BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!

Subject: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: beardedbruce
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 09:33 AM

Florida man owes $10,000 for child who's not his

Story Highlights

Man fights paternity case in which he's not the father and never knew the child

He owes more than $10,000 in child support

Case highlights legal complexity of paternity laws nationwide

One in every three children in America are born to unmarried parents

   
FORT LAUDERDALE, Florida (CNN) -- Francisco Rodriguez owes more than $10,000 in back child support payments in a paternity case involving a 15-year-old girl who, according to DNA results and the girl's mother, is not his daughter.


Francisco Rodriguez is fighting for leniency in his paternity case. "It's not right. I'm not the father, " he said.

Rodriguez, who is married with two daughters and a son from his wife's previous marriage, is fighting for leniency. "It's not right. I'm not the father, " he said at a recent court hearing.

He says he knew nothing about the other girl until paperwork showed up about four years ago saying he was the father.

He now has DNA results that show the 15-year-old girl wasn't fathered by him. He even has an affidavit from the girl's mother -- a former girlfriend from 1990 -- saying he's "not the father" and asking that Rodriguez no longer be required to pay child support.

Yet the state of Florida is continuing to push him to pay $305 a month to support the girl, as well as the more than $10,000 already owed. He spent a night in jail because of his delinquent payments.

Why is he in such a bind?

He missed the deadline to legally contest paternity. That's because, he says, the paperwork didn't reach him until after the deadline had passed. Watch Rodriguez plead in court for a break »

"It's like you're drowning every day," says Rodriguez, a massage therapist.

Rodriguez's case highlights the legal dilemma states face over how to handle paternity cases. More than a third of children born in the United States are born to unmarried parents, according to the National Center for Health Statistics.

But paternity laws vary from state to state, according to the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP), a nonprofit organization that works to improve the lives of low-income families.

Some states have detailed laws to challenge paternity within deadlines, while others offer little guidance. In most cases, men have 60 days to challenge paternity, according to CLASP.

After that, it can be "challenged only on the basis of fraud, duress or material mistake of fact," CLASP said last year in an update to a report on paternity law.

"There are no perfect answers," says Susan Paikin of the Center for Support of Families in Delaware. "Deadlines are imposed so that when families are broken -- the legal process is handled quickly."

She says state legislatures and courts struggle with paternity cases, trying to strike the proper balance between children's rights and adults' rights, always keeping in mind any potential harm to the child.

"This is a struggle. It's not something easy for courts or legislatures," she says.

Paikin says it's especially tricky in cases where a father has raised a child thinking it was his, only to learn years later the child had a different father.

"Most men who have a relationship with their child don't think of their child in terms of DNA," she said. "The real issue in most of these cases is anger and money."

Tampa Police officer Michael Anderson understands that sentiment. He paid child support for more than 12 years -- a total outlay he says amounted to more than $80,000. But a DNA test after he and his wife divorced showed the daughter he thought was his was somebody else's.

He then separated himself and his feelings from the child.

"I stopped having a relationship with the girl right from the beginning, when I found out," he said. "It was hard, but I had to do it."

A Tampa court earlier this year disestablished him as father and relieved him of his future child support payments. But by law, he is unable to get back the $80,000 he already paid.

Carnell Smith, who founded a group called U.S. Citizens Against Paternity Fraud, wants mandatory DNA tests when a child is born to avoid legal wrangling and anguish.

"Unfortunately, today it's not a crime for someone to lie about which man is the father," Smith said. "The mother doesn't have to return the money and rarely, if ever, is she prosecuted for perjury, for fraud."

Rodriguez's odyssey began in 1990, when he says at age 16 he had a four- to five-month relationship with a woman CNN is not identifying. He says when the relationship ended, he did not hear from her again until child support papers arrived at his home in 2003.

"My wife and I both had a confused look, and we're wondering, 'Where is the DNA test?' " he says.

But it was long past Florida's deadline to contest paternity. A court had already named him the father three years before when he did not respond to notices to appear, notices he says he never received because he had moved a lot.

He was now on the hook for monthly child support, as well as $10,623 in back child support.

He eventually paid for DNA testing. The test showed he was not the father.

A judge has now ordered a court-sanctioned DNA test for Rodriguez and the 15-year-old girl. Rodriguez has taken that test; the girl and her mother did not show up for their appointment to submit to DNA testing and it's unclear if the girl has complied.

CNN has repeatedly tried to contact the mother, but has been unable to reach her.

Rodriguez and his family continue to wait for answers.

"It's hard when your daughter needs sneakers and you have to pay $305 or your husband goes to jail," said Rodriguez's wife, Michele. "It's just unfair."

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 10:30 AM

There is also a strange case where a woman had casual sex on separate occasions with identical twins - and so DNA can't tell which is the father, or rather seems to indicate that they both are. The woman says she doesn't know which, and the apparently neither twin knew about the other sleeping with her... wonder if she thought she was sleeping with the same guy twice!

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: heric
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 10:40 AM

The most recent Smithsonian reports estimates of mistaken or misrepresented paternity traditionally hovering around 10%

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: Bert
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 10:55 AM

It's fraud.

