Massachusetts Child Custody and Parenting Time
The State of Massachusetts has guidelines and laws regarding the care of children after their parents’ divorce. These laws concern custody and maintenance, child support obligations, and provisions for education and health insurance. In the course of our practice, since we help couples navigate their divorce proceedings, we often must help them concerning child custody, child support, and parental visitation schedules. These custody and visitation cases are determined by the judges in the Probate and Family Court. These family law decisions can be made on cases that are just regarding the custody or visitation, or they can be part of a divorce case.
Massachusetts has offered a comprehensive resource that explains the law in full, a section of which reads:
“Upon a judgment for divorce, the court may make such judgment as it considers expedient relative to the care, custody and maintenance of the minor children of the parties and may determine with which of the parents the children or any of them shall remain or may award their custody to some third person if it seems expedient or for the benefit of the children. In determining the amount of the child support obligation or in approving the agreement of the parties, the court shall apply the child support guidelines promulgated by the chief justice of the trial court, and there shall be a rebuttable presumption that the amount of the order which would result from the application of the guidelines is the appropriate amount of child support to be ordered.”
We understand that a divorce or end of a relationship is a time of upheaval and a time with many questions. If you need answers to your questions or need advice about your particular situation, we can help you here at Keough + Sweeney. We have two offices in Massachusetts, in Raynham and Boston and an office in Pawtucket, RI.
