Any aspect of family law entails significant changes that can affect the finances, logistics, and lifestyle of everyone involved. Family law is a very personal area of the law, whether you seek custody modifications, grandparents’ rights, visitation rights, adopting a child, or planning your estate. That is why it’s essential to hire the right Texas family law attorney to handle your legal matter. Ed Lee is a skilled visitation attorney and domestic violence lawyer who can protect and support you through difficult situations.
What is Texas Family Law?
In Texas, family law includes anything relating to families, such as divorce, spousal support, modifications of custody
or support, grandparents’ rights, adoptions, and division of property and assets. The laws in Texas are often complex and confusing, so it is best to work with an experienced Houston family law lawyer to help you or a loved one navigate the Texas family court process.
Understanding Custody Modification in Texas
When a Texas court order is issued in family court, the order is binding by law. An attorney can request a custody modification if the custody order needs to be adapted or can no longer be upheld by the parent. The Texas custody modification process can be time-consuming and complicated. If you seek a court order modification or wish to fight a modification in Texas, you need a family law attorney who has experience handling modifications. The Law Office of Edwin E. Lee can help you or a loved one reach an agreement that you need for a custody modification case in Texas.
Reasons for a Texas Custody Modification
An individual can seek custody modification for several reasons in Texas. The custody order may be outdated, inappropriate, or useless in the eyes of the law. A custody situation may also change where either or both parties can no longer uphold the court order. For example, a custody modification may occur based on relocation, a change in parents’ work schedules, the preference of a mature minor, or potential issues of children’s safety when they’re with the other parent. If you want to seek custody modification, a Houston family lawyer, like Ed Lee, is vital during the modification process. He will take the time needed to gather evidence or documentation for custody modification in Houston and surrounding Texas areas.
Understanding Grandparents’ Rights in Texas
Texas recognizes the special relationship between grandchildren and grandparents. Grandparents have visitation rights that are protected in Houston, TX, and beyond. Sometimes, exercising and protecting those grandparents’ rights in Texas can be difficult. If you are a grandparent seeking legal guidance to protect your relationship with a grandchild or need legal help reestablishing that relationship, the Law Office of Edwin E. Lee can help.
While the relationship between grandchildren and grandparents is highly esteemed and necessary in most children’s lives, parents have the legal right to keep their children from visiting grandparents in Texas. Fit parents have the legal right to decide with whom their children spend time. Married parents have legal custody, and if they decide not to keep contact with relatives, the grandparents may be unable to pursue visitation rights through the Texas courts.
Understanding Texas Visitation Rights
Although parents have legal control over their children, there are situations in which grandparents can petition for legal visitation with grandchildren in Texas. If one parent of a divorced couple inhibits grandparents from maintaining a relationship, a petition for visitation may be warranted. A parent’s death is also grounds for pursuing legal visitation if the surviving parent tries to interfere with or extinguish the relationship. A petition may go forward if parental rights are terminated, and grandparents wish to seek guardianship or visitation. Ed Lee is a skilled guardianship attorney in Houston.
A Texas family court judge’s decision to grant a visitation petition is based on unique factors and the child’s best interest. Family law cases involving grandparents’ rights need time and attention from a skilled and compassionate Texas family law attorney and visitation attorney who will handle the legal case with the sensitivity it deserves.
Understanding Adoption Laws in Texas
A child may only have one official set of parents under Texas law. Adoption cases ask the court to make legal parents out of people who are not biological parents of a child. Texas adoption cases require the court to determine the best parental situation.
Adoption cases in Texas are generally categorized as either contested or uncontested. Houston adoption cases are legal actions serving the needs of a minor without a legal guardian. Some situations that may lead to an adoption case include:
- Neglect
- Abuse and domestic violence
- Homelessness
- Death of the biological parents
- Parents willingly giving up rights
- Other unique situations
As a result of the adoption process, an adoptive parent becomes responsible for the children’s financial, emotional, and physical care.
The Beginning Steps of Adoption in Texas
For a Texas adoption to take place, the parental rights of either the child’s mother or father must first be terminated by a Texas court. A petition for adoption would need to be filed in the court with jurisdiction over the child.
There are two significant situations in which the court can terminate parental rights of biological parents in Texas:
- If the judge finds the termination fits within the rules outlined in the Texas Family Code, termination of parental rights is justifiable in the child’s best interest
- A biological parent has voluntarily relinquished the child by signing over their rights to the state agency or other person
If you’re going about the process without an adoption agency, you’ll need to hire a Houston family law attorney to file the termination lawsuit on your behalf. If you find yourself in need of a Texas family lawyer, whether for an in-family or private adoption in Texas, the Law Office of Edwin E. Lee can help.
Your Houston Family Law Attorney
At the Law Office of Edwin E. Lee, we understand that each Texas family court case is unique. Court procedures and legal hearings are not one-size-fits-all scenarios. Texas families may need assistance navigating what legal services they need most for their unique legal matter in Texas. Ed Lee can help.
Family law cases require skill and compassion from an experienced Texas family law attorney, visitation attorney, or domestic violence attorney to support you throughout your case. Our firm is uniquely qualified to provide legal advice and representation in all matters of family law in Houston, TX, and surrounding areas.
At the Law Office of Edwin E. Lee, our Houston law firm practices estate planning and elder law, including Medicaid planning, asset protection, probate and trust administration, guardianship, family law, and related issues.
If you live in the Houston communities of The Heights, The Woodlands, Bel Air, or West University Heights, or in the surrounding cities of Baytown, Humble, Cloverleaf, Pearland, Stafford, Deer Park, and more, contact us for a consultation today.