Saturday, February 16, 2008

Overseas Tours Cost Soldiers Child Custody


In what the Pentagon and parent-advocacy groups agree is a growing trend, troops serving overseas are unable to maintain custody of their children upon their return, NPR reports.
One National Guardswoman raised her son until her unit deployed to Iraq, when his father took temporary custody. After she returned home, a court granted her ex-husband’s request to make the situation permanent.
• A bill passed last month aims to help parents like Tanya Towne, but her ex retained custody on appeal, partly because the court ruled Towne’s deployment contributed to instability.
“I don't care how they word it—it's a punishment to the soldier," Towne said. “The whole reason I'm in this situation is because I did a job for the military.”
Original Article-

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

This is not just happening to soldier deployed into war zones, it has become an standard in family courts that a parent who is in the Military is assumed to be slotted for deployment or could be deployed in a moments notice, therefore they state it is in the best intrest of the child to stay with a parent who is not deployable. In the case of our family, the children went to a parent/stepparent with a history of drug use, suicide attemp,child neglect and endangerment, and emotional abuse, unemployed, has warrents out for his arrest, and is possibll driving a school bus on a suspended licence and yet it was the judges decition that it was in the best intrest of the children to be with this type of parent/stepparent than to be with a US Soldier. The judge stated to the mother that "you have chosen a career that could keep you from your children". The Father got what he wanted ..... support, and a lot of it .... the support for the children was set 15% higher than what the state standard is (3 children = 37%, we pay 52%).
There is no justice for families/children in our nation, soldiers are being punished for Bias against military and judges personal opinions. our soldier are being faced with judges who having grown up during the viet-nam era and the protests of that war, now our country being in in another war that is under protest, it is now being protested from the benchs of our court rooms and our service men and women are the targets. Federal Laws need to be introduced on state levels to protect our military ... it is not a free nation if we send our military men and women in to fight for our freedoms and liberties and then take away their rights because they wear proudly a uniform of the United States Military.