Court Opinion

ID: 9690995
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 19:59:45.986375+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:11:00.841089
License: Public Domain

Larry D. Vaught, Judge, dissenting. I would affirm the /decision of the trial court to maintain jurisdiction of this child-custody case in Arkansas, and therefore, I dissent. The facts and applicable standard of review are set out in the majority opinion. On this issue of jurisdiction, the trial court’s order of February 13, 2006, states in paragraph four that “it has continuing jurisdiction over this matter unless and until it were determined that there is a more appropriate forum on the basis of Arkansas being an inconvenient forum or otherwise.” The only other holding by the court on this issue is an oral pronouncement that it did not have authority to transfer the case to another state as long as at least one parent resided in Arkansas, unless both parties agreed to the transfer. This statement is held to be an error of law by the majority, and the basis for reversal. The applicable section of the UCCJEA is Arkansas Code Annotated section § 9-19-202, which provides, in part: (a) Except as otherwise provided in § 9-19-204, a court of this state which has made a child-custody determination consistent with § 9-19-201 or § 9-19-203 has exclusive, continuing jurisdiction over the determination until: (1) a court of this state determines that neither the child, nor the child and one (1) parent, nor the child and a person acting as a parent have a significant connection with this state and that substantial evidence is no longer available in this state concerning the child’s care, protection, training, and personal relationships; or (2) a court of this state or a court of another state determines that the child, the child’s parents, and any person acting as a parent do not presently reside in this state. The trial court ruled that under the UCCJEA it had continuing jurisdiction of the case, so long as at least one of the parents lived in Arkansas, and that it had no authority to transfer the case. While there is no further analysis by the court in the record, it appears that it was relying on subsection (a)(2) of the above statute in making the ruling. I believe the wording of that subsection supports the trial court’s conclusion. The wording of subsection (a)(2) uses the conjunction “and,” indicating that in order to lose its exclusive, continuing jurisdiction the trial court must determine that the child, the child’s parents, and any person acting as a parent do not reside in the state. Because it was established that the mother resided in Arkansas, the court correctly held that Arkansas had continuing jurisdiction. The majority relies on subsection (a)(1), holding that there are no findings to support a conclusion that there are significant connections with this state. However, even if this subsection does apply, I believe that the record in this case supports the existence of significant connections, and we may affirm under our de novo review by concluding that a preponderance of the evidence supports the conclusion. See Hamilton v. Barrett, 337 Ark. 460, 989 S.W.2d 520 (1999). This case is very similar to West v. West, 364 Ark. 73, 216 S.W.3d 557 (2005), where our supreme court held that Arkansas retained jurisdiction even though the mother and her children had lived in Oregon the last few years. The court held that the children had significant connections with Arkansas because the father still lived in Arkansas, and the children spent 20-25% of their time with him in Arkansas. I would affirm under either subsection (a)(1) or (a)(2) of Arkansas Code Annotated section 9-19-202.