Suwanee Fathers’ Rights Lawyer

The relationship between a father and his children is special and should be protected. If you are going through a divorce or child custody dispute and wish to effectively preserve your paternal connection, you may need the help of a skilled family attorney from our team. A Suwanee fathers’ rights lawyer could help you learn more about your legal rights as a dad and then work with you to enforce them.

Parental Responsibilities in Court

When you are involved in a custody dispute, understanding how family law characterizes custody is critical before you can negotiate. Our team of attorneys and legal professionals in Suwanee is available to assist when you have questions about a specific aspect of custody.

Physical Custody

A parent who provides a home for their children has physical custody. Physical custody can be shared, called joint custody, which means the children live with one parent most of the time but spend substantial time living with the other parent too. However, only one parent can be the primary physical custodian and use their address for official purposes.

If a parent fights for sole physical custody, it means that the children live full-time with one parent, but the other parent is usually granted regular visitation time.

Legal Custody

Legal custody means the parent’s right to make critical life decisions like consenting to health care, deciding where the children will go to school, and supervising their religious instruction and practices. Georgia family courts typically award joint legal custody unless doing so would not be in the children’s best interests.

Family Law Is Gender Neutral

Many fathers assume that the mother of their children will be favored in custody issues. While this may have been true decades ago, today Georgia family law states that judges must make child custody decisions without regard to the gender of either parent.

Establishing Legal Parental Rights

A father can petition a Georgia family court to receive primary physical custody, legal custody, or shared custody of his child, but he must establish his paternity and legitimize the child. A father who was married to a child’s mother at the time of that child’s birth is automatically considered to be the child’s legal father under current law.

An unmarried father must take steps in court to prove his biological connection. For example, he could sign a Voluntary Paternity Acknowledgment form with the mother when their child is born or shortly thereafter, or he could submit to a DNA test to establish his paternity.

Additionally, an unmarried father must undergo a legitimation process to create a legal relationship between him and his children outside of biological paternity. Without legitimation, a biological father may not be granted custody of his children or any visitation rights, but he could still be ordered to pay child support. For these reasons, any dad seeking to challenge his legal access to his children should enlist the help of a Suwanee fathers’ rights attorney.

Custody and Visitation Rights for Dads

A father who has established his paternity and legitimized his children has equal standing with their mother to seek custody or visitation. A judge must make child-sharing decisions based on the following factors:

• The home environment of both parents;
• Both parents’ relationships and attachments to their children;
• Both parents’ mental and physical capacities to care for their children; and
• Either party’s history of substance abuse, domestic violence, or neglect.

Depending on how these and other factors balance out, a judge may award sole physical and legal custody to one parent or joint custody to both parents. A Suwanee parental rights attorney could help fathers understand how these decisions are made.

Joint Parenting Plans Allow You the Most Control

The Official Code of Georgia § 19-9-1 requires parents who live apart to establish a detailed parenting plan. This plan governs how they co-parent their children. It includes a parenting schedule with transportation arrangements, how the parents will divide decision-making responsibility, and a mechanism for resolving disputes about the children. You can design your plan to leverage each parent’s strengths and accommodate your children’s unique needs and preferences to everyone’s satisfaction.

Working with a mediator in these cases is helpful. Our legal team in Suwanee can offer advice and guidance to you as a father to negotiate your rights and make a plan. Whatever process you use, developing your own parenting plan keeps the control in your and your co-parent’s hands rather than leaving these critical decisions to a judge.

How Judges Make Custody Decisions

When parents cannot agree on legal and physical custody arrangements, each will submit a parenting plan to the family court judge that describes their preferred arrangement. The judge will review both plans and either accept one or create a different plan they believe best serves the children.

In such situations, parents can request or judges may often appoint a custody evaluator to make recommendations regarding the best interests of the children. The custody evaluation is usually conducted by a mental health professional. This evaluation may assess the environment in both homes or focus on a specific issue.

The family court judge is not required to accept the custody evaluator’s recommendation, but it typically carries significant weight in their decision. Our Suwanee family law attorneys can help you as a dad prepare for the evaluation to give you the best chance of maintaining your rights and obtaining your desired result.

Fathers and Child Support

Child support payments are meant to help a custodial parent with expenses incurred from raising kids, which might include rent or mortgage payments, utility bills, and food and clothing costs. Parents who share relatively equal custody typically have lower child support payments, whereas payments are usually higher in cases where one parent provides most of the child care.

Child support is determined using a formula that considers each parent’s contribution to the couple’s joint income, how many children the parents share, and how many other children either parent supports. The amount is then adjusted to account for the cost of providing health and dental insurance for the child and work-related child care expenses. Other adjustments to the support amount are possible when:

• One parent’s income is higher or lower than the guideline income range;
• A child has extraordinary medical or educational expenses;
• The parenting plan requires a parent or child to travel a significant distance to have visits.

Other deviations from the formula’s child support amount may be possible, depending on your specific circumstances.

Fathers who have custody of their children can petition the court or ask Georgia’s Division of Child Support Services for help with seeking child support payments. Custodial dads can also ask a judge to hold mothers in contempt for failing to make the necessary payments. In any case, dads who wish to make changes to their child-sharing arrangements should consult with a fathers’ rights attorney in Suwanee about how best to accomplish their goals.

Contact a Suwanee Fathers’ Rights Attorney Today

Sometimes family law cases seem to be stacked against fathers. Even though the law may be equal, it can be difficult to fight against long-established stereotypes and prejudices against dads. Get the help you need to protect your relationship with your children by scheduling an appointment with a Suwanee fathers’ rights lawyer today.