Surefire Tips For Improving The Odds Of Winning Your Child Custody Case

No one can anticipate when or how a child custody case will become contentious, but your best offense depends on the time and effort you put into building a great defense. Children are precious and innocent, so it is vital that you focus on building your case in an ethically and legally sound way. Since the other party likely won't voluntarily help you to build your case, you will need to be your own best advocate.

Establishing Credibility

Within the court system, particularly within the family courts, a party's credibility can be the most important factor in deciding a child custody case. If the judge, commissioner, or mediator has any reason to believe what you say is untrue, your credibility essentially becomes shot. You can help to establish your credibility by stating only the most relevant facts and then providing the appropriate supporting documentation. Receipts for child care expenses, personal journals detailing visitation, medical records, text messages and records of other communication between the other parent and yourself should be used to prove your stance.

Maintaining and Keeping Documentation

There are few situations where you want to assume the worst, but when it comes to child custody cases, the actions of the opposing party can be quite unpredictable. Maintaining documentation eliminates future conflict, and it also helps to keep legal costs lower. Sometimes objections as to the validity of your documented records can be raised, so make sure that you have several defenses in place to back up every one of your stated facts. Consult with your family law attorney prior to installing a camera in your car or home. Video documentation can help to assert when and where past child visitation periods have actually taken place as opposed to human recollection, which can be faulty at best.

Witnesses and Supporting Evidence

Family members, neighbors, friends, teachers and others can be summoned to help support your child custody case. You may also want to rely on other types of supporting evidence, such as video footage or phone records, which is both admissible in court and virtually taper proof. Technologically advanced evidence is very effective because they are generally captured when one or both parties are unaware. Your family law attorney can use this evidence to help support your case.

The only ones winning in your child custody case should ultimately be the children in question. If it is in their best interest to spend equal amounts of time with both child, try to frame your case with that factor in mind. Otherwise, use the tools that present themselves to you for defending your position and asserting your parental rights.