Get Deployed - Lose Your Kids

My grandfather always told me there were three things you never discuss in public Religion, Politics and Sex. Heading his words, I try to stay away from discussions around politics but this time I just had to say something. Now before I get started let me say that I am an ex-service member and understand what current and past service members have to deal with when it comes to such issues.

CNN recently featured a headline "Protecting deployed troops from custody battles" and being who I am I just had to read the article and once I did that I had to comment. It turns that certain people use a service member's deployment as a way to take their children away from them. Really this was not a surprise I suppose but I never gave it a great deal of thought. Worse still family courts around this country see the fact the parent is away serving their country as an unacceptable reason for missing a family court hearing and award custody to the attending person. Default judgment I believe it is called but I could be wrong on that terminology. Does this not strike anyone else as ludicrous? After all, if there is a viable reason for missing the hearing certainly defending your country is one? It is not as though they can ask for the day off from work especially if you are deployed on the other side of the world.

I'm not sure what irritates me more the people who use deployment as an excuse to take custody of the children, the courts for allowing this behavior, or the fact that a federal law had to be passed to make it less likely this would happen. All three are egregious wrongs. I say less likely because family courts can still disregard the Service Member's Relief Act and refuse to ninety-day stay period. Yes, you read it correctly. Even though there is a law that protects a service member from being evicted or having their repossessed there were not any laws which protected the custody of their own children. An ex-spouse or person of influence can still sue for and receive custody of the child, especially if they sue on grounds of abandonment. After all being called away for deployment is abandoning your child right? Kind of like saying, you are going out for a pack of cigarettes and never coming back.

I really hope that this brings this particular issue to light. Even if the service member does not warrant having custody they still deserve the right to show up and defend said custody in court. I am not saying all service members are saints and deserve to keep custody, believe me I know that simply is not true. At the same time though I believe they should not lose the right to be present at the hearing simply because they are on deployment and not available to get back right away. I always had to wonder about the kind of person who would wait until a member was deployed to serve divorce papers or custody papers, I guess laws like this will make that a little bit harder.