Court Opinion

ID: 9762070
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 02:09:43.092033+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:29.754596
License: Public Domain

David Newbern, Justice, dissenting. When a child is born to an unmarried woman, the child must be in the legal custody of someone, hence the General Assembly’s unremarkable determination that custody shall be in the mother who has just given birth. Ark. Code Ann. § 9-10-113(a). The granting of visitation rights to the father in the circumstance of a child newly born is equally unremarkable and, to me, does not signify that the court which established paternity reached any conclusion about which parent should have custody. Subsection (c) of that same statute says that if the father of the child born in these circumstances wishes to have custody transferred to him, he must show he is a fit parent, has assumed his responsibilities to the child, and it is in the child’s best interest that the father have custody. It does not require a showing of a change in circumstances. The Chancellor’s addition of the requirement that Mr. Nor-wood show a change in circumstances was wrong. The General Assembly had good reason for leaving that requirement out of the list stated. If the mother of a child is totally incapable of caring for the child, and the father would make an ideal custodian, should a chancellor be allowed to hold that custody must remain with the mother because she has always been incompetent and the father has always been competent, and thus there has been no change in circumstances? Of course not. Neither the Chancellor’s mistake nor the majority opinion is saved by the reference to Ark. Code Ann. § 9-10-109(a)(1) (1987). That statute is a general one setting forth procedure to be followed by the Chancellor after paternity has been established. While it states the Chancellor shall use general rules applicable to determinations with respect to children bom of marriages, it has nothing specific about what must be shown to change custody. Even if it could reasonably be said that § § 9-10-113(a) and 9- 10-109(a)(1) are conflicting statutes in pari materia, § 9-10-113(a) would control. Where a conflict in two such statutes exists, “the more specific statute controls over the more general one.” 2A N. Singer, Sutherland Stat. Const. § 51.02 (5th ed. 1992). The specific should always govern the general as it is a much better indicator of legislative intent. Section 9-10-113(a) is very specific; § 9-10-109(a)(1) is not. The majority’s position sets a dangerous precedent. Despite the fact that we can review this case de novo it should be returned to the Chancellor who is in a much better position than we to evaluate the parties’ testimony and that of other witnesses. While there is doubt that Mr. Norwood met the second criterion of § 9-10- 113(a), that of sufficient support of the child, that doubt is clouded by evidence that the child spent a lot of time with Mr. Norwood and his mother who may well be the child’s best hope. There is some suggestion that while in their care, Mr. Norwood gave a good deal of unrecorded financial support to the child. I simply cannot say how the Chancellor would have, or should have, ruled had changed circumstances not been erroneously used as a criterion for determining which parent should have custody. I respectfully dissent.