Is it fair that the law usually sides with the mother in a custody case?

This is a sore subnect for my family. Two of my brothers have lost custody of their children to their mothers even though my brothers were able to prove abuse. The first brother lost custody after rasing the two girls for three years without the mothers help. They split because she was caught abusing the older child. She would lock the older child up in a room while her father was at work. DCFS even had a case about it. Yet, she was able to win custody because she took parenting classes. He never hurt those girls so I don't understand how she would be the better parent. My other brother just lost custody of his two sons after he just spent the last four years taking care of them. For the first two years she didn't even visit them. But after she talked to some people and was told how much child support she could get she decided to fight for custody. The past year she would continue to mss the majority of her visits claiming she couldn't afford the gas to come get the boys or that she couldn't afford both gas and food both she needed my brother to pay for at least one or both. The judge didn't see anything wrong with that. Neither boy wanted to live with her. Again the judge didn't care.She went ahead an gave their mother custody. Now all of a sudden she could afford to buy a Cadillac. I do think that our justice system is messed up. The mother isn't always the best parent to be raising the child. And I do believe that fathers are getting scr*wed.

No, it it's fair, but as I used to ask my kids when they'd whine "That isn't fair"... "When did you start expecting life to be fair". ~~~~~ Fairness isn't Fair and Equality is Never Equal. ~ParaTed2k's (Not So) Famous Sayings.

You are absolutely right. There is no way that child should be with the mother. The mother has obvious problems and addictions and needs to deal with them before even beginning to raise a child. The father should definitely be given custody in this case.

I think custody should always go to the parent who is fit to take care of the child, regardless of gender. From the sounds of this "mother", she shouldn't be anywhere near a child acting the way she does, let alone have custody! This kind of ridiculous double standard drives me insane. Custody should always either be shared, or in cases like this, go to whichever parent is better able to take care of the child. This poor man must have been terrified for his child being stuck in such a situation! I hope he does get custody and keep it at least!

I think the law does a right thing to give the custody of a child to mother,as mother understands the child well then a father can....fathers always stays late at work but mother prefers to saty more with her child so mother should be given the custody of a child provided the mother is a good and resposible woman

yeah i think its teh netural and moral right of teh mother to get the custody of the child as she has took all teh efforts to give birth to him/her and still takes ggod care of him/her. she understands teh psychi of the child and thus possesses teh rite to have the child!!!

It is not fair that the law usually sides with the mother in cases of child custody. I am helping to support a close friend of mine who has been in just such a situation for the last three years now. Soon his son will be old enough to make his own decision, and for that we are glad. I have never understood the law in this situation.

Brave soul that you are, seeing that the majority of people on myLot are mothers .. lol ... Yes, it is a shame that the courts usually side with the mothers, in fact, in some states it is not even an issue that the father should get any kind of custody of the child. I have been in the legal field for over 20 years and I have seen some cases that make you shake your head and wonder what the judge was thinking. Currently I am with a man that is a wonderful father, in fact, it was one of the qualities that made me fall in love with him, and he would love nothing more than to take his two beautiful daughters away from her and yes, she should be held in contempt of court for violating the divorce decree, and I try to express to him, often, that although he knows that the girls would be best with him, he can't take 2 little girls away from his mother, she is not abusing them and takes very good care of them, she is just munipulative in her actions in everything in life and one of the stipulations in the divorce decree (which she signed) was that no one would live in the same house as the girls, unless the mother was married, well she is not married, and she has been living with the man that she cheated on with my boyfriend, so in fact, she is in violation of the divorce decree and with that said, he has every right to take the girls away from her. But would they be better with us? Would they be tramatized if he took the girls away from their mother, the woman they look up to? Hell yes, it would be awful, and because I love them so much and consider them mine, I won't let him go through with it. Unless the mother was abusing the child I see no reason that they can't live with them. A mother offers something that I don't think a father can give them. Unfortuantely in this day and age it is rare that a child has both their mother and father that brought them into this world, if they do, more power to them, but there are many, many dysfunctional families out there that are just trying to get by and live happy and get along and be a parted family. I think it is best, no matter, that both parents get along, even if they can't stand one another, do it for the chidren! You only get 18 years with them, only 18 years to raise them, to teach them, to share with them your knowledge and experience, to love them, teach them how to be good morale individuals and make it in the world the best they can. Now in the case of your friend, I hope he has alot of money, no matter what the case is, he is going to need it, in our state it takes a minimum of $50,000 just to get an attorney to side with you, no matter what the mother is doing. Tell him to document EVERYTHING, phone calls, video tape (if he can, camera phones work well) of her behavior and then go to an attorney. But remember, she has to be physically abusing these children, with marks or evidence before he will be allowed to get them. Sad as it is, it is the law, and we have to abide by it. I wish your friend the best! If your friend needs guidance on where he can get legal counsel send me a pm and I can give him some direction. I hope the book I typed helped, I am a strong advocate of children and making sure they are with the right parent for their upbringing, it is so important, so many children get a raw deal and then faced with so much as they get older that they take the wrong direction in life.

