Parentage

We help clients establish parentage rights to secure child support or to gain visitation, custody, or other important rights.

Parentage

A parentage action is required to legally recognize the parental rights of unmarried persons, to establish enforceable custody and visitation schedules, and to ensure that a child receives financial support from the child’s parents. Without a timely judgment determining parentage, a person may permanently lose any legal standing as a child’s parent, and/or a child may go without support.

For example, suppose you are the mother of a child, and you’re not married to the child’s father. In that case, you don’t get child support from the father unless or until legal parentage is determined. Similarly, suppose you’re a child’s father and not married to the child’s mother. In that case, you don’t get custody rights unless or until you are legally determined to be the child’s father — and only then if you go through a separate family law support proceeding.

Parentage

We help clients establish parentage rights to secure child support or to gain visitation, custody, or other important rights.

A parentage action is required to legally recognize the parental rights of unmarried persons, to establish enforceable custody and visitation schedules, and to ensure that a child receives financial support from the child’s parents. Without a timely judgment determining parentage, a person may permanently lose any legal standing as a child’s parent, and/or a child may go without support.

For example, suppose you are the mother of a child, and you’re not married to the child’s father. In that case, you don’t get child support from the father unless or until legal parentage is determined. Similarly, suppose you’re a child’s father and not married to the child’s mother. In that case, you don’t get custody rights unless or until you are legally determined to be the child’s father — and only then if you go through a separate family law support proceeding.

In California, parentage is established in two ways:

  • When a child is born to a married couple, California law presumes that the husband is the biological father, who is then named as the father on the child’s birth certificate.
  • When a child is born to an unmarried mother, the biological father can claim parentage of the child by signing a Voluntary Declaration of Parentage, which then gets signed by the mother and filed with the state.

In some California cases, more than two persons may be legally determined to be a child’s parents if the Court finds that recognizing only two parents would be detrimental to the child.

For a same-sex couple with a child, there is, at most, only one biological parent to that child. This can make the process of establishing parentage rights more challenging for same-sex couples, especially if they are not legally married. Consider the following common scenarios that confront same-sex couples:

  1. A child is adopted by both same-sex partners. Once the adoption is completed, both parents have the same rights and responsibilities as biological parents, regardless of their gender or sexual orientation.
  2. A child is born into a same-sex marriage. California family law treats same-sex marriages equal to opposite-sex (heterosexual) marriages. Suppose a child is born to a legally married couple in California. In that case, that couple is treated as the legal parents of that child, regardless of their gender or sexual orientation. In addition, the child’s biological parent might also be recognized as an additional legal parent in California.
  3. A child is born to an unmarried same-sex couple. In this situation, one of the members of the same-sex couple has parentage rights because the couple is unmarried. The partner who is not the biological parent of the child can use the psychological parenting doctrine to try to gain some custody, visitation, or other rights vis-à-vis the child. Under this doctrine, a Court may find the person to be a “psychological parent” of the child if the following conditions are met:
    • They lived in the same household with the child.
    • The child’s legal parent consented to them forming a parental relationship with the child.
    • The person cared for the child and provided financial support to the child.
    • The child develops a bonded, dependent relationship with them.

Why Ford Family Law?

We understand that there’s nothing more important than your children. Our attorneys have decades of experience helping clients establish parentage so that their children have legal rights to support, inheritance, and health and life insurance benefits, among others.

Why Ford Family Law?

We understand that there’s nothing more important than your children. Our attorneys have decades of experience helping clients establish parentage so that their children have legal rights to support, inheritance, and health and life insurance benefits, among others.

(510) 835-9000

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