Posted on 01/09/2006 12:19:01 AM PST by RWR8189
A former Broward County man has been ordered to continue to pay child support for a child he did not father. He said his wife cheated on him; she denies it.
Richard Parker said he never suspected that his wife had been cheating on him when she got pregnant seven years ago.
When the Hollywood couple divorced in 2001, he agreed to pay her $1,200 a month in child support.
But less than two years later, when his son was 5, he says he learned the awful truth: The boy he had raised as his own wasn't his.
Parker sued his ex-wife, Margaret Parker, claiming fraud. He wanted to terminate his child-support payments and recover the money he had paid out. His court battle, so far unsuccessful, raises delicate questions about fatherhood and men's rights in an age in which it has become relatively simple to prove -- or disprove -- paternity.
For the most part, courts say the bonds of matrimony trump biology.
A Broward County judge dismissed Richard Parker's claim of fraud in January 2004, and an appeals court in November upheld the decision, effectively ending his quest for return of the child support he had paid to his ex-wife. Moreover, Parker must continue to pay $1,200 a month in support.
The court said Richard Parker should have questioned the blood line sooner -- within a year of the divorce -- if he had any doubts.
''It could have been over, and I could have been in control of my money,'' the 55-year-old dental implant salesman said of the dismissal, an outcome that didn't surprise him.
Margaret Parker, 41, insists that she never deceived her husband. She said they had trouble conceiving, so she had sex with a ''mutually agreed upon individual'' in order to get pregnant.
''He is the fraud,'' she said, describing her ex-husband as a louse, eager to dodge his responsibility.
Richard Parker, who now lives in Boston, said he didn't question his son's paternity until someone else suggested that there wasn't much of a resemblance.
''When kids are all really little, they all look the same,'' said Parker, a man of Irish and Italian ancestry. He said that both he and his son have dark hair, and that the boy has dark eyes shaped like his mother's.
But when his child was 5, his girlfriend's 90-year-old grandmother looked at a photo his father was carrying and told him that the child was certainly not his.
Parker confirmed the elderly woman's hunch with a DNA test he saw advertised on a billboard.
In June of that year, he sued his ex-wife.
In a petition before Broward Circuit Judge Renee Goldenberg, he said Margaret Parker intentionally misled him to believe that he was the father, and he asked the court to make his ex-wife pay him damages to compensate for past and future child-support obligations.
Goldenberg rejected his claim without wading into the issue of whether Richard Parker had been deceived. In late November, an appeals court upheld the decision.
`A TIME LIMIT'
Time was not on Richard Parker's side, said Joanna L. Grossman, a professor at Hofstra Law School in Hempstead, N.Y.
''The law provides a remedy for fraud, but imposes a time limit for raising the claim,'' Grossman wrote in an e-mail. ``Since his wife made the representation about the child's paternity during the divorce action, that proceeding was the appropriate time for him to raise any concerns he might have had.''
His lawyer, Scott A. Lazar, questioned the fairness of such a time limit, considering, as he alleges, that Parker was duped into believing he was the father.
''No one's going to tell you they are having an affair,'' Lazar said.
But Margaret Parker said she wasn't having an affair.
She said her ex-husband was infertile, a claim he called a ''a total lie,'' adding that, in fact, he has impregnated women in the past.
As part of her ruling, Judge Carole Y. Taylor of the Fourth District Court of Appeal in West Palm Beach acknowledged that Richard Parker might feel victimized by the court's ruling. But she said the child's needs are paramount.
She said that the father's appeal could trigger ``psychological devastation that the child will undoubtedly experience from losing the only father he or she has ever known.''
Moreover, Taylor noted, cheating is hardly rare. Quoting from a law article written by Temple Law Professor Theresa Glennon, the appeals judge wrote:
``While some individuals are innocent victims of deceptive partners, adults are aware of the high incidence of infidelity and only they, not the children, are able to act to ensure that the biological ties they may deem essential are present. . . . The law should discourage adults from treating children they have parented as expendable when their adult relationships fall apart.''
Andrea Moore, executive director of Florida's Children First, a statewide advocacy organization based in Coral Springs, applauded the court rulings.
PUTTING CHILD FIRST
''Why would society allow a child to suffer for the mistakes of the parents?'' Moore said. ``If you look at it from the child's perspective, the child needs parents who consistently provide and care about them. That should come first. I am not so sure the youngster would care who the biological father was if the man had acted like the father.''
The child, now 7, still believes Richard Parker is his father, both parents said. His name has been withheld to protect his identity.
