[strawberry61]

I am being granted temporary custody of my niece's 7 month old baby. She was raped by the father and although she loves the child, when she's with him it brings back painful memories. The father is in jail now and facing a possible 15 year prison term, but he will not sign his rights over. Could anyone tell me the difference between Permanent Guardianship and Adopiton. The social worker my niece is seeing has said the she will keep taking the father to court until he does sign over his rights. She does not want him to see either one of his children. He is a very volatile person. I would appreciate any help that anyone could give me on this matter. Thank you.

[3girls1boy]

Legal Guardinship means that you have the right to make care for the child and take responsiblity for the child- you can seek medical attention, enroll them in school, etc.- but you are not legally their parent. You must go before a judge to get legal guardianship. Sometimes the parents agree to this, because it does not terminate their parental rights, but allows someone else to legally care for their child. Guardiansips can be revoked if they are challenged by the child's parents or other interested party. Sometimes judges grant guardianships even if the parents don't consent. It depends on your state laws. Right now your niece can give you temporary guardianship with just a signature witnessed by a notary. I would check with a lawyer or social worker in your state. Adoption gives you complete full legal rights to a child just as if you had given birth to them. Birthparents parental rights must be terminated for this to happen. I would contact Grandparents as Parents, or other organizations in your area. They will give you all sorts of advice. If you get legal guardianship of your niece it would be termed "kinship guardianship."

[strawberry61]

Thank you so much for your help. The information has really helped me. My husband and I want this so much, we just need to check all avenues. Hopefully, the birth father will sign over his rights and we will be able to adopt. If not, we will go with the guardianship. Again, thanks for your help.

[Gina78]

Strawberry, what state are you in? We are in the midst of adopting my husband's 5 week old nephew. We are dealing with paternity issues, too (cannot locate father and only know his first name). Turns out that in TX they have to register for paternity and that no contact with the pregnant partner is considered abandonment. It's not totally cut and dry, but our lawyer isn't worried about it.
I did ALOT of research about how to terminate the rights of the father while we awaited the baby's birth, and I remember reading something about involuntary termination of paternal rights in the case of rape or long-term incarceration. I'm in TX, but I wouldn't doubt that they have similair laws where you are.

why are the courts not terminating his rights? Seems kinda cruel for a child to need the permission of his rapist father to be adopted. Convicted of rape should mean automatic tpr....

[Colorbind love]

Raping the mother, even being convicted of that rape is NOT considered an automatic reason to tpr in any state. Or at least, no states had such a provision 10 years ago. The reason is that supposedly what the rapist did to the mother is no reflection of the type of parent he is capable of being.

You'd have to take it to court for tpr. Its possible you can get a judge to sign off. More likely he'll stop fighting. Rape is about power in the first place. A baby is the ultimate power after a rape. He is has to fight YOU and not HER, he's more likely to give it up.

Rape should be an automatic reason for tpr. Sadly, its not.

[strawberry61]

Thank you all for the responses. I am sorry it is taking me so long to get back to you but I have been sick. I do not have a computer at home right now and have to use the one at work. I live in Ky. Right now, they are offering the father a plea bargain of 6 years. If he does not take it, it will have to go before a jury trial and he may get 10 to 20 years. The district attorney is the one who wants to wait and see what happens. He seems to think that it will be easier to terminate his rights if he gets sentenced. As of right now, they have not even told him where the baby is. He knows where the other boy is but not the baby. For some reason, none of his family is even interested in the baby. They have never called my sister to check on him, see how he is, or anything. They knew he was with my sister and they never even called. They are only interested in the older boy. I got the baby a little over 3 weeks ago and have custody for 1 year for now. We are doing what the district attorney asked, and if that does not work out, my husband, myself, and my niece are going to do what we have to do to see if we can get him to sign over his rights. My sister and my niece seem to believe that once he finds out that my niece wants nothing to do with this baby, he won't either, because it will not be a way to hold onto my niece. He knows she wants the older boy and that is what he is holding onto right now. It is just one big mess at the moment. But for the present time, we will wait and see and just give him all the love he needs.