We love our kids. That’s why custody battles often become so heated and contentious. Courts consider many factors when ruling on child custody, including criminal records. If you have a felony conviction on your sheet, for instance, that can impact your case, who ultimately gets custody, and visitation.
Our founding partner, Rick Jones, regularly appears on the Danny Bonaduce and Sarah Morning Show, where he addresses various family law topics. On a recent show, a listener asked this very question.
Text-In Question:
Listener: “Does being convicted of a felony automatically prevent you from getting custody or visitation of your child?”
Rick: “It won’t prevent you, but certainly it’s going to be a factor to consider. The courts are not going to be so objective in their standard where they say, ‘If this happens you’re out of your child’s life.’
“You can imagine, you can have a felony for all sorts of different reasons, and all sorts of phases in life. They’re going to consider what the nature of it is, and whether or not you present a danger to your own child.”
Danny: “Right, and just so you know, this’ll help the texter out a little bit, I have three felony convictions on my record. They all stopped over 30 years ago, I’ve been a stellar citizen, it didn’t even come up in my divorce. Not one time did anybody ask me, ‘Are you sober these days,’ because I’d been such a good boy for so long. So if that happens, you still have a very good chance.”
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