South Carolina Family Law Blog : Spartanburg Divorce Lawyer & Attorney : Stevens-MacPhail Law Firm : South Carolina Family Law Serving Columbia, Charleston, Greenville, Hilton Head Island

Today, my law partner, Paul MacPhail, addresses the question: whether for child custody purposes, a parent can reside in more than one state?

Yes. Relying on a 1975 case, which held that “… a person may have only one domicile, but may have several residences”, the Court of Appeals in South Carolina has recently issued an opinion that a parent can be a resident of more than one state for purposes of determining what state can modify a custody order.

This is important because one of the factors for jurisdiction under the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act asks for the court to determine if the child, the child’s parents, or any person acting as parent resides in the state where the last order pertaining to the child was issued.

In this case, the parent and child lived in South Carolina for several years after the last order was issued in Georgia, and the non-custodial parent (mother) had moved to Florida. Mother tried to register the Georgia order in South Carolina and then asked the court to modify the order. Father claimed that while Father and child were living in South Carolina, he also still maintained a residency in Georgia, so Georgia still had jurisdiction over the case.

The Court of Appeals agreed with Father. Even though Father and Child clearly resided in South Carolina, and had been living there for a number of years, Father had also remained a resident of Georgia, where he is registered to vote, owns real estate, holds a Georgia driver’s license, files his income taxes, and remains an enrolled student. Finally, on his student loan application Father listed his permanent city as North Augusta, South Carolina, but his state of legal residence as Georgia.

The case is Russell v. Cox, 2009-SC-0428.212, opinion number 4535, dated April 27, 2009, and you can read it HERE.

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What happens when a married parent leaves with a child to a foreign country, and refuses to return?  It happened to David Goldman, and for 4 ½ years, he was not allowed to see his son. In that time, his wife divorced him in a foreign country, remarried, and died, leaving Mr. Goldman’s child in the custody of her surviving husband in a foreign country.  You can read much more about Mr. Goldman's struggle to assert his rights and the obstacles he had to overcome in doing so by clicking HERE.

Source:  "After bitter 4-year fight, he finally sees his son again. Dad has ‘beautiful’ reunion with boy whose mother abducted him to Brazil" by Mike Celizic, published at Today.MSNBC.com.  Thanks also to my law partner, Paul MacPhail, for his contribution to this post.

 

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Before a party may file an action for divorce or separation, at least one of the parties must have been a resident of South Carolina for more than one year, or both spouses must have resided in South Carolina for at least three months.

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The South Carolina Supreme Court affirmed in part and reversed in part a Family Court’s decision enforcing a final divorce order, requiring that the father pay his share of the medical and educational expenses of the child.  The Court first determined that, because both parents had moved out of state since the original proceeding, the lower court had jurisdiction only over matter where the mother sought to enforce a final order, not over matters still on appeal. Thus, the Court voided for lack of jurisdiction the family court’s suspension of overnight visitation rights because the appellate court would have exclusive jurisdiction over the matter on appeal. Because the order modifying the terms of visitation was void for lack of jurisdiction, the father could not be held in contempt for violating the order.

You can read the full text of Arnal v. Fraser by clicking HERE.

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