Visitation order with grandchildren

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dsp2008

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I live in Massachusetts. I have a court order for visitation every other weekend with my grandchildren. It was granted Jan 2007. In Oct 2007 I stopped picking them up. This was after the guardians called the police to my house while the children were there, filed with dss against my daughter-in-law, and took me back to court to "suspend" my visitation. Basically, nothing happened but the guardians are looking at everything to boot me, my son, daughter-in-law, and anyone else in my family out of the children's lives. The judge at that time continued the visitation order with some slight modifications. Every time I have gone to pick up the children there have been terse words from the guardians. Every email is filled with horrible accusations of things that have not happened and how horrible I am. Oh, and how wonderful they are! Phone calls to speak to the children were no different. Now they do not even answer the phone when I call.

I began asking about a month and a half ago to have my grandchildren for a day (to start with). The guardians refused saying that now they had permanent guardianship and the court order for visitation was terminated. I reread the court orders and in no way was the visitation tied to the temporary or permanent guardianship. I was never brought into court to have the visitation order vacated either.

My daugther-in-law spoke to a legal friend of hers who said that the guardians can probably get away with this because of all of the time loss (about a year). She said I should and still can file contempt but the judge probably won't find it, the judge will just re-evaluate the situation and decide whether or not I can still see the kids as previously ordered. The lawyer friend also said to be careful because the guardians might let me take the kids but then may claim kidnapping ???

What is all of you-alls take on this? What should I do?
 
You need a lawyer IMO.

If you have a valid order for visitation and you have the children during that time, then you could not be charged with kidnapping. However, I would check to be sure that the order is still valid, and that there wasn't a hearing in the interim that you missed.

I agree that you should file for contempt of the visitation order. If you ever called the police when visitation was denied, make sure to get the reports. Although the police can't enforce visitation, the police report proves that visitation was denied.
 
The only hearing I missed was one in Dec 2007 where the guardians and my daughter-in-law submitted an agreement that they would have guardianship, she would have visitation and they would work together to transfer the children back in her care after "reviewing" her process i.e. not smoking marijuana, getting an apartment, etc. They, of course, did not follow through but it was so vague and ultimately they were in controlled and are making all the decisions. Nothing was ever said or done about my visitation order.

I have decided that I will go to court today and file contempt. I did not want to spend the money nor did I want to cause any more friction between us but if this is what I have to do to see my grandchildren and to keep safe from them having me arrested then that is what I have to do.

Thank you,
 
I had a similar situation to yours, the only difference is that I had custody of my grandkids while my daughter in law and son went through a program. Because we were financially stable we hired an attorney and did a grandparents intervention where we legally adopted the children. If your daughter in law is not fulfilling her obligation to the program, the judge can terminate her parental rights and give the guardians the option to adopt them. We paid our attorney $2600 to file the adoption. Emal me at pauljusticefor@aol.com and I can discuss this further with you.
 
My daughter-in-law has done what her parents have asked. They persuaded her to sign an agreement that would eventually lead to her getting the kids back. It was however, a sly trick to keep her in their control, and I seriously doubt that they have or had any intentions of re-uniting mother and children. They attack her everytime she goes to see the kids and let me tell you from my own experience it is not fun. They know how to use the court system to their advantage.

I do not know why they have a hair across their bottoms about everyone other then the fact that they don't want the children to love anyone but them. It is a very sad situation for my grandchildren. The only thing we can do at this point is to hope that the GAL and the judge sees through their "act" of doing what is in the best interest of the children.
 
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