[ConcernedGANana]

Our 20 yr. old daughter found out she was pregnant shortly after her relationship ended. She and our grandson (now 17 months old) live with us and we physically, emotionally and financially support them 100%. The birth father is not on the birth certificate nor has he contributed a penny or purchased anything for our grandchild. Although he lives in the same state (GA) he lives in another county and has a child who is 10 months old and lives with that mother. He has seen our grandson only once for about an hour. Because of his criminal past our daughter has been afraid to anger him by filing for child support but finally did 5 months ago. She cannot seem to get any response and/or answers from child support enforcement despite numerous phone calls and visits to their office. The 'father' refuses to take a DNA test although he claims the child as his in his threatening texts to our daughter. We love this child and want only the best for him. Our fear is that if our daughter died he would get custody of our grandson and we would be excluded from his life and he might be put in a dangerous situation. Would this qualify as abandonment and what steps would our daughter need to take? Thanks for your help!

[cdad]

First off he can't refuse a court ordered DNA test. And it shouldn't take more then 5 months to process this in the system. Someone isn't telling the whole story here.

[ConcernedGANana]

OWe have never gone to court... Child support enforcement said he needs to do a DNA test first... which he says he will not do because he cannot afford it... Is C.S. giving us the run around or are we missing some steps here?

[Fr_Chuck]

Sorry, you are putting the horse before the cart.

You need to file in court for custody and child support, And request ( or require) a DNA test from the court. If he does not, he will be held in contempt, locked up in jail till he agrees to the test.
** he can refuse but he can sit in jail also.
** the court can fine him also instead of jail, but normally jail works best.

Next in GA abandoment is only for non payment of child support that is court ordered.

In GA he can have no rights taken away for merely not seeing the child, or for not paying support, ( even court ordered support)

[ConcernedGANana]

OK. Clarifying... Even though he is not on the birth certificate she still would need to file for custody? Would there be ANY chance she could lose custoday? Despite his criminal record/non payment he would get visitation should he chose to visit?

[twinkiedooter]

She needs to go through the legal channels to make sure she has 100% custody. He can request visitation at that time. You really need to get an attorney involved versus do it yourself or ask the Child Support Services people to do it for you. Most CS agencies around the country don't have the $ or the manpower to handle everyone's case as they are too geared up to just collect the money owed by people who already have child support orders in place against them.

As far as her losing custody - that would not happen.

[ConcernedGANana]

Yesterday she received her letter from Child Support telling her a court date was set so on, We were surprised it is set in his county (about 4 1/2 hours away) instead of the county where the baby lives. We are just happy to have a date set! :)