Child Cus­tody and the Coro­n­avirus Cri­sis: Three Things to Know

Child cus­tody and vis­i­ta­tion ques­tions bring anx­i­ety dur­ing the most ordi­nary times. Add coro­n­avirus to the mix and every­thing is edgier. You want to pro­tect your kids from COVID-​19 and you also want to be with them; their other par­ent prob­a­bly feels the same way. And you’re still fac­ing weeks or months of upended plans that bring up dif­fi­cult prac­ti­cal and legal questions.

• What hap­pens to cus­tody and vis­i­ta­tion agree­ments when everyone’s sup­posed to stay home?
• Who should be allowed around the kids? How much should they be out of the house and for what reasons?
• How do we han­dle new finan­cial problems?

As par­ents grap­ple with child cus­tody and coro­n­avirus con­cerns, most legal experts rec­om­mend stick­ing to a few fun­da­men­tal principles.

1. Nego­ti­ate, Medi­ate, Cooperate

A cri­sis has the poten­tial to bring out the very best or the very worst in us. Because folks are under so much stress and most courts are closed for all but the most urgent mat­ters, it’s in everybody’s best interest—especially the kids’—to be as flex­i­ble and coop­er­a­tive as possible.

If you’re gen­uinely con­cerned about any part of your cur­rent par­ent­ing agree­ment, think about propos­ing tem­po­rary, com­mon­sense changes. The alter­na­tives you sug­gest should take everyone’s needs into con­sid­er­a­tion but must always put your kids’ safety and well-​being first.

Some par­ents are revis­ing their cus­tody plans together, one week or one month at a time. Some­times this means chang­ing where the kids stay; some­times it’s the par­ents who are tem­porar­ily mov­ing houses or chang­ing when or where they work. Other par­ents are employ­ing cre­ative ways to visit when in-​person vis­its are impos­si­ble or unwise. By now you’re prob­a­bly an expert at using Zoom or Face­Time and keep­ing in touch by call­ing and texting.

Of course, if you have a con­tentious rela­tion­ship with your child’s other par­ent, this guide­line may frus­trate you. Remem­ber you can ask for help. Lawyers and medi­a­tors are still work­ing. With courts mostly closed, they may have even more time avail­able for phone con­sul­ta­tions or video-​conferenced medi­a­tion ses­sions. For those who can’t afford a lawyer, court self-​help cen­ters or legal aid offices may be able to help.

What­ever you do, keep in mind—and remind your ex if necessary—that with­out a court order, even a pan­demic may not give you the legal right to uni­lat­er­ally change your exist­ing cus­tody and vis­i­ta­tion agree­ment. Later, courts are likely to look care­fully at how par­ents are act­ing now.

2. Think About How a Judge Will View Your Actions Later

Some fam­ily law attor­neys are shar­ing sto­ries of par­ents using the coro­n­avirus out­break as an excuse to deny their exes access to the kids when doing so may not be war­ranted. They stress that aggres­sively or uni­lat­er­ally chang­ing cus­tody or vis­i­ta­tion agree­ments can land par­ents in legal hot water.

Before you can­cel vis­its or with­hold your kids from their other par­ent, it’s wise to do two things. First, think about whether you have a legit­i­mate rea­son to be con­cerned for your child’s safety. Sec­ond, learn all you can about how fam­ily courts in your area are treat­ing exist­ing cus­tody and vis­i­ta­tion agreements.

If you find out that your fam­ily court is tak­ing the strict view that cus­tody agree­ments stand as writ­ten, you risk being penal­ized or even held in con­tempt of court for fail­ing to com­ply. And unless your sit­u­a­tion qual­i­fies as an emer­gency in the eyes of the court, it will be up to you and your ex to resolve your dif­fer­ences. As men­tioned above, you don’t have to do this alone. Con­sider reach­ing out to a local fam­ily law attor­ney, medi­a­tor, or arbi­tra­tor to help you reach a rea­son­able agree­ment that will work now and keep you out of court later.

3. Find Out How Local Judges View Child Cus­tody Agree­ments Dur­ing the Coro­n­avirus Crisis

Across the coun­try, judges are tak­ing vastly dif­fer­ent approaches to the inter­pre­ta­tion and enforce­ment of exist­ing child cus­tody agree­ments dur­ing the coro­n­avirus pandemic.

At one extreme, the Texas Supreme Court said that par­ents should fol­low exist­ing cus­tody orders with­out regard to shel­ter orders put in place by coun­ties or cities. At the other, some judges have said exactly the oppo­site,  tem­porar­ily freez­ing cus­tody with the par­ent who had the child when the stay-​at-​home order took effect. Many other juris­dic­tions seem to be abid­ing some­where in the vague mid­dle, with out­comes depend­ing on whether an indi­vid­ual judge thinks it’s likely that a par­ent is putting the kids in real danger.

Do what you can to fig­ure out which way your local fam­ily court is lean­ing. You may want to begin by check­ing the court’s web­site. Some have pub­lished infor­ma­tion to help lawyers and par­ents nav­i­gate ques­tions related to the COVID-​19 pandemic.

If your local court hasn’t issued guide­lines, con­sider con­nect­ing with a fam­ily lawyer in your area. Until you get infor­ma­tion to the con­trary, assume that any court ordered or approved agree­ment remains in effect.

You can find con­tact infor­ma­tion for your fam­ily court—and infor­ma­tion on find­ing local fam­ily lawyers—in Legal Consumer’s Child Cus­tody learn­ing cen­ter. (Just enter your zip code; you need not pro­vide per­sonal data to find your court.)