2018 Tuesday — Day in Court

Today our granddaughter Desiree was awarded full custody of her son Tristan. I don’t have enough vocabulary to express our relief and also our gratitude to the judge who obviously was not in favor of the case nor the person who was attempting to get full and permanent guardianship of Tristan.

This custody stuff started a long time ago back in October 2013 when Desiree originally filed for custody of Tristan I think because Tristan's dad, Nick, was not paying any child support and Desiree needed help. I blipped that day, October 10, 2013, and the sad news that Desiree had not been granted custody, but Tristan had been awarded to his dad. Nick had come to court prepared to do battle. I think Desiree was not prepared and had not figured that Nick would even ask for custody.

A year after Nick was awarded custody, Desiree had moved from California to Missouri with her husband who is a Navy Recruiter. So Tristan was still in California. What the courts did not know is that Nick was no longer with his live-in girlfriend, Nichol, but Nick had left Tristan with Nichol and her little son, Tristan's half brother, Jaxon. When Desiree learned that Nick was no longer living in the home where Tristan was living, she knew she could get him back if she were living in California, but she did not feel that a California judge would award her custody to take Tristan out of state.

Last August, Nichol convinced Nick to allow her to seek guardianship of Tristan (we think because she could receive money for him and she could count him on her income taxes). When the paperwork was served to Desiree in Missouri telling her that Nichol was seeking guardianship, Desiree came to California immediately and hired an attorney. In order for the guardianship to be granted, Nick had to relinquish all rights of Tristan to Nichol, and he did.

What Nichol neglected to do was send court certified paperwork to all of Tristan's grandparents because grandparents would be given first choice of custody if Tristan was not wanted by his father or his mother. He was very much wanted by his mom and stepdad, so we are not sure why the grandparent paperwork was so important, but anyway, Nichol's attorney had neglected to send the certified paperwork 15 days previous to court date to the grandparents and the judge permanently dismissed the case.

We were in court less than 45 minutes and it was over.
We are so very thankful.

Desiree will fly home to Missouri Thursday morning greatly relieved.

The day in court had a happy ending. My photo is of the Riverside County Superior Courthouse.
Rosie (& Mr. Fun), aka Carol