Court Opinion

ID: 4859273
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2021-08-26 01:36:11.86058+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:20:00.292933
License: Public Domain

I fully concur that the probate court reached the correct result. I also concur in much of the reasoning of the main opinion explaining the distinction between "presumed fathers" and "putative fathers." I write specially regarding the main opinion's statement suggesting that the father "neglected or refused to file a notice on his own behalf."41 So.3d at 773. As I read the Putative Father Registry Act, § 26-10C-1, Ala. Code 1975, when a man is adjudicated by a court of this state to be the father of a child born out of wedlock, that man has no duty to file anotice of intent to claim paternity under § 26-10C-1(i); rather, it is the duty of the clerk of the court that determines a man to be the father of a child born out of wedlock to "immediately notify the Department of Human Resources of the determination of paternity. . . ." § 26-10C-1(b), Ala. Code 1975 (emphasis added). L.A.M., who is indisputably the biological and presumed father of A.I.S., did not "neglect[] or refuse[] to file a notice on his own behalf," whether that "notice" refers to a notice of intent to claim paternity or a notice of the determination of paternity.