Back in 1997 my husband was informed by his on and off again girlfriend that
she was pregnant. Later that year the in November the child was born. At the
time my husband signed a paternity affidavit believing that he was the child's
father. Months later the mother admitted that he may not be the child's father,
after which she left the state and moved to Virginia.
For background reasons: the child was conceived and born in Indiana, my
husband has lived in Indiana is whole life. My husband was only 18 at the time
the child was born. Under Indiana law a paternity affidavit can not be revoked
with out a court order after 60 days.
In 2001 my husband received a notice from the courts in PA. The notice was to
inform him that the mother of said child had filed for custody and that he was
required to come to the conference on the scheduled date. We had no knowledge
that she had even moved to PA. My husband and I attended the conference with the
plans on having a paternity test done. He was told that since he signed a
paternity affidavit that he had no rights to one. They then forced him into a
custody agreement. When we received the court order, the conference officer did
not include any information about my husband requesting a paternity test.
Under PA law paternity affidavits are inconclusive if they are signed before
January 1st of 1998, my husband signed his affidavit on November 2nd of 1997. We
found this information out on our own months later. My husband and I have had
minimal contact with the child over the years. We have seen the child maybe 8
times since the mother moved out of state and those visits were with my husbands
parents not with us.
A year later in 2002 my husband receives another notice from PA. This time it
is for a support conference. In the documents it states that the mother filed
for child support in May of 2000, yet this notice is the first we had heard of
her filing. It also stated a conference date which was set one week from the day
we had received the notice. My husband called the Domestic Relations office. He
explained that we had just gotten the letter and that we were unable to attend
and that we had no time to retain a lawyer for the conference with such short
notice. They informed him of the steps he needed to take in order to have the
conference rescheduled and that it was also up to the mother of the child if
this rescheduling would happen. My husband followed the instructions and asked
for the conference to be rescheduled. In the letter he also requested a
paternity test. After receiving a fax confirmation he then called the DRO to
make sure they received his fax and they confirmed they had. Needless to say the
conference went on without us.
A couple weeks later we received a wage withholding statement in the mail.
(My husband had not supplied them with any financial information.) They had set
up the child support for over $800 a month. They then figured this amount back
to her filing date and awarded her over $20,000 in back support. They then
proceeded with the wage attachment all before the judge had even signed the
order. We called Domestic Relations again. They told us we would have to wait
for the actual order to come in before we could appeal this amount. When we
received the court order the conference officer noted that my husband had
requested information on how to get our conference rescheduled but that he never
made such a request. She also noted that we had brought up paternity but that it
was not an issue due to the signed affidavit. At our appeal hearing they took
the correct financial information for my husband and lowered our payments by
$10.00.
At the time I had not worked for over 2 years and was staying at home with
our 2 year old daughter. We were also getting ready to build our own home. Since
then I have had to put my daughter into daycare and get a job to help support
us. We still live in the same apartment complex. Domestic Relations claims that
this outrageous amount is fair and just. We live in a Indianapolis a major U.S.
city. After this "just" amount of support we could not even pay our
bills on my husbands salary alone.
After receiving their "new amount" we again filed an appeal. This
time we had saved up enough money to hire a lawyer. We paid her $2000 in
advance. This amount was to take us through the appeal. According to her
calculations we shouldn’t have been paying over $500 a month. When we finally
received a new conference date they had set it for 3 months out. I did not trust
this lawyer. She kept telling us we couldn’t fight the issues concerning
paternity and jurisdiction. That there was no hope. A couple of weeks before the
appeal date she talks to my husband and changes her views on everything we
wanted done. Not that any of that mattered. On the day of the appeal the mother
of the child shows up with out her lawyer and the judge grants her a
continuance. The mother of the child has had the same lawyer since her custody
conference and had known about the conference date for 3 months just like us. It
was obvious it was intentionally done. We later received notice about the
rescheduling. My husband then tries to contact his lawyer and could not reach
her and was never called back. Two days before the rescheduled date he finally
talks to his lawyer. They informed him that they needed $2000 more before they
could attend on his behalf. My husband ended up having a phone conference
scheduled. Nothing was changed. We decided not to file another appeal.
I am a very determined and resourceful person. I started asking myself for
the answers to this problem. I wanted to know why it took 2 1/2 years to place a
support order. When I anonymously asked domestic relations this question they
said that "when someone files for support a date is scheduled no more than
2 months out". I wanted to know what gave them the right to make a support
order against him. I wanted to know how they could use a inconclusive document
as conclusive evidence. Simple, they cant do any of it. Every order they have
against him is illegal.
According to PA law custody and support are 2 separate issues. Since my
husband lives in Indiana they have to get jurisdiction over him. In the case of
custody he attended the conference which submitted him to their jurisdiction, in
the case of support they have none. He has never been out there for a support
issue. When asked how they had jurisdiction PA responds that it is long arm
because he came out there for a custody case. It's all bullshit. You cant say
they are two separate issues and then have one affect the other. Its also
illegal. According to the Uniform Custody Act you can not use a submission to
jurisdiction on custody to affect any other legal matter. PA has adopted the
Uniform Custody Act. So that leaves the question "Do they really have
jurisdiction over him?" In our case, no. In the UIFSA guidelines it states
requirements for long arm jurisdiction. None of these apply to my husband. In
case's where the someone does not fall under the long arm guidelines, UIFSA
states that the case must be submitted to the state that person lives in and
that state would be responsible for making and upholding the support order. So
when she submitted her claim for support, PA should have sent it to IN, the
state we live in. IN would then make up the order and up hold it by their
guidelines. PA adopted UIFSA's guidelines on April 4th 1996.
The short of it. PA has a custody and support order against my husband based
off of an inconclusive paternity affidavit and a support order with out proper
jurisdiction. They are using everything they can to take our hard earned money
and brand my husband a "dead beat father". I'm writing this in hopes
someone knows a good lawyer we can trust. We desperately need to find one.
If anyone has any questions, comments or information please email us at
beethann@hotmail.com. Please put PA help in the subject line so we can decipher
it from junk mail.
Thanks Beth
