I know everyone’s going to think this is about me. Oh well, doesn’t matter.
I have a friend back home in Baltimore who called me to tell me he’s getting married to someone I hate. She’s pregnant and he feels that rather than pay child support (something he’s already doing for a child similarly concieved) he’ll get married. Dumb, dumb, dumb. I keep telling him but he just says he knows it’s dumb but he’s going to do it anyway.
Ok, I told another friend, a smarter one, who said that a father could make some kind of legal statement that he favored abortion or adoption and didn’t want to support the child. If done early enough, this would relieve him of responsibility except for helping with medical fees for the abortion or birth.
Can I call this guy back and tell him he has another choice? This marriage really shouldn’t happen. And this guy, though he’s a fun guy, is not really capable of providing consistent financial support. He’s been to jail once already for failure to pay child support. This woman is the kind of woman who would intentionally stop using birth control in an attempt to trap a man into marriage. Help me to stop this.
This is all occurring in Baltimore so it’s Maryland law (or federal) that is relevant.
Sounds to me like this guy really, really needs to talk to a lawyer. There are so many ways this could go wrong, 5 or 10 or 15 years down the road, that the mind boggles. But then, you know that.
Maybe the person who really needs help is you. Maybe you need somebody to remind you, “Hey, people are gonna do what they’re gonna do, and you can’t always stop them.”
Don’t tie yourself in knots over this. Try to get the guy to at least talk to some kind of storefront legal assistance place or something, but if you can’t, it’s really not your problem, okay? I hereby give you permission to stop worrying about it.
I agree with you, this guy shouldn’t be reproducing. Email me his address, I’ll pack up some rubbing alcohol and an Exacto knife and pay him a visit. After all, I AM in the business of stomping out ignorance.
More seriously, your buddies need to talk to a lawyer or two. This sort of thing is complicated and expensive, and laws change all the time. And your first buddy does need to see a doc, if he’s this irresponsible.
Women can opt out of parenthood if they want (kill the little bugger, give it away to strangers, leave it in a safe place after it is born), a man simply has to wait to see what the woman will do. Her “choice”, her child apparently.
She carries it to term, he pays for the next 18 years. There is no good way around it.
Oh well, no one said life is fair and anyway, any man with half a brain knows these rules before he gets into this mess.
my understanding is: two people concieved said child. two people have the duty to raise said child.
Re: abortion: In many places, if the woman names the father, then they must have the father’s permission, but since it would be simple to simply not name the father, it isn’t an issue. However, the father CANNOT force the mother to get an abortion.
RE: adoption: again, if the father is named (remember baby Jessica???), the father must sign off on the adoption. Father alone cannot authorize adoption. If some time down the road a new spouse of the woman wishes to adopt the child the father can sign off parental rights and then not owe c/s.
and re the aside about those sneaky women not taking b/c - A. if you don’t trust some one , why are you having sex with them???
B. and ditto why aren’t you using a condom.
Bottom line is : he donated sperm, he’s the biological father and owes support til the kid is 18.
and, frankly, since this is his second “Whoops she got pregnant”, I’d like to add, I LIKE quick learners.
I have a couple questions, not about the OP directly. If the mother wants to put the baby up for adoption, and the father wants to raise the child, I assume he has the right to. Can he then sue her for chld support?
Second, how do they handle this with sperm donors? If the woman somehow tracks down the donor, can she sue him for child support?
Any thoughts on whether it’s better for the kid to have parents who never married over parents who had a messy divorce? Obviously a lot of variables here as far as custody, visiting rigths etc., but I’m trying to figure out what I want to try to talk this guy into doing.
I do worry about it because I have some influence over this guy. I told him I’d pay for a vasectomy and he has already set up his appointment. I even spoke to the doctor about whether I had to worry about legal problems with me paying for such a thing. He said that the patient would have to sign a lot of forms before he did the surgery and that they will cover me.
I would still like to help the poor child but I have no influence over the mother. I don’t think the father has any influence either. The only thing I can think of is that if he refuses to marry she might give the baby for adoption, but I think she might keep it just because it’s the only way she can force him to pay. I forsee him paying child support AND wife support until he fails and goes to jail. Depriving his earlier child of support also. This sucks.
