Grandparents Visitation Rights Lawyer in Dallas & Frisco, TX
Do you need help getting access to your grandchildren in Dallas, Plano, or north Texas area? We urge you to consult our family law lawyer in Frisco or Dallas if you have found yourself being denied access to your grandchild. Unfortunately, it is harder to fight for visitation with grandchildren than it is to gain custody of them currently in Texas. Jeff Anderson has over 25 years of experience practicing family law, and is board certified in family law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization, a prestigious distinction earned by less than 1% of family law attorneys in Texas. You can rest assured that he will fight aggressively for your visitation case in court.
Getting Visitation With Your Grandchildren in Texas
There are many reasons why a break in a grandparent/grandchild relationship can happen. The most common is the result of divorce of the child’s parents, with custody going to the parent that is not your child. Unfortunately, there are numerous other reasons you may be being denied access to your grandchild. It could be that your child is incarcerated and you don’t have a good relationship with your grandchild’s other parent. It could be that your grandchild has been places in foster care, or another family member has taken custody of them. Whatever the case, it has caused you to lose access to or contact with your grandchild, and surely you never expected that you would be looking for a family lawyer to get visitation rights with your grandchildren. We can help you fight for legal access to your grandchild, even of the objections of the legal guardian.
What You Need to Prove in Texas for Grandparents’ Visitation Rights
Although one might think that the bar for grandparents’ visitation rights would fall below the requirement to seek custody of a grandchild, it is in fact harder to be granted visitation than it is the gain custody of your grandchild. It is also correct to say that the obstacles that one must overcome before even having the legal right to file a case (also called standing), to seek visitation are numerous and onerous. But it is not impossible to be ranted grandparent visitation rights in Texas.
Starting the Visitation Request
Before you even have the right to seek assistance from the court in the form of Court Ordered Visitation, you must attach to your request filed with the court a sworn statement that says that a denial of your access to your grandchild would significantly impair the child’s physical health or emotional well-being. If you cannot meet this requirement, the Court must deny the relief you request and dismiss your suit without a further inquiry or hearing.
As you can see, this is something of a mountain that you must climb. You will need a dedicated and talented family law attorney to assist you in scaling that mountain to pass the initial obstacle of standing.
What You Must Prove If Court Accepts Request for Court Hearing
Once you have made it past the standing issue, your next task is to show that you meet at least one of the following criteria:
- At least one biological or adoptive parent of the child has not had that parent’s parental rights terminated. This means either your child or the other parent (or both) must not have had their parental rights terminated.
- You, the grandparent requesting access, must overcome the presumption that the parent denying you access is acting in the best interest of the child. You must overcome this presumption by showing that not allowing you court ordered access to your grandchild would significantly impair the child’s physical health or emotional well being. Does this sound familiar? It should because this is the first mountain you climbed and you were successful. But now the parent denying you access gets an opportunity to disprove what you put in your affidavit to get to this point.
- You, the grandparent requesting access, must show that YOUR CHILD is:
- Incarcerated in jail or prison during the three-month period preceding the filing of the petition
- Has been found by a court to be incompetent
- Is deceased OR
- Does not have actual or court ordered access to the child.
As you can see, fighting for visitation with your grandchildren takes a lot of sustained effort and legal expertise. Our team of legal experts is well poised to fight in your corner so you can get visitation rights with your grandchild.