With Hurricane Florence slowly approaching Charleston and with South Carolina’s northeastern coast under a mandatory evaluation order, I’ve spent the past few days with my office closed fielding a number of questions from current clients regarding evacuation and visitation in the midst of unpredictable weather conditions. Most of these questions address visitation issues and my […]
Archive for the ‘Not South Carolina Specific’ Category
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 […]
A client’s tolerance for uncertainty is a consideration in settlement negotiations
There’s a theory that our modern world offers us so little exposure to pathogens that our autoimmune systems overreact to things like pollen and peanuts, causing a massive increase in allergic reactions to relatively benign substances. On a level of culture I see something similar playing out with the human ability to tolerate risk. Evolved […]
Mediator or messenger
During the past few weeks two attorneys I greatly respect have conducted mediations for my clients. One mediator settled every single case, often in circumstances in which I thought reaching settlement would be difficult. The other attorney failed to obtain a settlement in a case that frankly should have settled without much difficulty. This had […]
Crossing the Rubicon
Per wikipedia, during the Roman republic, the river Rubicon marked the boundary between the Roman province of Cisalpine Gaul to the north-west and Italy proper (controlled directly by Rome and its allies) to the south. Governors of Roman provinces were appointed promagistrates with imperium (roughly, “right to command”) in one or more provinces. The governor […]
Smith case reveals judges do more than simply call balls and strikes
After I posted my blog on the May 9, 2018 South Carolina Supreme Court opinion in SCDSS v. Smith to Facebook, a number of my attorney friends commented with dismay about the court’s consideration of the Grandmother’s limited income as a factor in allowing Foster Parents (and not Grandmother) to adopt the minor child […]
Attorney-client privilege’s crime-fraud exception in family court
The recent FBI search of the records of Michael Cohen, President Trump’s attorney, has raised issues of attorney-client privilege and the crime-fraud exception to that privilege. Attorney-client privilege is the client’s right (and the attorney’s obligation) to shield a client’s disclosures to the attorney and that attorney’s advice to the client from exposure to others […]