Dad Loses Custody Change to Move Out of State Even with Moms DWI
Tennessee child custody case summary on relocation.
Michael Todd Sansom v. Amanda Jane Sansom – Tennessee divorce relocation denied
The mother and father in this Williamson County, Tennessee, parental relocation case were divorced in 2012. They agreed to a parenting plan for their daughter, who was about two years old. The mother was named the primary residential parent with 284 days of parenting time, and the father received 140 days per year of parenting time.
The mother was an alcoholic, but at the time of the divorce, the trial court found that her alcohol abuse was under control at that time. But about a week after the divorce, the daughter began telling stories of incidents where the mother was clearly intoxicated. In 2014, she was arrested for a third offense of driving under the influence.
Shortly after the arrest, the father filed a petition to modify the parenting plan and for emergency temporary custody. The mother contested the petition, and argued that the father’s true reason for filing it was that he was no longer employed in Tennessee and wanted to relocate to Virginia. After a number of preliminary hearings and rulings, the trial court issued its order in 2016. The trial court ruled that the mother would remain the primary residential parent, based in part upon the father’s desire to move to Virginia. In doing so, it applied the Tennessee Parental Relocation Statute. Since the child was then spending most of her time with the mother, the court applied the portion of the statute used when the parent making the request is not spending substantially more time with the child. After post-trial motions, the father appealed to the Tennessee Court of Appeals.
The court noted that under the relevant portion of the statute, the father had the burden of proof of showing that the move would be in the child’s best interests. The appeals court examined the relevant statutory factors, and addressed how the lower court had applied them. The appeals court reviewed the evidence regarding each of the statutory factors, and ultimately concluded that each of the lower court’s rulings was within the spectrum of rulings within the lower court’s discretion. Since the standard of review for such findings is whether there was an abuse of discretion, the appeals court affirmed the lower court’s ruling.
The father did fare better in other parts of the appeal, since the Court of Appeals agreed that the child support had been calculated incorrectly. For that reason, the Court of Appeals affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded the case.
No. W2016-01026-COA-R3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. May 10, 2017).
See original opinion for exact language. Legal citations omitted.
To learn more, see Tennessee Parent Relocation Statute Law.
See also Tennessee Parenting Plans and Child Support Worksheets: Building a Constructive Future for Your Family featuring examples of parenting plans and child support worksheets from real cases available on Amazon.com.
