A court ruled that it was “a no-brainer” to deny a mother’s visitation request to force her children to spend the summer with her in Florida since she abandoned her family and took up residence with a convicted felon. The Court said visitation would not be in the best interests of children.
In LG v. JG, the mother sought to compel her children to travel to Florida to visit her in the home she shares with her boyfriend, a convicted felon. The court shared the father’s concern that the new boyfriend was “a general undesirable,” who should not be in contact with young children.
Moreover, the Court found that the children were quite bitter towards their mother since she, without explanation, abandoned them.
Justice Pastoressa ruled that “it is the best interests of the children which controls, not the personal preferences, convenience of one parent vis-à-vis the other.” Since there would be no way of preventing the boyfriend from being in contact with the children if they were compelled to visit the mother in Florida, the Court ruled that it was clearly in the children’s best interests to deny visitation with the mother in Florida.
The Court noted that the father was open to the mother seeing the children in New York.