To be sure, Parker said he still wants to help the child. He said he would like to control where the money goes, and added that he and his current wife are already starting a college fund.
Miami attorney Gerald Kornreich said that courts sometimes order an accounting of such payments, but added that it's not standard because the amount -- in this case, $1,200 a month -- is based on a guideline stemming from the parents' combined salaries.
''Disgruntled dads often say, `I am giving all this money and the mom is using it to go out at night or use it with her boyfriend,'' he said.
''But usually it's too little and not too much'' support.
Biology isn't everything, conceded Parker, himself a child of adoption. He said his son should know as much as he can about his biological father's health history.
''Let's find out who this guy is,'' Parker said.
Should the non-parent be made to suffer for the sins of the parent?
Wrong. The child is going to suffer no matter what. The blame should fall squarely on the mother.
Total self-serving crock.
They just don't think they bare responsibility when women have "choice."
Simple as that.
Your post is exactly right.
Your argument is a thinly veiled support for the single-mother welfare state. Somehow all choices by women is good, right? Wrong.
Yours is a slippery slope argument in support of the Nanny State.
Actually you don't know if any your statement is truth.
As the judge said, he waited too long. He obviously knew he did not sire the child.
The only one that will suffer is the child.
The mother and father will go on with their respecive self serving lives.
It's amazing what you can pull out of your poop chute to come up with a way to blame him.
Yea, right, whatever helps your conscience.
Did you actually mean to post this bit of classic male-bashing BS?
I'm not the one inventing fairy tales to blame the victim, so whose conscience needs help?
"I agree with it actually. The kid shouldn't be made to suffer because of the sins of it's parent."
But the child always DOES suffer. The child suffers from marital discord, from divorce, from a family which moves all over the country every time there is a better career offer. The child suffers from being raised by a woman with poor values, by a father living in another state.
$1,200 per month will not replace what this child needs. It is also being collected from the wrong guy.
What about the other man in this case? Where is he?
The court is nuts. They would come back fifty years later if the kid claimed that he had been abused by a priest, but they will not let the father off the hook for his wife's infidelity when he finally realizes what happened.
Actually yes I did, I thought that it would go well with all the woman bashing 'slut' comments.
I actually use the term "slut" in precisely the same way for both men and women, so your silly rejoinder is totally misdirected on me..
Actually you don't know if any your statement is truth.
Of course I do. The wife even concedes he's not the father. Did you actually read the article or did you just seize on an opportunity to sound foolish?
As the judge said, he waited too long. He obviously knew he did not sire the child.
Obviously? There is nothing whatsoever to suggest that he knew except for the ex-wife's statement which seems verifiably false.
The only one that will suffer is the child.
BS. He will obviously suffer. The ones that it seems won't suffer are the slutty wife and her slutty companion of however many years ago.
The mother and father will go on with their respecive self serving lives.
Well, the article seems to indicate that she will go on with her slutty life notwithstanding whereas he will take part in the child's life whether forced to or not, or at least so he claims. Regardless, there is nothing whatsoever to suggest that he is self-serving besides your own self-evident biases, which mean absolutetely nothing from an objective standpoint, least of all to me. Moreover, he has done nothing in this whole situation that gives any reason why he should not be able to go on with his life, self-serving or otherwise.
Perhaps ... a "recalcitrant contract holder"? Would something like this help you to feel better?
BS. He will obviously suffer
Telling, ain't it?
Well, matrimony sure doesn't trump biology when the wife wants to abort her husband's biological child.
*shrug* A good number of women (though certainly not all - probably not even the majority) regard men as little more than dildos with a wallet, so I didn't really carry the remark further. It's just the way it is.
I actually use the term "slut" in precisely the same way for both men and women, so your silly rejoinder is totally misdirected on me..
That may be so but you are the first male that I have ever heard say that so it would be impossible for me to misdirect that statement.
Of course I do. The wife even concedes he's not the father. Did you actually read the article or did you just seize on an opportunity to sound foolish?
Yes, she did concede that and she also said that he knew it at the time of the divorce. So I guess because she is a 'slut' she has to be lying and because the male is a 'slut' he has to be telling the truth.
Obviously? There is nothing whatsoever to suggest that he knew except for the ex-wife's statement which seems verifiably false.
Obviously but there is also no evidence to prove the opposite.
The only one that will suffer is the child.
Good grief, you are right, I can't image why I would think it would be the child that will suffer.
I am sure he will 'continue' to be a loving caring father until it interferers with time he wants to spend elsewhere and they both will continue in their 'slutty' ways. Raising the child to be just like them.
Isn't parenthood great.
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