[JMercer]

My daughter is trying to get her daughter's father's right terminated. She is getting different information form family court. She hired a lawyer, who has since disconnected her phone and shut her office without returning the retainer. So I would like to help her. Who should she talk to at the family court to start the process? The father has been absent (no money, no contact) since Dec 1st. She would like to marry and have her husband adopt her daughter.

[stinawords]

Well then she needs to be married for at least a year first. Most states have this as a requirement. Then she can ask the dad to sign off to allow the adoption. That would be her best bet because a judge won't just terminate his rights unless he can be proven to be a danger to the child or there is someone eligible to adopt that wants to and even then (the adoption part) if the father shows up to say he dosen't want to allow the adoption there is little she can do. Has she gone to court for a support order? That would be her first step besides the wedding.

[JMercer]

The problem is the father is nowhere to be found. Can't she use abandonment as a reason for terminating rights.

[stinawords]

No she can't. There are only a couple states that consider no contact/support to be abandonment and even in those states it hasn't been long enough. What state is she in? Has she looked in to getting a Private Investigator? They are pretty good at their job.

[Fr_Chuck]

The bio father will have to be tried to be contacted, there has to be a search made according to court rules. If they are not found, it would be posted in the legal news. After that point the court will normally allow the rights taken away.

But understand, merely not paying and not seeing the child, esp for less than a year is not grounds to have rights taken away.

The father not showing up in court to fight for the child's right may be enough for the court to take the rights away