Ask Divorce Lawyer In Fort Pierce For Help If Child Has To...

Ask Divorce Lawyer In Fort Pierce For Help If Child Has To Testify

Children are always given the chance to testify in divorce trials, if they are asked to. Now, this is something that you might want to avoid at every cost possible. It is always best to just avoid putting child in the middle of a family dispute, especially if that involves the child’s parents getting separated. However, there are some crucial cases, when you cannot avoid this situation and have to involve your little ones even if you don’t want to. During those instances, there are some ways which will help you to allow the child to share his or her thought in custody or visitation matter, without even forcing them to stand in the witness box.

Ways to relieve your child from stress of court testifying:

In place of having a child giving testimony, to the judge can appoint any lawyer. The main aim of this divorce lawyer in Fort Pierce is to rely on the opinions presented by the child and preferences to judge. This can be presented if the child is quite young or if the judge determines that it is not in the child’s best interest to just testify in the court.

You can procure the child’s opinion by letting him or her speak to an appointed child custody evaluator. The little one can further talk with an appointed mediator or an investigator with a friendly and warm approach.

If any one of the above points is used, then a report will be generated concerning the child’s preferences and concerns. Then the said report can be submitted to court and then made available to attorney and parents.

But, this service will be marked confidential. It means that the report will then be sealed in the file of a court and cannot be easily kept by any of the party over here.

Things to expect from a child who is going to testify:

There are some cases, when the child’s testimony becomes a crucial point for the spouse to determine the custody and visitation rights. There are some legal codes which will allow any child of 14 years of age or older to tell a court the preferences in terms of visitation matters or custody. It is given to the child unless the court is the one to determine that the points mentioned might not be good for the child’s interest.

When the judge thinks that the child is old to give testimony, there are various ways in which this testimony can be heard and without even letting the one stand in the witness trial stand.

If the judge wants then he/she might speak to the child directly either in the open court or just privately in chambers.

In case, the child is the one to take the stand, then the attorneys are able to ask some questions. The judge is the one to require attorneys to use some extra restraints when it is time to question any typical witness.

In case, here the judge wants to interview child in his or her chamber, then it is up to the lawyers to provide the judge with a proper set of questions that they want the judge to ask the little member of the family.

At this point, parents will not be given the permission to stay in front of the child. Sometimes, the attorneys are given the permission but not always.

The court always tries to make the little child as comfortable as possible, mostly during such crucial situations so that they can easily speak candidly about parents without any form of fear of reprisal.

What child can speak:

The child is given full permission to let the court know with whom he or she wants to stay. Even if the little one does not have any preference, they can always give court enough information regarding the parent who is covering more parenting duties. A little one might be able to provide some insights into whether parent has any substance abuse based issue or another form of parenting concern over here.
Even when the matter seems quite necessary to have child’s input in divorce matter, it has to be properly handled with care. It is always mandatory to give a Fort Pierce divorce attorney a call as the pros are well-known of the points to consider.

Warm and friendly nature:

It is really important to check out more about the divorce layer and his warm nature before you can let him or her speak to the child. For that, checking out more about the lawyer and his credentials will work out great for you and even the judge to know if that person is the one to help get words out of a child’s mouth. As these lawyers have enough experience in this field so they are more than happy to serve you right.

Emma Dicousta, is an experienced consultants on divorce and family law matters. She has several years of experience in Law. She has written some of the most blogs on divorce and family law matter.

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