Opinion ID: 1678618
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Separating the siblings.

Text: The best interests of the child require a showing of compelling reasons before separating siblings in custody matters. Mayer, supra . Such a showing is necessary even for half-siblings. Id. In Mayer, the two girls, who were half-sisters, were two years apart in age and shared a strong, common bond of childhood. No compelling reasons were shown to separate the siblings. As a result, the Mayer court held that it was an abuse of discretion for the trial court to separate the children in awarding custody. Here, there was an age difference of nine years between Ralandi and her closest half-sibling. John was fourteen years old and interested in horseback riding, fishing, bowling, and wrestling. Sheri was sixteen years old and occupied with friends and boyfriends and a part-time job. There was no evidence of shared activities between the children other than Sheri's baby-sitting of Ralandi when Lou Anne was away from the home. There was some indication that the older children showed some resentment toward Ralandi. The court found no common bond of childhood between Ralandi and the older children. In addition, and unlike Mayer, the court found misconduct on the part of Lou Anne and that this misconduct had a detrimental effect upon Ralandi. The court also found that Roland provided a more stable and positive environment for Ralandi. These findings were sufficiently compelling and the court did not abuse its discretion in awarding custody of the child to Roland, even though this resulted in separating the siblings. Mellema, supra ; Mayer, supra .