Custody and parenting time disputes often involve factual disputes based on conflicting allegations and accusations made by the parties. It can often be difficult to resolve these disputes and plenary hearings can be time consuming and expensive. In an effort to re
FAMILY LAW
20-2-1472 M.H.S. v. L.G.S., App. Div. (per curiam) (18 pp.) In this matrimonial case, defendant-wife appeals by leave from several interlocutory orders of the Family Part that granted unsupervised overnight parenting time to plaintiff-husband; temporarily transferred physical custody of the infant child to the husband; and denied the wife’s applications for a stay. She also appeals as of right from an order directing that she be held in custody for refusing to produce the child for unsupervised parenting time with the husband. The orders were issued without the court holding an evidentiary hearing to consider the wife’s contention that the child was at risk because the husband was allegedly obsessed with Internet pornography that contained incestuous themes. The appellate panel makes no determination here that the husband, in fact, viewed incest or any other kind of pornography, but concludes that the Family Part erred in discrediting the wife’s accusations and ordering changes in parenting time and custody without conducting an evidentiary hearing. Furthermore, although the panel makes no determination as to whether the wife or her sister violated any law in installing spyware and intercepting computer images, or in the effect of any such violation on this case, the manner of their obtaining the evidence should not divert the Family Part from its primary function of evaluating the best interests of the child. The panel reverses and remands for an evidentiary hearing and other proceedings before a different judge.
alize a timely resolution courts often try to avoid conducting evidentiary hearings. However, as the case bellows reaffirms, evidentiary hearings are often necessary and should not be avoided.