I think its really unfair for the law to side with mother in a custody case! i mean things such as both parents earning, their demeanor, their habits and things that would directly and indirectly effect the child should be taken into consideration before handing down the verdict. I think the law usually sides with the mother because they are considered better child raisers and the love of a mother is a proverbial thing! In case of your husbands co-worker i pray that he wins over the custody of his daughter soon cause from the looks of it the mother is a reckless mess and shouldnt be left in charge!

A mother is hte one who is the usual care giver for a child and it is hard to beleive that a mother would not want what was best for her child so that is the reason that a mother has to be proved unfit before the law will go with the father . The mother carries the child for nine months and most mothers form a bond with their child right from pregnancy that is hard to break and when it comes to two sides , the law has to decide who is telling the truth . Statistics show that a child will do better with a mother because she is more supportive of a child , the one who does the talking but there are cases where the father is the one that is more fit but this has to be proven in a court and is often hard to prove . I hope your husbands co-worker does succeed in getting his child because every child deserves the right to happiness weather it be with the father , mother or just someone who loves him or her . Obviously this mother wants nothing more to do with her child but to use the child against the father because she doesn't want him to have something that she can't have . It has nothing to do with love but more of possession .

I worked with a guy, his wife would go on business trips with her boss, was having an affair with him. She then ran off with the boss. She was gone for weeks. The guy told her he was going to a lawyer and going to sue for full custody. She went to the police and accused him of molesting the kids. Next thing he new, the police were arrested him. CPS would not allow him to see the kids. She got an order of protection. Before they got a court date, she took the kids and left the state, did not tell him where moved. 6 months later, she moves back, they go to court. The kids say nothing happened with him molesting the kids. She still got custody. His reputation was ruined, he lost his job...and she did not even get a slap on the wrist.

I don't think it is fair at all. People just don't seem to understand that men can be more suitable parents then women. They assume that since she is the mother, her "motherly instinct" will make her take care of the child. I think dad's should get to have their children too!

They should always look at both parents and not just assume the mother should get custody. When a child is endangered, abused or neglected, they should automically seek to place the child with someone such as the other parent. Fortunately, times are changing, and the mother doesn't always automically get custody anymore, but change is slow.

I think that when a situation like that arises, the court should take every detain into consideration! Than is just wrong! They should have given the kid to the father, it is such a shame that a mother would act like that and put herself before her child! I hope your husbands friend decides to continue to fight for his child! I know I couldn't sleep at night if I was in that situation. I wish him luck!

I think the child deserves to be raised by whichever parent is more fit. This woman you described is definitely not fit to raise her child. I will cross my fingers that the father gets sole custody. When my stepson was little, we wanted to sue his mother for custody. She threatened to my husband that she would drive him in front of a train if we tried to "take her baby". Meanwhile, she starved him and hit him. We were too afraid of her to take her to court. She is bipolar and often very frightening. By the time her sister called DCFS on her, she had already decided that the kid cramped her style and dropped him on our doorstep. The mother is not always the best choice.

It is a very unfair system for the most part. However, in this situation it appears as though she hardly has a leg to stand on. The more that's officially documented against her, like the arrest, the stronger his case grows for gaining custody. Just from what I've read I'm getting the picture of what is classified as an unfit Mother. There isn't much worse than that. There is but not much. As long as he's not a mirror image of her, there isn't much to do but let her hang herself. ‹(°¿°)›