My boyfriend and I live in Illinois. He has joint cusody of his 3 children with his exwife. He was paying almost 50% of his check for child support, and picking them up on the weekends. As of Feb of 2006 he was injured on the job, and hasn't worked since. His ex wife dropped the children off March of 2006 and has seen them 2 times since then. We now have not heard from her in months, and we don't know where she is at! My question is, is there a child abandonement law? Does she lose her legal rights to the children after so long. They have no insurance or anykind of benefits and we want to transfer them to our school district. We think drugs might be involved, and don't want her to have any legal rights to the children. Thank you Lisa