This topic concerns whether Colorado is a Mother’s Rights state or a Father’s Rights state in custody actions. I’m gonna talk to you a little bit about the law when it concerns whether or not Colorado favors mothers over fathers or fathers over mothers. In fact, in Colorado, the law is gender neutral. That means that the court makes a decision about what’s best for a child regardless of whether or not the parent who is requesting parenting time or primary care is a man or a woman. It is not something that a court is even allowed to consider whether one parent is female or male.

I’ve often heard advertising from lawyers stating that they are a father’s rights law firm and I have to chuckle when I hear that because obviously that advertisement is meant to place fear into the the heart of a father who’s seeking parental rights. Unnecessarily, that father should know, just like all mothers should know, that when a judge decides parenting time and custody, a judge is doing that regardless of gender. That means that the judge is colorblind and is not going to prefer a man or a woman, and a father or a mother should not have preference in a custody case.

A court has to carefully consider the child’s best interest. The court is going to look at what kind of pattern of parenting time has taken place between the parties, how are the children or the child bonded with each parent. And this is another serious, thoughtful consideration that you should be making when you are involved in one of these cases, so that you can come up with a strategy that you know a judge is going to be looking at in deciding your child custody case.

In Colorado, there are essentially two different kinds of cases that involve children. These cases are called allocation or parental responsibilities, which are actions between parents or third-parties that involve children. There are also cases filed as divorce cases where the parties have children.

As a lawyer, I spend much of my time arguing for the best interest of children. Young children and adolescents are impacted in these kinds of cases in different ways; most of the time, young children will continue to hope their parents will get back together, while adolescents tend to rely more on their friends or outsiders rather than family to help adjust to this massive change in their lives.

Children going through a divorce or a custody situation are going to have to deal with the consequences of a fractured home of parents that are not going to be living in the same household. Maybe mom and dad are not going to be involved in decision making the same way. In many of these cases, a parent moves to another state or out of town, and the parenting time requires the child or children to be shuffled back and forth—all of which are major adjustments for children.

Depending upon the age of the child, there’s going to be dynamic changes to that child’s life and how they can adjust to these changes. I feel that if a parent really cares about their children it’s important to sit down and discuss what’s going to happen in the future with them, and that they get their children the kind of emotional help they need to be able to deal with the future of a separated home.

In Colorado and most of the 50 states regarding the definition of a child’s home state is dictated by the Uniform Child Custody Judicial Enforcement Act. This act says that a child’s home state is where the child has lived for at least 182 days prior to any court action.

If a parent gets proper orders or permission from the other parent to leave Colorado with a child or children, the question becomes what happens next? A parent can register the case in the child’s new state. An example would be if the parents went through a divorce in Colorado and the father agreed that he would have parenting time, but the mother would be the primary parent and wishes to relocate to the state of Georgia to be closer to her family, and the father has consented to that, and the judge has issued an order approving that.

After six months passes from the time that the orders were entered in Colorado, the mother may be able to make application in the state of Georgia to transfer the case from Colorado to Georgia, arguing that it’s more convenient to have the Georgia court address post-decree disputes, custody disputes and visitation disputes in Georgia now that the children have been away.

By the same token, let’s assume that parents have no custody orders and they’ve just moved to Colorado. Before they can file any action in the state of Colorado, the children have to be here for 182 consecutive days before it is appropriate to file any action here.

There are some exceptions to that in cases where there are certain emergencies and that’s why it’s always good to consult with a lawyer regarding the filing of custody actions in Colorado when it’s questionable as to how long the children have been here and what proof you have that Colorado is the children’s home state.