Fort Lauderdale High-Conflict Child Custody Lawyer

Helping Families Reach Solutions in High-Conflict Child Custody Cases

Child custody cases can be difficult and complex, even when parties are amicable. These difficulties are especially heightened in high-conflict custody cases. Contact us online today to schedule a free initial consultation with Fort Lauderdale attorney Rebekah Brown-Wiseman. At our law firm, we believe in exceptional and thorough family law representation.

Options and Strategies in Highly-Contested Custody Cases

Child custody attorney Brown-Wiseman is very familiar with options and strategies that can assist with your highly-contested custody case. She can discuss the best approach for your specific situation and what is best for you.

There are several options to consider:

• Guardian Ad Litem: A guardian ad litem is court-appointed and will represent the best interests of a child through an independent evaluation. He or she will go to the home, talk to collateral contacts such as parents, relatives, teachers, doctors, sports coaches and friends in order to gather pertinent information. The guardian ad litem then files a report which is in court to help advocate for what is in the child's best interest in terms of custody and visitation.
• Psychological Evaluation: A psychological evaluator is a licensed professional who conducts a formal investigation to determine how well each parent is suited to care for their child(ren). The psychological evaluation includes a personal interview, standardized psychological testing and collateral contacts.
• Substance Abuse Evaluation: When substance abuse such as drugs or alcohol is suspected, it is very important to seek this route. In some cases, a private investigator can be hired.
• Deposition: A deposition is questioning of a witness through sworn testimony. Well organized preparation for the deposition of your child's other parent can obtain information that lead to relevant evidence, memorialize the answers of your child's other parent and create a record to impeach if he or she later contradicts himself or herself. Fort Lauderdale child custody attorney Brown-Wiseman will work closely with you and help prepare you if you are the deposed witness. She will assist to fine tune your answers when being deposed. This includes understanding:
  • The purposes of a deposition
  • Your job as a witness
  • What the question is asking before you answer
  • How to limit your answer to the specific question
  • How to avoid helping the opposing lawyer
  • How to avoid being bullied by the opposing lawyer
  • How to respond when a trick question is asked
• Vocational Evaluation: This type of an evaluation assesses an individual's work abilities, skills, abilities as well as work limitations. The outcome can identify an income to impute to the child's other parent to be used for purposes of child support calculations and in the case of a divorce also used for alimony considerations.  Vocational evaluations have internal validity to identify malingering.

In addition, clients can keep a journal in order to remind themselves of all events that occur between the time a divorce is filed until the conclusion of the divorce. Only if this journal is prepared appropriately can it be used at trial during your testimony to refresh your memory, if necessary.

Contact a Broward County Family Law Attorney

Contact the Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Law Office of Rebekah Brown-Wiseman, P.A., to take the first step towards finding a solution for your high-conflict child custody case. We handle divorce cases in both Broward County and Palm Beach County, Florida. Free initial consultations.