New York Paternity

The issue of Paternity is defined by the Family Court as being the father of a child/children. A determination of Paternity can dramatically introduce a whole slew of Family Law issues which may include; Child Custody (Shared or Joint Custody or Full Custody) Visitation and Child Support. Your New York Paternity Lawyer knows that DNA testing is today frequently used to determine paternity, and that a paternity order that is entered against a father is part of imposing a child support order. In the offices of Stephen Bilkis & Associates, PLLC, each New York Family Lawyer and New York Divorce Lawyer has extensive experience in evaluation and litigation of Paternity cases, as well as in representing fathers who wish to be established as the biological father of a child and maintain an ongoing relationship together with the child. If you are on either side of a Paternity case, you’ll find a New York Paternity Lawyer in any of our offices in the New York metro area, in Manhattan and the other boroughs and in the suburbs, ready to provide you with a free evaluation regarding your case.

All through New York, from NYC to Westchester County to Long Island, establishing paternity generally gets conducted in the Family Courts. New York Paternity Lawyers regularly explain to clients that paternity may be established by a specific written document called an acknowledgment, which you must file with the birth registrar. When either parent—the mother or the alleged father—contests paternity, the New York Family Court may take jurisdiction over the matter. From Suffolk County and Nassau County to New York City, the mother or the alleged father can file to start the paternity case. From there, a Family Court Judge will decide Paternity. Once it is determined, the Family Court as the power to award child support obligations, Custodial rights as well as setting a visitation schedule.

Each New York Family Lawyer in our firm has familiarity with the scientific methods that can play a part in the conducting of a paternity case. Scientific advances like DNA testing, genetic marker testing, and more are not necessarily 100% conclusive except when they actually exclude the presumed father. In Family Court they are, however, given substantial evidentiary value. Our New York Paternity Lawyers, whether they are based in our New York or Nassau County offices, understands that a test result indicating 99% or higher probability of paternity, more often than not, leads to the Court deciding in favor of the validity of the paternity test results. The respondent or the petitioner (mother or father) still possess the right to challenge this finding. Further, your New York Paternity Lawyer should advise you that if the Court finds the child’s best interest is not served by allowing any testing, the Court has the authority to deny a test be ordered. A sample situation in which that may happen is this: A child and its father already have a relationship, and that presumed father discovers an earlier instance of infidelity on the part of the child’s mother. The father then reasonably suspects another man may be that child’s father. The Court can still deny his request to challenge paternity.

All parents should be aware that the State of New York, only acknowledges an automatically presumes paternity of a child is if the man is married to that child’s mother during birth or were married to her when she was pregnant. You should also know that it’s relatively easy to address that: You and your child’s mother should complete an Acknowledgment of Paternity form at any time following your child’s birth. You can do this in the hospital or at a child support office, at the birth registrar’s office, as well as in the New York Family Court itself. Doing so establishes your Father’s Rights. And you must be established as a parent in order to request visitation rights or perhaps custody. Your New York Family Lawyer will also explain that, if the mother of your child was married to another man when the child was born or at any point of her pregnancy, the father has to establish paternity via the courts.

Do you need to secure Father’s Rights? Request Custody or Visitation? Or request that your child’s father pay Child Support? In any of these family Law cases, Stephen Bilkis & Associates, PLLC brings you the knowledge for resolving a Family Law case to suit your family’s individual situation. Call for a free case evaluation: 800.696.9529. And we’ll get started with a meeting in any of our convenient New York area offices.

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