Summary of Pending Family Court Cases By Circuit and Class As of 7/31/2016

This document is a summary of the number and percentage of pending family court cases divided by county and circuit.

South Carolina/Family Court Circuits Meeting Benchmark : 80% of Pending Docket 365 Days or Less as of June 30, 2016

This is a diagram broken down by circuits of the percentage of family courts meeting the benchmark of 80% of disposing of cases within a year. Seven out of the 16 circuits met the standard.

Summary of Pending Family Court Cases By Circuit and Class As of 6/30/2016

This document is a summary of the number and percentage of pending family court cases divided by county and circuit.

Summary of pending family court cases by circuit and class as of 9/30/2016

This document is a summary of the number and percentage of pending family court cases divided by county and circuit.

Contemporary issues in Australian family law: Do we need a more unified and interventionist judicial model

Recent decisions of the Family Court of Australian reflect concerns over the adversarial nature of the legal process. The processes and procedures of the judicial system militate against a detailed examination of the issues and rights of the parties in dispute. The limitations of the family law framework are particularly demonstrated in disputes over the custody of children where the Court has tended to neglect the rights and interests of the primary carer. An alternative "unified family court" framework will be examined in which the Court pursues a more active and interventionist approach in the determination of family law disputes.

Family law issues and schools : guidance for Australian educators

A substantial number of Australian children are now living in separated families, with many moving between their parents’ homes. This has led to educators being confronted with an increasing number of family law issues. This article discusses the key aspects of family law that involve children. It highlights the need for schools to be aware of all family law orders that relate to children in their care, including family court, domestic violence and child protection orders. It also provides guidance in relation to how schools can adopt child focused approaches in some common scenarios, where parents are in dispute. In particular, we will recommend that educators take a child-focused approach, consistent with the principal provision of the Family Law Act 1975 (Cth) that ‘the best interests of the child’ be the paramount consideration. We will highlight how this contrasts starkly with what can be described as a ‘parental rights’ interpretation, which has unfortunately been taken by some since the 2006 amendments to the Family Law Act, and is, in our view, directly at odds with the intention of the legislation.

Surrogacy and IVF

While in the past surrogacy was illegal in Queensland, since June 2010 the Surrogacy Act 2010 (Qld) (“the Act”) has made altruistic surrogacy arrangements lawful in Queensland. In addition, it provides a mechanism for transfer of legal parentage from the surrogate to the person(s) wishing to have a child (the intended parent(s)). Commercial surrogacy – where a payment, reward or other material benefit of advantage (other than the reimbursement of the “birth mother’s surrogacy costs” (s11 of the Act) is made for entering into a surrogacy arrangement – remains unlawful. The paramount guiding principle underpinning the Act is that of the wellbeing and best interests of a child born as a result of surrogacy. The Surrogacy Act 2010 (Qld) allows a single person or a couple (heterosexual or same sex couples) to enter into an agreement with a woman, and her partner (if she has one), to become pregnant with the intention that the child will be relinquished to the intended parent(s). The Act also provides a mechanism for the intended parent(s) to be legally recognised as the parent(s) of the child. In order for the intended parent(s) to be legally recognised (via a parentage order, discussed below) it must be shown that the surrogacy arrangement was entered into when all the parties were over 25 years of age and the intended parent(s) are male or, in a heterosexual or lesbian couple the female(s) are not likely to conceive or give birth to a healthy child due to medical reasons. The arrangement must be entered into before the surrogate becomes pregnant and all parties must have obtained independent legal advice and counselling about the proposed arrangement, and evidence of this is required at the time a parentage order is applied for. For the purposes of the Act it does not matter how the surrogate conceives the child or if the child is genetically related to the parties. During the period of the pregnancy, the surrogate has the right to manage her pregnancy in the way she wishes. Although she cannot profit from acting as a surrogate, section 11 states that she is entitled to surrogacy costs. These include, for example, reasonable medical costs related to pregnancy and the birth of the child; counselling and legal costs associated with the surrogacy arrangement; actual lost earnings because of leave taken during pregnancy or following birth and any reasonable travel expenses incurred. The surrogacy arrangement itself is not legally enforceable; however, obligations to pay a surrogate’s surrogacy costs are enforceable unless she chooses not to relinquish the child to the intending parents. While the Act does not specifically deal with the situation where the surrogate decides she is unprepared to relinquish the child to the intended parents, there have been examples where parties have entered into these kinds of arrangements, and the arrangements have become difficult. For example, the Family Court case of Re Evelyn (1998) FLC 92–807 involved a child born to a surrogate mother who decided not to surrender her. The child was the genetic child of the surrogate mother and the husband of the couple who had contracted with the surrogate mother. Both sets of parents brought proceedings in the court, seeking that the child live with them. In hearing the application, the court applied the paramount principle of the ‘best interests of the child’. The court made clear that there is no presumption in favour of the birth mother, although in this case the court found that the child may be better placed with the surrogate mother’s family.

