https://buttecountychicofamilylawattorney.blogspot.com/2016/
LINK TO ANOTHER OF ATTORNEY'S LEGAL BLOGS, STARTING IN 2014 INCLUDING DATA FROM 4 YEARS AGO INVOLVING MUSICAL.LY APP
Published by attorney on legal blog in 2016 and as can be seen, today the data is still true but even worse with the advances made in technology, impacting even children and minors...........
There
is no bright line law or family case law currently in California
which seals a parent's fate as to "marijuana" in
general right
now,
and there is not likely a published case on using non appropriate
media as a sole reason for denial of custody (although we have had
cases where porn movies being shown and allegations of abuse have
resulted in loss of visitation...)
There is a non certified
dependency case
involving some marijuana issues (not a family law case; it is an
unpublished Los Angeles appeal under Juvenile Court Law, DCSS and
involved two teenage kids, 15/14 at the time...).
Custody is
likely to be highly affected by Domestic violence TROs, inappropriate
punishment, inappropriate drug use, abusive situations, neglect, etc.
Parents with DV charges or TROs against them cannot usually be the
custodial parent. We see some parents accept DV TRO charges for one
reason or another, but generally, it's best to fight such charges in
most cases. We also see many females use DV TROs when they have no
grounds. Occasionally males may do the same.
Although attorney
herein has research knowledge on medicinal marijuana and various
state law issues involving same, there is no one criteria in either
medicinal marijuana or recreational marijuana, that would be the 100%
certain win or lose factor for a parent, because in most cases, it's
only one issue, and not the ONLY issue at hand. Depending on how many
other issues are involved, the credibility of each parent, the depth
of insight that the attorney has, and how well an attorney can size
up each parent, this can make or break a case.
Simply hiring
"experts" means who can afford more--it doesn't mean
necessarily that one parent really wins. It will also depend on how
well each parent can present him or herself, answer questions, and
understand how the mediation process works. Attorney of this website
has seen countless cases involving mediation, and has seen some cases
go sideways at mediation, because the client may ruin his or her case
by saying the wrong things.Attorneys are not allowed in mediation,
therefore attorney can only try to teach client how mediators operate
so they will understand what is actually being done. Attorney has
seen extremely biased mediators (judging from the report they put
out) over the years, good mediators, and those that are fair.
Underestimating the mediation process usually results in bad
results.
Attorney herein researches these issues as they apply
to California Family Law, and makes best efforts to remain current on
new cases or decisions. Attorney is well aware of the long
running case involving marijuana, from Butte County that then seeming
moved to another county just north of Butte, with varying detriment
(depending on what one considers detrimental...)
In
any event, any type of drug, even if it's a prescription, can be
cause for concern in a divorce case. 
We
all know that alcohol use can be a concern, but it's legal to buy it,
right, and even to consume in the home? We have seen many court
orders where alcohol is NOT to be consumed during one parent's
custody.
And it's legal to obtain many drugs straight off the
shelf at the store.
When courts have to consider whether drug
usage is going to affect custody, it will depend on what evidence is
available, how good the attorney is at setting up the defense or
attack of the issue, what the exact facts are and are they
verifiable, and how; essentially, all of the foundation requirements
for evidentiary hearing, and all of the foundation requirements for
supporting evidence should be known; further, the lack of such
evidence and the preclusion possibilities, as with all evidence, will
come into play.
Trying cases with drugs involved should be
left to attorneys who handle trials, because the proof and litigation
aspects can be done with more precision. Many clients don't want to
spend the funds to engage litigators to gain appropriate custody
because they do not understand the time involved to make the defense,
or the admissibility for proper charging evidence.
In family
law we usually see many clients that just believe all they have to do
is say something, and that makes it true. That is not the case
necessarily. Conversely, clients often believe they can just
say something is not true, and that will prove their case. That too
is not necessarily true, because if it was, then there would be no
NEED for any attorneys at all, because clients could prove everything
themselves?
Obviously, clients, at least most of them, are not
able to do that because they did not go to law school and then work
for 20+ years at honing their skill. We
have to deal with inaccurate facts, misleading statements, the social
media nightmare, Facebook (often the absolute worst), and tons of
Internet postings, admissions, accusations, texts, blogging,
examples:
Lively,
Instagram, Vine, Snapchat, Kiks Messenger, WhatsApp, GroupMe,tumblr,
Twitter,Musical.ly,** You Now: Broadcast,Chat,and Watch Live Video,
Burn Note,Whisper, Yik Yak; could be inappropriate.........
---
Omegle+Tinder ( not appropriate for kids). Some of these apps
will or can be hidden or disappear, or may cause kids to meet up with
others that could be predators-- with parents not even knowing it is
happening.
**CURRENTLY IN 2020, TIK TOK AND FORMER mUSICAL.LY ARE IN LITIGATION INTERNATIONALLY AND WITH THE USA. PRESIDENT TRUMP AND NATIONAL CORPORATIONS ARE BATTLING FOR CONTROL OVER THE POTENTIAL FOR HARM IN PEOPLE USING THE APPS WITHOUT KNOWLEDGE OR REGARD FOR POTENTIAL BACK DOOR THREATS....................
NOTE:
New
apps come out all the time and they will never stop. These things can
be worse than drugs in some ways as unknown people can take advantage
of kids, teens, etc. A parent would never even know because most
parents don't really know what kids are doing with their
phones.
Personally,
we would not give kids a phone, computer or any electronic device
which was NOT monitored,
it is very easy to obtain software to do this!
