New Missouri law pushes divorce judges to establish equal child custody time

In early 2009, Scott Myers read through his finalized divorce settlement and felt like he had been the victim of a pre-planned robbery.

It wasn’t the child support, or the divvying up of the couple’s possessions. It was about the time he got with his children. It was so sparse, “I felt like a visitor and not a father.”

Although the circuit court judge in St. Charles County consented that day to joint custody of his two young daughters with his former wife, he was not granted equal time with them.

Nothing negative was brought up in court about his parenting, he said. He made it clear to his attorneys he wanted equal custody. Even so, the judge ruled for a fairly typical custody agreement: He would get the children every other weekend and four hours every Tuesday. Their mother would get the rest.

Read more: http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/state-and-regional/new-missouri-law-pushes-divorce-judges-to-establish-equal-child/article_91956c76-1725-5c4c-aa6a-bb39584a7c1d.html