I spoke to a lawyer. He said that this guy has some mental problems and that it probably wouldn’t be too hard to get him put on mental disability (not being able to hopld a job for more than a few months has been accepted as evidence in the past, jail time is also a common symptom). In most situations he would advise clients to avoid this, because he doesn’t want to encourage people to suck the system dry, and because once you’ve been on mental disability the stigma sticks to you for life. However, in this case it would maybe be better than sitting in jail over missed child support. The child would likely qualify for additional government assistence also. This idea stick in my craw and I haven’t told my friend about it. Anyone out there have some thoughts to help me?
IANAL - BUT:
adoption case: Mom identifies dad, both sign child over, adoption goes through, no c/s.
Dad wants kid adopted, mom doesn’t = no adoption, c/s owed by non custodial biological parent.
Mom wants kid adopted, dad doesn’t (AND IS IDENTIFIED) = no adoption (that’s the baby Jessica case) c/s is owed by non custodial biological parent
Sperm doners- two cases: mom goes to sperm bank, makes a “withdrawl” -= no c/s since sperm doner is not identified.
mom goes to male friend, please be sperm doner = better get a lawyer or c/s is potential.
With Sperm doner kind of scenario, the sperm doner is not generally identified, and therefore c/s wouldn’t become an issue. I believe there would be contractual stuff involved - otherwise, who’d donate to a sperm bank.
and to answer a prior poster, yea, since the mom is physically going through the pregnancy, often she’s the one making the choice. HOwever, I believe that if a guy impregnated a woman and SHE wanted an abortion, and HE wanted to raise the child, and KNEW about her intent, it is entirely possible that the courts may intervene.
bottom line (pardon the pun). If you don’t want to be mentally and emotionally hooked up with a person for the next 18 years via a child, PERSONALLY make sure no child is conceived (works for both male and female).
If they’re really sneaky, you do trust them, but the result is the same.
Anyway, short of being held by a court to be incompetent and therefore unable to hold a job, your friend is liable for support.
Worst case scenario, but with a happy ending: He gets married, the child is born, he finds that he likes being a husband and father, he turns his life around, and everyone is happy.
Yes I have an excellent idea. Stay out of it. It sounds like your friend is occasionally an irresponsible idiot and you are attempting to generate strategies for him to evade his lawful responsibility, assuming he is the bio-dad of the aforesaid baby to be. It is to his credit he is not listening to you.
When a man puts his penis in a fertile woman’s vagina I don’t care if her diaphram is made out of steel belted radials, or she swears before the Supreme Court that she is taking birth control pills… there is the risk of making a baby, a risk which the other partner (your friend) assumes.
She may be a conniving pain in the ass and you obviously don’t like her but this is really beside the point. If your concern is really for the child stop playing Nostradamus and let him get married. At least the child will be born in wedlock and there is the increased chance that he will bond to the child and possibly be able to be a father figure to this innocent baby. Stop trying to cheat this man and his baby out of even a slender chance of having a relationship because “you know better”.
A man is financially obligated to any child until the child is 18, UNLESS the mother makes a legal agreement that she does not want his financial support OR he has custody of the child.
Yep, some women have so much money they don’t need it.
One thing. Yes, a mother can say that she doesn’t want child support, and the guy doesn’t have to pay…as long as she doesn’t change her mind. If at any time she asks for child support he is legally obligated to pay, possibly including back child support.
The legal reasoning behind this is that a father owes child support to the child, not the mother. She doesn’t have the power to make such an agreement for her child. She can sign all the contracts she wants guarenteeing that she will not seek child support, but those docutments are worthless.
One more thing. I seriously doubt that the friend would have to pay spousal support if he got married and then they divorced. It is veeery rare for people to be paid alimony these days unless one person is rich.
Let’s suppose there is some legal precedence where the man can get out of responsibility because he advocated abortion or adoption. Even if that law exists, it would be immoral for the man to abandon his child.
I don’t follow about the mental disability angle. If this is another way of avoiding paying child support, it’s not the right way to go.
I don’t want to touch the abortion or adoption angles, but if the child is born and stays with the mother, the father has a moral obligation to take care of the child, at least financially.
You obviously have some influence over this man. Don’t advise him to take steps that cause a bad life for this child. You’re helping, perhaps driving the decision; make it the right one.
Maybe you need somebody to remind you, “Hey, people are gonna do what they’re gonna do, and you can’t always stop them.”