Conozca la Ley: North Dakota
ACTUALIZADA 21 de julio, 2010
Please consider getting help from an organization in your area before proceeding with court action. To find an organization, please go to the Where to Find Help tab at the top of this page.
- General information
- Who can get custody or visitation?
- How the custody process works
- After a custody order is in place
General information
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In North Dakota, custody is called "parenting rights and responsibilities." When a judge makes a custody order, he or she will decide about both "decisionmaking responsibility" and "residential responsibility."
"Decisionmaking responsibility" is the responsibility to make decisions concerning the child. The term may refer to decisions on all issues or on specified issues, but not child support issues.* Some types of decisions often included in this are:
- where your child goes to school,
- whether your child gets surgery, and
- what kind of religious training your child receives.
"Residential responsibility" means a parent's responsibility to provide a home for the child. If a parent has more than 50% of the residential responsibility, then the law calls that "primary residential responsibility."*
When a judge decides these things, it is all written down and explained in a "parenting plan," so each parent knows his and her rights and responsibilities for the child.*
* N.D.C.C. Sec. 14-09-00.1. Definitions.
arribaWhat is a parenting plan and what does it include?
A parenting plan is a written plan describing each parent's rights and responsibilities.*
If you go to court for custody -- or to establish decisionmaking and/or residential responsibilities, then you will create a parenting plan that the judge will include as part of the court order. If you cannot agree, the judge will make one for you, based on what he or she thinks is in the best interest of the child.
A parenting plan must address:
1. decisionmaking responsibilities for routine day to day decisions and major decisions such as education, health care, and spiritual development;
2. information sharing and access to the child, including telephone and email or other electronic access;
3. legal residence of a child for school attendance;
4. residential responsibility (where the child will live), parenting time (visitation), and parenting schedule, including holidays, vacations, birthdays, weekends, weekdays, and summers.
5. how the child will be exchanged and transportation, considering the safety of the parties;
6. procedures for reviewing and adjusting the parenting plan; and
g. methods for resolving disputes about the plan or the child.**
* N.D.C.C. Sec. 14-09-00.1
** N.D.C.C. Sec. 14-09-30
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There are many reasons some people choose not to get an order from a court regarding their children. Some people decide not to get an order because they don't want to get the courts involved. They may have an informal agreement that works well for them or they may think going to court will provoke the other parent into seeking more time and more rights with the child.
In some cases, it is a good idea to get the courts involved, and you will have to make that choice based on your particular situation.
If you do decide to go to court, then you can get some specific things spelled out by the judge, so that there is no confusion as to which parent has which responsibilities. For many people, this is important. If you go to court, a judge can give you (or the other parent):
- The responsibility to make decisions about your child;
- The responsibility to have your child live with you or to have the child live with both of you; and
- The responsiblity to give or receive child support payments.
Without an order by the court, parents have equal rights to their child. For example, the police cannot take a child from one parent and return it to the other parent without a court order in place saying so.
arribaShould I start a court case to ask for supervised visitation?
If you are not comfortable with the abuser being alone with your child, you might be thinking about asking the judge to order that visitation (or "parenting time") with your child be supervised. If you are already in court because the abuser filed for custody or parenting time, you may want to go ahead and ask that the visits be supervised.
However, if there is no current court case, please get legal advice BEFORE you start a court case to ask for supervised visits. We strongly recommend that you talk to an attorney who specializes in custody matters and domestic violence to find out what you would have to prove to get the visits supervised and how long supervised visits would last, based on the facts of your case.
In the great majority of cases, supervised visits are only temporary. The judge might order a professional to observe the parent on a few visits or the visits might be supervised by a relative for a few months. Then, if there are no obvious problems, the visits will likely become unsupervised. Oftentimes, the parent ends up with more frequent and/ or longer visits than s/he had before you went into court. The parent may even end up with shared decisionmaking or residential responsibilities.
In some cases, to protect your child from immediate danger by the abuser, starting a case to ask for custody and supervised visits is appropriate. To find out if that is best in your situation, please go to ND Finding a Lawyer to seek out legal advice.