All Jennifer Lawson wants to do is take good care of two kids she assumed legal responsibility for two years ago. One of the ways she intended to do so seemed simple enough.
The kids' adoptive father had been charged with taking indecent liberties with a different child and she'd been named their legal guardian. So Lawson figured it'd be easy to transfer to her the adoption-support payments that the stepfather had been receiving through a program for people who adopt foster children.
She had the law on her side. Her stepfather, Vance Oxendine, was a convicted sex offender, and she had a strongly worded order awarding her sole custody of the kids, a girl who's now 11 and a boy who's now 7. She also had a judgment in hand that ordered Oxendine to pay $543 a month in child support. In her mind, it really shouldn't have been difficult to channel the adoption-support money to the kids.
If the courts can garnish someone's wages from a private employer, Lawson reasoned that one government agency surely could get another to transfer the payment of public money intended to support two kids who'd had a rough start in life. She figured wrong.
Not only did Oxendine ignore the child-support order -- he only made two payments before he went to prison in October 2007 for violating his probation -- but also the state continued to mail those adoption support checks. Somebody -- it's not clear who-- continued to cash them. And Lawson's children never saw a dime.
Because Oxendine refused to give up his parental rights, and a petition to terminate those rights had never been filed, he was still eligible for adoption-support payments.
Full Article and Source:
Money should be going to woman taking care of kids
The kids' adoptive father had been charged with taking indecent liberties with a different child and she'd been named their legal guardian. So Lawson figured it'd be easy to transfer to her the adoption-support payments that the stepfather had been receiving through a program for people who adopt foster children.
She had the law on her side. Her stepfather, Vance Oxendine, was a convicted sex offender, and she had a strongly worded order awarding her sole custody of the kids, a girl who's now 11 and a boy who's now 7. She also had a judgment in hand that ordered Oxendine to pay $543 a month in child support. In her mind, it really shouldn't have been difficult to channel the adoption-support money to the kids.
If the courts can garnish someone's wages from a private employer, Lawson reasoned that one government agency surely could get another to transfer the payment of public money intended to support two kids who'd had a rough start in life. She figured wrong.
Not only did Oxendine ignore the child-support order -- he only made two payments before he went to prison in October 2007 for violating his probation -- but also the state continued to mail those adoption support checks. Somebody -- it's not clear who-- continued to cash them. And Lawson's children never saw a dime.
Because Oxendine refused to give up his parental rights, and a petition to terminate those rights had never been filed, he was still eligible for adoption-support payments.
Full Article and Source:
Money should be going to woman taking care of kids
3 comments:
Look at all this unnecessary red tape.
Lawson was right. It should have been an easy fix.
And the courts could have fixed it for her.
This is an outrage1
Everyone who had the power to help Jennifer Lawson and didn't -- or who made things even more difficult for her, should be reprimanded.
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