Hello, my sons father hasn't seen him in a little over 5 years now. He sometimes pays child support. It depends on if he is working or not. The court just takes it out of his paycheck. But I have tried and tried to get him to be a father and he just refuses. I am married and my husband has raised josh since he was 3. And josh is now almost 11. He wants to adopt josh, but I don't know how to go about this. We live in Florida.

Personally, I would not open this can of worms, especially in Florida. You run the risk that the father, once you file to terminate his rights, will decide he wants sole custody or time sharing. If the father requests his rights to custody or time sharing, the Florida courts are inclined to grant him what he requests despite the fact that your son does not even know him. I am not an attorney and this is not legal advise. I would consult an excellent attorney on this before acting.

I very much disagree with the previous advice. One of the main reasons a court will terminate rights is to clear the way for an adoption. Also absentee fathers are more inclined to agree to an adoption since it will free them from a support obligation. If you have offered him the chance to be a father and he has refused all along, I doubt if he will change his mind now.

What I do agree with is you need to consult an attorney. You are approaching this from the wrong angle. You do not "file for an abandonment". Your husband files a petition to adopt Josh. You need an attorney to properly prepare that petition. As part of the adoption petition, the father will be given the opportunity to relinquish his rights. If he refuses to sign, then your attorney will petition to the court to allow the adoption anyway on GROUNDS of abandonment. The only way the adoption would not be approved is if the father shows up in court and refuses to allow it.

No offense Scott, but I live in Florida and the Court system here is one of the scariest backward malfunctioning messes imaginable. The advice you give is great for NY but not really applicable to the disaster of a "unified family Court" system that we have going here in Florida. I agree the poster needs legal advice from a very competent family law attorney before proceeding.

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Originally Posted by imrachelsmommy

Personally, I would not open this can of worms, especially in Florida. You run the risk that the father, once you file to terminate his rights, will decide he wants sole custody or time sharing. If the father requests his rights to custody or time sharing, the Florida courts are inclined to grant him what he requests despite the fact that your son does not even know him. I am not an attorney and this is not legal advise. I would consult an excellent attorney on this before acting.

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I completely disagree with this post,


You will need to hire an attorney, he will write up adoption paper work and contact your ex to ask them to sign. Since he wants no contact, and he will not have to pay support once the adoption takes place he may be willing to do so.

If he will not sign over his rights it is hard ( if even possible ) to get the adoption

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Originally Posted by imrachelsmommy

No offense Scott, but I live in Florida and the Court system here is one of the scariest backward malfunctioning messes imaginable. The advice you give is great for NY but not really applicable to the disaster of a "unified family Court" system that we have going here in Florida. I agree the poster needs legal advice from a very competent family law attorney before proceeding.

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Can you explain how the system is a backward malfunctioning mess? If it were as backward as your trying to make us believe then the father would already have custody of the children and the mother would be the noncustodial parent.

So how exactly is it suppose to be backwards ?

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Originally Posted by imrachelsmommy

No offense Scott, but I live in Florida and the Court system here is one of the scariest backward malfunctioning messes imaginable. The advice you give is great for NY but not really applicable to the disaster of a "unified family Court" system that we have going here in Florida. I agree the poster needs legal advice from a very competent family law attorney before proceeding.

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Again, can you provide proof of that. I have never heard any categorization of the Fl system as you describe (BTW, my niece works as a paralegal in FL and has specialized in Family Law). Maybe your personal experience was bad, but I don't know what your experience is.

In the OP's situation, we have a father who apparently does not want to have anything to do with his child. And a step father, who has raised this child and wants to adopt. I can't imagine a court that would not approve this adoption even if the bio father objects.