Court Opinion

ID: 7815707
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-09-07 17:35:29.255794+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:30:35.712176
License: Public Domain

Carleton Harris, Chief Justice, dissenting. I feel that the Court should have granted custody of the child, Nettie Katherine, at least for the time being, to the grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Duncan, rather than to the mother, Jeanne Duncan Lindoerfer Crowder. The Majority have not seen fit to relate the evidence which most strongly supports the view that Mrs. Crowder is unsuitable to be given the custody of the child. Since they have not done this, I shall follow suit, for the testimony is, as the Majority state, rather sordid, and nothing would be gained by discussing the charges of immorality against appellee (a substantial part of which was admitted), other than to considerably strengthen this dissent, which, after all, is unimportant. Suffice it to say, that the conduct referred to occurred some seven or eight years before this trial, while appellee was a student at a girls ’ school in a neighboring state. It may be, as Mrs. Crowder stated, in defending her conduct, that it was “mostly a case of delayed adolescence”, but the admitted acts occurred during the course of a year when appellee was 19 to 20 years of age. Be that as it may, this testimony was only a part of the evidence which I consider to indicate Mrs. Crowder’s emotional instability or immaturity. A short time after her graduation, she married Frank Lindoerfer, father of Nettie, but they separated after five months. Subsequently, she went to Emory University, where she had been awarded a fellowship, in furtherance of an expressed intention to obtain advanced degrees in psychology. During this period, though still married to Mr. Lindoerfer, she dated a man named Sheldon Fein, admittedly thought she was in love with him, and discussed the subject of future marriage. The relationship with Fein was terminated because the appellants herein wrote Fein, and apparently threatened to attempt to obtain his dismissal from the school. Sometime subsequently, the fellowship awarded appellee was cancelled by the Dean of Emory University, because of her unsatisfactory scholastic record. Mrs. Crowder had been married to her present husband less than eleven months at the time of the rendition of this decree, which, under my view, is not a sufficient period of time in which to determine whether this marriage will provide a suitable home environment, or whether appellee has attained that degree of stability which is so desirable and necessary for one having the custody of a small child. Certainly, I have no desire to punish Mrs. Crowder for “indiscretions” of youth, if, in fact, the acts mentioned in the testimony were indiscretions, rather than evidence of a fixed behavior pattern. I also recognize there are two sides to this lawsuit, and that perhaps appellants are not entirely blameless, but I am firmly of the opinion that the Court’s order giving appellee custody of this child was premature; i.e., her change in habits and attitudes should be more firmly established before entrusting her with the care of this little girl. I therefore respectfully dissent. Mr. Justice Holt joins in this dissent.