The judiciary in contemporary society : Australia

In Australia the appointment of judges is, by constitution or statute, universally the responsibility of the executive branch. The federal government handles all such matters relating to the High Court, the Federal Court, the Family Court and other federal judicial bodies. State governments exercise similar authority over the state supreme courts, district and magistrates' courts. All appointments are formally made by the Governor-General, or the Governor, in Council...

Treatment for gender dysphoria in children : the new legal, ethical and clinical landscape

- Gender dysphoria is a condition in which a child's subjectively felt identity and gender are not congruent with her or his biological sex. Because of this, the child suffers clinically significant distress or impairment in social functioning. - The Family Court of Australia has recently received an increasing number of applications seeking authorisation for the provision of hormones to treat gender dysphoria in children. - Some medical procedures and interventions performed on children are of such a grave nature that court authorisation must be obtained to render them lawful. These procedures are referred to as special medical procedures. - Hormonal therapy for the treatment of gender dysphoria in children is provided in two stages occurring years apart. Until recently, both stages of treatment were regarded by courts as special medical treatments, meaning court authorisation had to be provided for both stages. - In a significant recent development, courts have drawn a distinction between the two stages of treatment, permitting parents to consent to the first stage. In addition, it has been held that a child who is determined by a court to be Gillick competent can consent to stage 2 treatment. - The new legal developments concerning treatment for gender dysphoria are of ethical, clinical and practical importance to children and their families, and to medical practitioners treating children with gender dysphoria. Medical practitioners should benefit from an understanding of the recent developments in legal principles. This will ensure that they have up-to-date information about the circumstances under which treatment may be conducted with parental consent, and those in which they must seek court authorisation.

Children with gender dysphoria deserve better from the law

An increasing number of Australian children are accessing specialist health services for gender dysphoria treatment, largely because of a growing awareness among doctors about available specialist health services. But the law is not in step with the needs of these children...

National Council of Jewish Women, New York Section records, undated, 1895-2004.

These records document New York Section’s early history to the present, representing a significant portion of its work in community programming and advocacy, as well as its supporting administrative, fundraising, membership, and public relations activities. As a section of the National Council, its records also include a substantial amount of material regarding the National Organization’s programs, events, publications, and reports, dating from 1896 through 1999.

Women and Marital Breakdown in South India : Reconstructing Homes, Bonds and Persons

Women and Marital Breakdown in South India: Reconstructing Homes, Bonds and Persons is an ethnographic analysis of the situation of divorced and separated women and their families in the South Indian city of Bangalore. The study is based on 16 months of anthropological fieldwork, i.e., participant observation and life history interviews among 50 divorced and separated women from different socio-religious backgrounds in their homes, in the women s organisations and in the Family Court. The study follows the divorced and separated women from their natal homes to their affinal homes through homelessness and legal battles to their reconstructed natal, affinal or single homes in order to find out what it means to be a person within hierarchical gender and kinship relations in South India. Marital breakdown impacts on kin relations and discloses the existing gender relations and power structure through its consequences. It makes the transformability of relational personhood as well as the transformability of relational society and culture visible. Although the study reveals the painful history of women s ill-treatment in marriage, family and kinship systems, it also demonstrates the women s rejection of the domination; and shows their ability to re-negotiate and promote changes not only to their own positions but to the whole hierarchical system as well. The study explores the divorced and separated women s manifold dilemmas, complicated legal battles, and endless arrangements when they have to struggle with the very practical problems of supporting themselves financially, finding and making a new home for themselves, and re-arranging relationships with their kin and friends. As marital breakdown fundamentally transforms the women s relational field, it forces them to recreate substitutive relations in a flexible way and, simultaneously, to re-construct themselves and their lives without a ready or positive cultural or behavioural template. This process reveals the agency of the divorced and separated women as well as shedding light on issues of gender and the cultural construction of the person in South India. This topical study explores the previously neglected subject of marital breakdown in India and shows the new meaning of kinship in South India.