But it somehow doesn't surprise me that the State of Florida is part of a conspiricy to defraud.

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: Bee
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 11:35 AM

The Rodriguez case is totally unfair to the man - he's not the father and never knew the child at all, and the child did not know him.

This guy, however:

Tampa Police officer Michael Anderson understands that sentiment. He paid child support for more than 12 years -- a total outlay he says amounted to more than $80,000. But a DNA test after he and his wife divorced showed the daughter he thought was his was somebody else's.

He then separated himself and his feelings from the child.

"I stopped having a relationship with the girl right from the beginning, when I found out," he said. "It was hard, but I had to do it."

A Tampa court earlier this year disestablished him as father and relieved him of his future child support payments. But by law, he is unable to get back the $80,000 he already paid.

Particularly this: "I stopped having a relationship with the girl right from the beginning, when I found out," he said. "It was hard, but I had to do it."


It is unclear how long he thought the child was his before cutting her off from his 'feelings'. Once you have established a fatherly relationship with a child, it seems unimaginably cruel to dismiss the child emotionally, regardless of DNA.

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: beardedbruce
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 11:38 AM

Bee

Total agreement on both. Tampa Police officer Michael Anderson seems to have been the father by his actions until the divorce: He acted like an idiot, and cruelly.

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: SINSULL
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 11:43 AM

I agree, Bee. After twelve years of loving and raising this girl, he cuts her off. Why exactly did he "have to do it"? Financial support, maybe but just to stop loving a child. Unfair at best.

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: GUEST,meself
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 12:05 PM

Um ... don't you think you should have a little more information before condemning this Michael Anderson?

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: beardedbruce
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 12:12 PM

"He paid child support for more than 12 years -- a total outlay he says amounted to more than $80,000. But a DNA test after he and his wife divorced showed the daughter he thought was his was somebody else's.

He then separated himself and his feelings from the child."


The above statement is what I am basing my judgement on. He thought the child was his, and acted as the father UNTIL AFTER THE DIVORCE.

He is taking out on the child his problem with his ex-wife.

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: GUEST,meself
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 01:43 PM

"The above statement is what I am basing my judgement on."

Exactly my point. I don't think it's very much to go on; I would want to know a lot more before making any kind of judgement. But that's just me, I suppose.

"He paid child support for more than 12 years" - So he wasn't living with her for 12 years - in what way was he acting as a father, other than putting a cheque in the mail once a month? Does anyone here KNOW the answer to that question?

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: PoppaGator
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 02:14 PM

Mr. Anderson was married to the mother when the child was born, and thus legally the father. even if not biologically. Also, he established some degree of parent-child relationship (perhaps only financial), which continued for years. Nevertheless, Florida law let him off the hook, at least for the present and future if not retroactively.

Mr. Rodriquez, on the other hand, was not married to the mother, never knew the child, and never even knew he was being "framed" for paternity until recently ~ yet Florida law has put him behind bars and continues to dun him for payments.

Judging by their surnames, these two guys are, respectively, probably Caucasian and almost-undoubtedly Hispanic. In Florida.

Gee ~ does anyone think there might be a hint a racism at play here?

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 02:29 PM

No I don't really suspect racism. But I think every baby should have a DNA test when it is born to prevent problems in the future. Now, it could cause a whole lot of problems right on the spot, but deal with them while they are fresh. And shame on women who keep thinking it is OK to bring children into the world not knowing who the father is and without benefit of marriage. There will be accidents of course biology being what it is..but there are a few too many deliberate cases. And shame on the women who keep saying it's a woman's right to do whatever she damn well wants to when it comes to harming a child by depriving her of a father, grandparents, financial support etc. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 02:58 PM

In the UK there is a concept of "child of the family" - based on whether the child, legitimate, illegitimate, of different parentage, fostered, adopted, whatever was "treated as child of the family". In such a case a person may have parental responsibility, irrespective of DNA - I oversimplify of course. That seems to me to be morally right, insofar as addressing the responsibility of the adult to the child. Basing all on DNA seems to me to be very primitive.

But as between the adults it is different.

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 03:06 PM

True..assuming that the father knows right up front what the situation is. The best of men will say he is my child regardless but I don't think support should be imposed unless there is full disclosure right up front. And most disclosures are not likely to be forthcoming voluntarily. I realize this will destroy many relationships, but if they are held together with dishonesty maybe it is for the best. It will prevent other abuses from occurring and everything will be based on the painful truth. You shouldn't have to wait until the situation gets solved by Maury Povich. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: GUEST,dianavan
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 03:12 PM

"He then separated himself and his feelings from the child."

He did this after assuming the role of father for 12 years!

Anderson is a cad. Rodriguez, on the other hand, seems to be caught up in bureacratic bungling. This may have been the result of the mother receiving welfare payments for the child. In which case it is the State seeking the support payments.

In B.C., if a man assumes the role of father in a child's life, he is responsible for child support should the relationship between the two adults end. Sounds like it is much the same in the U.K.

Subject: RE: BS: Kid not his- So Pay Up!
From: GUEST,meself
Date: 13 Jul 07 - 03:27 PM

In related news, I offer this without comment: Canadian court ruling re: (lack of) parental obligations contract.