concepts are simple, and yet they are brilliant.

See Lost Generation here:

Lancet retracts position that MMR vaccinations are a cause of autism

From time to time, I write here of children's issues. Because I see so many clients with family law problems whose children have been diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, I feel it's important to mention that a British medical journal, The Lancet, has "fully" retracted a paper it published in 1998 that suggested a link between measles-mumps-rubella vaccination and the subsequent development of autism.

Thanks to Andrea B. Carroll, C.E. Laborde, Jr. Professor of Law, Paul M. Hebert Law Center, LSU writing on the Family Law Prof Blog for the following analysis and commentary concerning surrogacy issues and problems faced by gay and lesbian families seeking to have IVF or surrogacy agreements in order to raise children in their families. Professor Carroll writes:

"Joanna Grossman (Hofstra University School of Law) has recently posted an excellent two-part commentary on whether the Baby M decision should survive, particularly in the context of a recent New Jersey case.  The case involves two gay men who were legally married.  One of the men provided sperm and a donor egg was used, with the resulting embryo implanted into the (non-egg donor) surrogate.  After twin girls were born, the surrogate sought a judgment that the surrogacy agreement she signed relinquishing her rights was a nullity and that she was entitled to parental rights.  The trial court agreed, resting on Baby M.  Grossman argues that Baby M should be revisited in light of distinctions between its facts and those in the most recent case and reproductive advancements since the Baby M decision.

David Goldman | Great spokesman for left-behind parents

In the spirit of the families of Adam Walsh and Polly Klass, David Goldman steps beyond the recovery of his son Sean, kidnapped by his mother to Brazil and recovered more than five years later.

David Goldman is today continuing his heroic efforts on behalf of left-behind parents whose children have been kidnapped to foreign countries. Today he spoke out on Canadian television on behalf a another child kidnapped to Brazil--a country that, while a signatory to the Hague Convention, seems determined to thwart the basic legal premises of the Convention.

Here's a link to a terrific interview of David Goldman on a Canadian television station advocating for a left-behind parent from Canada in his efforts to recover his child.

http://watch.ctv.ca/news/clip261805#clip261805

War of the Roses

Most family lawyers have probably seen the film War of the Roses starring Danny DeVito, Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner. This is a story about a romantic encounter, a marriage and a really nasty divorce. The warring Roses both ended up dead. Recent real divorces have been similarly messy, even though they've not resulted in any deaths.

Oh wait. There was that doctor in Long Island who donated a kidney to his wife and then wanted it back . . . the kidney of $1.5 million. I guess we could call that a case of "near death."