A manifestação da vontade da criança na disputa judicial da guarda: escuta psicanalítica/

Currently, in custody disputes, the child has the right to be heard and to have its opinion considered, according to its age and maturity. The psychologist/psychoanalyst who works in the Family Court is required to produce a Report with the purpose of helping the Court´s decision. The present research aims to discuss and to find guiding principles for the hearing of the declaration of the child´s will in a custody dispute by its parents, from a psychoanalytical perspective. The case of a nine year old girl that affirmed in Court the desire of living with the mother and seeing the father only once a year is the starting point of this theoretical research over the psychoanalytic fundaments of the hearing of the case, how it appeared in that experience and how it was reflected in the report. Throughout this work, the peculiarities of psychoanalysis as a way of understanding the subject and the conditions that must be observed so that a sctrictu sensu analytic hearing is possible are studied. Then we present a reflection of the case, in the light of the theories studied, verifying that we could observe in the experience: i) the assumption of a subject of the unconscious, divided and desire full that constitutes itself from the oedipic structuration, that leads to the difference between speech and speak; ii) the concept of the child as having a sexuality of its own; iii) a hearing based on the ethic principles of psychoanalysis and the analysts'' formation. In the final considerations, we state that the institutional demand of a meaning for the case is a great difficulty for the analyst since he works from a place of 'not-knowing"

O elo entre o serviço social e o judiciário: demandas, desafios e contribuições na defesa de Direitos

Unveiling the link between the Social Services and the Judiciary is the object of this work, since the judiciary is constituted as one of the socio-occupational areas of the profession in the sphere of the state, seize the demands placed on professionals which work becomes relevant , considering that these are embody the multiple expressions of social issues, constituting a challenge to social work, while influencing the contributions that the profession has engendered in the defense and expansion rights. It constitutes an analysis from the standpoint of theoretical and methodological basis Qualiquantitative taking for granted the rights violations against children and adolescents in their social, legal and historical guide to the topic. For this we used a theoretical Marxist Behring (2009), Colman (2008), Faleiros (2205), Faria (1999, 2001), Fávaro (2007, 2008), Iamamoto (1985, 1992, 2002, 2006, 2007) Yazbek, Marx (1983), Netto (1994), Nicholas (1984), Pequeno (2009), Rizinni (1997, 2008), Santos (2009), Sales (2006), Telles (1999), Tonet (2009), among others. Besides literature, empirical research conducted through semi-structured interviews using a script and written records and systematic observation / free during interviews. The subjects were 06 social workers from the area of the judiciary to act on Justice for Children and Youth, Family Court and NOADE in Natal / RN. The research aims to analyze the demands and challenges of Social Services and their contribution in ensuring and enforcing rights in courts nowadays. The route established between knowledge and method involves conceptual analysis on the Judiciary, Social Services, and Child and Adolescent Rights. Seize-up in this study the existing contradictions in confronting the multiple expressions of social issues in the context of the judiciary. The research allowed us to identify relevant aspects regarding the challenges and demands placed Social Service; limits on defense and expansion of their rights and contradictions within sociojurídico. For being one of the judiciary institutions that comprise the system warranty rights, social workers also face difficulties in implementing the professional doing since the ills posed by current sociability capital focus in everyday spaces socio-occupational presented here. On the other hand, is commendable acting those protagonists who believe, defend and contribute to the defense and expansion rights