Interstate Child Custody Jurisdiction Blog

Foster v. Foster: JURISDICTION – CUSTODY – UCCJEA – FORUM NON-CONVENIENS – HOME STATE – CONTINUING JURISDICTION – EMERGENCY.

An example of the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act (UCCJEA) working just as it is supposed to, to discourage opportunistic forum shopping and child snatching, is provided by an opinion called Foster v. Foster, ___ Va. App. ___, ___ S.E.2d ____, 23 VLW 299 (8/12/08) from the Court of Appeals.  After a mother took three children from Virginia to Maine and there got a ex parte protective order and, using the “emergency” provisions of the UCCJEA got a temporary custody order by alleging domestic violence by the father, she responded to the Virginia custody order that the father had meanwhile gotten from the local JDR court by appealing it to circuit court. There she argued that under the UCCJEA, Virginia should give up its home state jurisdiction and continuing jurisdiction because it was an “inconvenient forum.”

Swalef v. Anderson: UCCJEA — CUSTODY — INTERSTATE — TRIBAL COURTS — CONTINUING JURISDICTION — FORUM NON CONVENIENS (DEFER AND DECLINE) — APPEALS — SELECTIVE APPELLATE REVIEW.

Taking a very practical approach to an appealed UCCJEA case involving Indian tribal courts in Minnesota, the Court of Appeals declines to review the validity of the Norfolk Circuit Court’s discretionary decision to decline and defer exercise of child custody jurisdiction over a child then in Minnesota, because whether or not this Virginia court had jurisdiction, its decision to defer the case to the Minnesota Tribal Court was authorized and correct.