The Uniform Child Abduction Prevention Act ["UCAPA"] provides courts with guidelines to follow during custody disputes and divorce proceedings, to help courts identify families at risk for abduction, and to provide methods to prevent the abduction of children.
UCAPA has been enacted in Alabama, Colorado, District of Columbia, Florida, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Utah. Legislation has been introduced during the 2011 legislative session in the following states: New Mexico, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Texas, Virginia and Michigan. You may follow the progress of this legislation here, except for Michigan, where you can check the status here.
UCAPA provides the solution to a problem that many family lawyers are encountering these days. All too often, a parent will take the parties' child or children "on a vacation." But the vacation doesn't end. The children are gone. In Michigan and in many other states, the law limits a parent's relocation after a court order is entered for custody and parenting time to 100 miles. To defeat that law, however, some parents are relocating prior to filing a divorce or custody action because if the parents are more than 100 miles from each other at the time of filing of a custody or divorce action, the law does not apply. In my practice, I see one or two cases a month where this relocation appears to be purposeful, with the intent on the part of the "taking parent" to limit and/or destroy the possibility for a meaningful relationship between the "left-behind parent" and the children.
When a parent takes children out of the state, the Uniform Child Custody and Jurisdiction Act--even prior to filing a divorce or custody action--has an "extended home state" protection for those children. This means that even if the children are out of the state for more than 6 months, a left-behind parent may petition the court for an ex parte custody order and a civil warrant for the recovery of the children. However, the UCCJEA doesn't apply to the situation where a parent relocates within the state. In states as large as Michigan, New York, California, Texas (to name a few), relocation of several hundred miles can keep the children in-state, but still beyond the reach of a meaningful parent-child relationship with the left-behind parent.
http://www.nccusl.org/Act.aspx?title=Child%20Abduction%20Prevention
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