Court Opinion

ID: 9765174
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 03:54:34.443046+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:54:01.743846
License: Public Domain

Tom Glaze, Justice, concurring. I join the majority, but write to address only the subject-matter jurisdiction issue, since I agree entirely with the majority’s procedural holding that writ of prohibition is not the vehicle for review of this cause. The majority court also correctly holds that the chancery court had subject-matter jurisdiction in granting appellant-stepparent Rodney Smith visitation, but I concur to offer further support for that conclusion. Michelle Young is correct that Smith has no statutory right under which he can demand visitation with Dustin. Even so, visitation privileges may be extended to nonadoptive stepparents who have stood in loco parentis to the child. See 27C C.J.S. Divorce § 632 (1986); see also Golden v. Golden, 57 Ark. App. 143, 942 S.W.2d 282 (1997), citing Riddle v. Riddle, 28 Ark. App. 344, 775 S.W.2d 513 (1989); contra 27C C.J.S. § 632 (Cum. 1997). Concerning the Golden and Riddle cases, Young makes a strong argument that those cases fail to support the proposition that a stepparent is entitled to visitation with a stepchild. I agree. Riddle never decided the issue, and Golden simply mischaracterized the Riddle holding. Nevertheless, our court, in Stamps v. Rawlins, 297 Ark. 370, 761 S.W.2d 933 (1988), did address the issue as to whether a chancery court can award custody of a child to a stepparent, and held a chancellor may do so. The Stamps court did so even though Arkansas’s statute makes no reference to a stepparent, but instead reads, “. . ,[T]he award of custody of the children of the marriage shall be made without regard to the sex of the parent, but solely in accordance with the welfare and best interests of the children.”1  Given the rule that a stepparent may be awarded custody of a stepchild if the child’s welfare and best interest warrant such placement, I submit that a stepparent standing in loco parentis may be awarded visitation rights. See also Jeff Atkinson, Modern Child Custody Practice § 8.18 (1986 and Cum. 1987) (case law from at least nine states has recognized a right of stepparents to seek visitation); see also Koelle v. Zwiren, 672 N.E. 2d 868 (Ill. App. 1 Dist. 1996) (awarding custody or visitation rights to nonparent over objection of natural parent is permissible if it would be in best interests of child). In conclusion, I note Young’s reliance on two earlier cases of this court, Poe v. Case, 263 Ark. 488, 565 S.W.2d 612 (1978), and Wilson v. Wallace, 274 Ark. 48, 622 S.W.2d 164 (1981), that dealt with grandparent visitation rights. She suggests those holdings provide visitation orders that lack statutory authority and are void and unenforceable. I disagree. Poe merely holds that probate court is a court of special and limited jurisdiction and a probate court decree attempting to grant visitation rights to a natural grandparent as an incident to an adoption, or to enforce a grandparent’s visitation rights without specific statutory authority, is surplusage and void. And the Wilson case, a chancery court case, involved whether paternal grandparents were entitled to visitation rights after the widowed mother remarries and the second husband adopts her child. The Wilson court said no, but it denied visitation based upon the legislature having enacted law that “terminated all legal relationships between the adopted individual and his relatives... so the adopted individual thereafter is a stranger to his former relatives for all purposes.” Here, the Arkansas General Assembly has enacted no law that proscribes stepparents, standing in loco parentis, from visiting with a stepchild. In sum, I find the cases Young cites inapplicable to the situation now before this court. I concur with the results reached by the majority. Corbin, J., joins this concurrence.   In Stamps, the court awarded custody of the child in the mother because the mother was a fit and proper person for custody.