NASHVILLE, Tenn. - A national legal panel that works to standardize state laws wants to simplify child custody rules for military service members, whose frequent deployments can leave them without clear legal recourse when family disputes erupt.
The Uniform Law Commission, an influential group of some 350 attorneys appointed by all the states, met in Nashville on Wednesday and gave final approval to the Deployed Parents Custody and Visitation Act. It is a set of uniform codes to standardize custody rights for parents who are deployed.
With deployments on the rise from the first Gulf War through the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, especially for National Guard and Reserve members, a majority of the states have implemented a patchwork of laws designed to protect service members in child custody and visitation cases. But the rules aren't consistent across the country, says Eric Fish, legal counsel for the Uniform Law Commission.
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State courts have struggled with how to determine jurisdiction when a military member is assigned to a base in another state, whether a stepparent or grandparent can have visitation rights when a parent is deployed and whether a temporary custody arrangement should be made permanent when a parent returns from assignment, among others.
The commission has been crafting consistent state laws for over a century, including the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act, which is used in 49 states as a standard for establishing jurisdiction and child support orders between states. Its drafts are recommendations and need to be enacted by state legislatures.
Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class John Moreno deployed in 2007 while his wife was pregnant with his daughter, Vanessa, at their home in Virginia. But when he returned, he found his wife had moved to Arizona and refused to let him see his daughter.
He petitioned a judge in Virginia to order her to return his daughter, but he said the judge claimed that he didn't have jurisdiction because Moreno had been given military orders to leave Virginia.
He's gone through a string of attorneys, but never had any legal success. He said he feels like he has fewer rights in the custody case because he is a service member and the courts don't know what rights he is afforded
"It seems like every time I go to court I get beat up because I am in the military," said Moreno, who is 31 and working as an air-traffic controller for the Navy in New Orleans.
The Uniform Law Commission, which writes only state legislation, has opposed a proposed federal law because they argue family law is a states' rights issue.
Attorney Mark Sullivan, a retired Army reserve JAG colonel, helped draft the uniform code. He said a key point establishes that the mere absence of a military parent from a state will not be used to deprive that state of custody jurisdiction.
"For service members, the move is not voluntary and that involuntary move should not be punished by the loss of jurisdiction," said Sullivan.
