maurene1225
New Member
My roommates daughters stepfather has petitioned for adoption. The Mother has denied visitation for the last few years. She has lied, and exagerated circumstances to get the court in a small town to side with her and order a restraining order against my roommate. He has been unable to have any contact with his child (who is now 15 years old.) He has never threatened her bodily harm, threatened to take/keep her from her mother. Restraining order was unnesscary. He was allowed supervised visitation, the court appointed person to conduct the supervised visitation went to court on my roommates behalf stating "he does not require supervised visitation." The suggestion went ignored by the judge. My roommate rather pay child support, in hopes that one day he and his daughter would have the opportunity to be able to get to know eachother again, than sign off on her stepfather adopting her. Today was the court hearing for the adoption, my roommate was 10 min. late to court, due to unforseen road delays (he had to travel 5 hours to make it to court), in his absence the judge ruled against him. He lost all parental rights, the adoption was finalized, he is heart broken. Does he have any rights? Living in a different county than the Mother (and child), does he have the right to contest the order in his county? At this point, would it be worth it to retain legal counsel? Does he have a leg to stand on? Any and all advise would be greatly appreciated.
