The Father appealed from a final
judgment of paternity which determined that the Florida courts had subject
matter jurisdiction over the parties' custody dispute concerning the parties'
eight-year-old daughter; granted custody of the child to the mother, ordered
monthly child support; and placed the burden of visitation costs entirely on the
father. With regard to the jurisdictional question, the District Court held:
1. "A Florida court has
jurisdiction to make an initial child custody determination if Florida is the
home state of the child on the date of the commencement of the proceeding. Home
state is defined in relevant part as the state in which a child has lived with
a parent or person acting as a parent for at least six consecutive months
immediately before the commencement of a child custody proceeding."
2. "The UCCJEA gives jurisdictional
priority to the child's home state. However, the UCCJEA grants an exception to
the home state jurisdictional requirement when 'a court of another state does
not have jurisdiction' Therefore, under the UCCJEA, even if Florida is not the
child's home state, Florida may exercise subject matter jurisdiction over a
child custody matter if another state does not have jurisdiction""On the date that the paternity action was commenced in this case, Florida was not the 'home state' of the child because the child had not lived in Florida for six consecutive months prior to the commencement of the paternity action…. However, no other state had jurisdiction since the mother and child had lived in several states in the six months prior to their arrival in Florida and the commencement of the paternity action."
4. "As a result, because no court of any other
state would have had jurisdiction under section 61.514, the Florida trial court
had jurisdiction to make an initial custody determination."
Hindle v. Fuith,
33 So.3d 782 (Fla. 5th DCA 2010)
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