How to Handle False Allegations of Abuse in Oklahoma?
I wanted to talk to you about something that comes up pretty frequently, I would say, considering how serious it is in my practice, and that is an allegation of abuse. If you are a non-custodial parent or a parent at all involved in a custody or visitation suit or a divorce, and there’s an allegation that you abused your child, but you know that that allegation is false, what can you do to protect your legal rights?
Well, obviously, in my business, I’m going to say hire a good lawyer. Happy to talk to you about that or any other questions you have, but specifically, you need to engage a lawyer that knows how to defend against those allegations.
Guardian Ad Litem Can Help
To give you some idea of how I would handle that, the first thing is I would suggest that potentially you get a guardian ad litem in your case. A guardian ad litem is a third-party lawyer appointed by the court that interviews your child or children in both parties. Sometimes or oftentimes, that can be a very useful fact-finding tool to try and help make those allegations go away in the sense that they’re proven false.
Cooperate with the Department of Human Services
The second thing that you can do is you can cooperate with the Department of Human Services. If there is no credible evidence of abuse, DHS is an investigative agency in Oklahoma. It’s one that the courts and family lawyers depend on quite a bit to do an investigation. Lawyers aren’t investigators, judges aren’t investigators, but DHS is. With the counsel of an attorney, you can cooperate with DHS. The goal in that cooperation is for them to come to the finding that the abuse allegation is unsubstantiated.
Once DHS has a report that says that the allegation was unsubstantiated, your position in court is much better. It does require oftentimes the advice of a good attorney to tell you how you handle those interviews with DHS. Sometimes we interact for DHS for you, go before you interview, or anything of that nature. You definitely, on the other end of proving that an allegation is false, have a much better position in court.
