Insights

Open Adoption-Pros and Cons

Adoption & Parental Termination, Family Law, InsightsMarch 21, 2016

Open Adoption-Pros and Cons – Giving your child away for adoption, be it for any reason, can be a little tough for birth mothers. Nowadays, the agencies and parents are encouraging open adoptions. However, there have been heated debates between attorneys and agencies on pros and cons of open adoptions. Open adoptions can be both…

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Reporting Family Violence, Child Abuse and Neglect

Child Custody, Divorce, Family Law, Insights, MarriageFebruary 29, 2016

Reporting Family Violence, Child Abuse and Neglect – The State of Texas requires both the general public and licensed professionals such as teachers, doctors and daycare officials to report any instances of child abuse or neglect. Believe it or not, knowingly not reporting is considered a Class A misdemeanor. But we as a society should…

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Petitioning for Name Change – Adults and Minors

Child Custody, Divorce, Family Law, Insights, MarriageFebruary 15, 2016

Petitioning for Name Change – Adults and Minors – Name change petitions happen all the time, and it’s fair to assume most are reasonable requests. What that means is the name change is being made with the best interests of the petitioner in mind. As a result, most pass through the courts without issue, and…

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Medical Treatment of a Child – A Child’s Consent

Child Custody, Divorce, Family Law, Insights, MarriageFebruary 8, 2016

Medical Treatment of a Child – A Child’s Consent – The average person in America may find it hard to believe that minors can consent to their own medical treatment, and for the most part, they are right. There are established rules in place regarding medical treatment of a child, and that decision is typically…

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Medical Treatment of a Child – implied consent vs consent not required

Child Custody, Divorce, Family Law, Insights, MarriageFebruary 6, 2016

Medical Treatment of a Child – implied consent vs consent not required – Before a physician can perform any medical treatment or procedure on a patient in Texas, they must first receive authority or consent from the patient. The reasoning behind this is based on the patient’s right to either accept or refuse treatment. This…

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Spouses and Liability for taxes – a digestible overview

Divorce, Family Law, InsightsJanuary 26, 2016

Spouses and Liability for taxes – a digestible overview – My blogs as of late have focused on family liability and how it affects spouses, parents, children and even third parties. Since it is tax season, I figured now is as good a time as any to discuss how liability comes into play when you…

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Spouses and Contractual Liabilities – a digestible overview

Divorce, Family Law, Insights, MarriageJanuary 20, 2016

Spouses and Contractual Liabilities – a digestible overview – So you are young and newly married, and after getting a higher-paying job, your spouse applies for a few credit cards and gets approved for all of them. No big deal, right? Well, what if your spouse became overzealous and charged up so much debt that…

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Summary of Common Family Law Terms

Child Custody, Divorce, Estate Planning, Family Law, Insights, Marriage, TortsJanuary 18, 2016

Summary of Common Family Law Terms – Over the last few months I have written about the legal concepts related to marriage and attempted to break these concepts into bite-size pieces over a series of blogs. We’ve covered some serious ground in that time – around 15 or so blogs – and my hope is…

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The curious case of the tort and tortfeasor

Child Custody, Divorce, Family Law, Insights, Marriage, TortsJanuary 6, 2016

The curious case of the tort and tortfeasor – While sitting at my desk last night debating which direction to take my next blog, two words kept popping up as I read through a chapter on family liability – tort and tortfeasor. These are common legal words for someone like me who has been practicing…

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Authorized Relative’s Rights and Duties

Child Custody, Divorce, Family Law, InsightsJanuary 2, 2016

Authorized Relative’s Rights and Duties – I want to discuss one more point about the parent-child relationship, and that is the rights and duties of a relative who has been legally authorized by the parent(s) to act on a child’s behalf. It is important to note we are not talking about child-safety placement in this…

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