Mississippi Custody

Physical custody refers to the periods of time when one parent is responsible for care of the child.¹ Legal custody means decision-making rights and responsibilities related to the child’s health, education, and welfare.²

Joint physical custody means that each parent has regular and continuing contact with the child and a significant period of time when the child is in his/her care.³ Joint legal custody means that both parents share decision-making rights and responsibilities regarding the health, education, and welfare of the child. A joint legal custody order also requires that you and the other parent consult before making decisions regarding the health, education, and welfare of the child.⁴

¹ Miss. Code § 93-5-24(5)(b)
² Miss. Code § 93-5-24(5)(d)
³ Miss. Code § 93-5-24(5)(c)
⁴ Miss. Code § 93-5-24(5)(e)

If the judge finds that a parent has a history of committing family violence, the judge should assume that it is not in the child’s best interest for the abusive parent to have sole or joint legal and physical custody. However, the abusive parent can present evidence to try to change the judge’s mind. The judge may find that there is a history of committing family violence if:

• one incident of family violence has caused you serious bodily injury; or
• there has been a pattern of family violence against you, your family/household member, or the abusive parent’s family/household member.¹

The judge also has to make a written statement explaining how the family violence affected his/her custody decision.¹ In deciding whether to grant custody to a parent who committed violence, the judge will consider whether or not the parent who committed family violence:

• has shown that giving him/her sole or joint physical or legal custody of the child is in the best interest of the child due to the other parent's absence, mental illness, substance abuse or another situation that affects the best interest of the child;
• has successfully finished a batterer's treatment program, an alcohol or drug abuse counseling program, or a parenting class if the judge decides any of these programs are appropriate;
• is on probation or parole or has a restraining order issued against him/her and whether or not s/he has complied with its terms and conditions; and
• has committed any other acts of domestic violence.²

¹ Miss. Code § 93-5-24(9)(a)(i)
² Miss. Code § 93-5-24(9)(a)(iii)

If you are not comfortable with the abuser being alone with your child, you might be thinking about asking the judge to order that visits with your child be supervised.  If you are already in court because the abuser filed for visitation or custody, you may not have much to lose by asking that the visits be supervised if you can present a valid reason for your request (although this may depend on your situation).

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 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 majority of cases, supervised visits are only a temporary measure.  Although the exact visitation order will vary by state, county, or judge, the judge might order a professional to watch the other parent on a certain amount of visits or order a relative to supervise the visits for a certain amount of time -- and if there are no obvious problems, the visits may likely become unsupervised.  Oftentimes, at the end of a case, the other parent ends up with more frequent and/ or longer visits than s/he had before you went into court or even some form of custody.

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 what may be best in your situation, please go to our MS Finding a Lawyer page to seek out legal advice.