August 2018

August 29th, 2018

<i>Stoney</i> 2 (or 4) largely follows the original <i>Stoney</i> opinion

The long strange journey of the Stoney appeal took another step on August 29, 2018 when the Court of Appeals issued its remanded opinion in Stoney v. Stoney, 425 S.C. 47, 819 S.E.2d 201 (Ct. App. 2018). Told by the Supreme Court to review the case on a de novo standard of review, and then told by […]

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August 21st, 2018

Can non-custodial parents delegate their parenting time to third-parties?

An issue that commonly arises in interpreting custody orders is whether the non-custodial parent is allowed to delegate his or her (in this culture, mostly his) visitation to third-parties during his custodial periods when the custody order is otherwise silent on the issue. South Carolina case law remains silent on this dispute. However, while acknowledging […]

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August 6th, 2018

The unusual distribution of bi-weekly overnights in most custody trials (or why one’s unlikely to get 50/50 custody except by agreement)

When I first started trying custody cases a quarter century ago, the family court was pretty uniform, and uncreative, in its awards of visitation to the non-custodial parent. Absent a mother’s unfitness, she was very likely to get custody. Absent the non-custodial parent’s unfitness, that parent was likely to get every other weekend. If the […]

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