Foster Child Custody Argued in CA and OH

An Orange County woman can hold onto her two-year-old foster daughter at least through the holidays and to the new year, per a California appellate court justice ruling, and reported by My Fox LA.

The woman, Stacey Doss, resides in Santa Ana, CA., and is battling the girl's birth father in Ohio.

The panel of justices believe that Doss should remain in California and maintain custody while the case is being sorted out.

The child's father, Benjamin Mills Jr., and his attorneys, have been given until December 24 to file their legal briefs with the Fourth District Court of Appeal in Santa Ana.

After hearing merits of the case, Associate Justices Eileen Moore, Richard Aronson and William Rylaardsam, were given a full 90 days to issue their final ruling.  They also have the right to lengthen that amount of time.

After the hearing was over Doss said, "I am comforted Vanessa will stay with me through Christmas."

In Ohio a trial is set to start on December 6.  Authority over those proceedings will most likely not fall under the California appellate justice's jurisdictions.

Doss's attorneys have told her not to participate in the Ohio custody hearing.  They have warned her that if she were to try - thereby acknowledging Ohio's jurisdiction - that her rights in California may be relinquished. 

If Doss doesn't participate in the Ohio hearing she runs the risk of losing custody of her daughter to her biological grandmother - that lives in Ohio.  If that were to happen Doss would have to be satisfied with only regular visitation.

The little girl, Vanessa, is Doss's ultimate concern.  Doss feels that the courts should do what's best for the child.  She has decided that if the lower court in Ohio rules against her that she will go to the Ohio appellate court.

Questions of which court has jurisdiction, and if Doss can even gain the right to an appeal of rulings made by the California Family Court judges - as they are relinquishing their jurisdiction to Ohio - are all being sorted out.

Doss was unable to conceive a child of her own for many years and finally decided to adopt.  An agency she contacted connected her with Andrea Conley, Vanessa's birth mother, who agreed to give her child up to Doss after she was born.

Mills has a history of domestic violence with Conley, a criminal background and has had his driver's license suspended on more than one occasion for failure to pay child support.

Mills' mother already has custody of Vanessa's two half-sisters, and two other children her son has had with another woman. 

The judge in Ohio will be taking Mills' unsuitability into consideration while the California justices weigh whether it would be best for Vanessa to return to social services in Ohio - as it has been ordered - while judges from both states sort out the custody issue.

Are you concerned about protecting your rights as the parent of an adopted child in a custody dispute?  Click here to contact a family law attorney in our directory for assistance.