I am asked occasionally whether a parent’s child support obligation can be terminated on the grounds that the child stopped all contact with the parent in order to avoid parental control. My usual response is that it can be done, but the parent must establish either abandonment or constructive emancipation, and faces a substantial burden of proof.
The Family Court Act §413 mandates that parents support their children until they reach the age of 21. The courts in New York have held that a child’s right to support and the parent’s right to custody and services are reciprocal and that a parent may impose reasonable regulations. Generally, where a minor of employable age and in full possession of her faculties, voluntarily and without cause, abandons the parent’s home, against the will of the parent and for the purpose of avoiding parental control, the child forfeits his/her right to demand support. Roe v. Doe, 29 N.Y.2d 188 (1971); Matter of Ontario County Department of Social Services (Christopher L.) v. Gail K., 269 A.D.2d 847 (4th Dept. 2000), leave denied, 95 N.Y.2d 760 (2000).
While the duty to support is a continuing one, the child’s right to support and the parent’s right to custody and services are reciprocal. Roe v. Doe, 29 N.Y.2d 188 (1971). Thus, a parent, in return for maintenance and support, may establish and impose reasonable regulations for his/her child. In Roe v. Doe, supra, the Court of Appeals explained:
Accordingly, though the question is novel in this State, it has been held, in circumstances such as here, that whereby no fault on the parent’s part, a child “voluntarily abandons the parent’s home for the purpose of seeking its fortune in the world or to avoid parental discipline and restraint [the child] forfeits the claim to support” . . . To hold otherwise would allow, at least in the case before us, a minor of employable age to deliberately flout the legitimate mandates of her father while requiring that the latter support her in her decision to place herself beyond his effective control.
The doctrine of constructive emancipation is applicable to the non-custodial parent where the child unreasonably refuses all contact and visitation. Matter of Commissioner of Social Services (Jones) v. Jones-Gamble, 227 A.D.2d 618 (2nd Dept. 1996). In that case, the court held that the evidence clearly established that the child wanted no relationship with her father. Despite the father’s prior support payments, there was essentially no parent-child relationship between them. The appellate court held that to require the father to provide reimbursement for the support of a daughter who had renounced and abandoned him would have clearly resulted in an injustice under the facts of that case.
In the Fourth Department case, Perez v. Perez, 239 A.D.2d 868 (4th Dept. 1997), appeal dismissed, 91 N.Y.2d 956 (1998), the record established that the parties’ 18-year-old daughter had refused to visit with the father or to have any relationship with him. That child was found to be a minor of employable age and in full possession of her faculties, who had voluntarily refused to have a relationship with the plaintiff. The child thereby forfeited her right to support from her father. Accordingly, the Fourth Department rejected the mother’s contention that the lower court erred in modifying the parties’ divorce decree by suspending the father’s obligation to pay child support for the parties’ child until further order of the court.
Children of employable age and in full possession of their faculties who voluntarily and without cause abandon their home, against the will of their parents and for the purpose of avoiding parental control, forfeit their right to demand support, even if they are not financially self-sufficient. Guevara v. Ubillus, 47 A.D.3d 715 (2nd Dept. 2008). In that case, the petition for child support was denied where the petitioner, without good cause, abandoned the mother’s home on her 18th birthday in order to avoid parental control and to gain independence from her mother’s restrictive household rules; the petitioner was found to have abandoned her mother’s home against the mother’s will and without cause.
In Rubino v. Morgan, 224 A.D.2d 903 (3d Dept. 1996), the Appellate Division held that the lower correct properly terminated the father’s support obligation on the grounds that his daughter’s refusal to visit with him and the child’s unprovoked rejection of him constituted abandonment. The Third Department noted that at the time of the hearing, the daughter was 17 years old, and she had refused to visit with the father since she was 14 years old. Even after the daughter refused to visit her father, he continued for years to send letters and cards to her. The letters were never answered. He also attempted to talk with the child, without success. His actions and requests were not arbitrary, and there was no evidence of malfeasance, misconduct, or neglect. The Appellate Division upheld the lower court’s findings that the daughter chose to permanently breach her relationship with the father, notwithstanding her generalized claim of “emotional abuse”, and that the father did not contribute significantly to his daughter’s decision to distance herself from him.
Furthermore, where it can be established by the non-custodial parent that the custodial parent has unjustifiably frustrated the non-custodial parent’s right of reasonable access, child support payments may be suspended. Usack v. Usack, 17 A.D.3d 736 (3d Dept. 2005). In that case, the father had encouraged the children’s unbridled enmity toward, and total exclusion of, their mother through a course of conduct calculated to inflict the most grievous emotional injury upon her. The Appellate Division held that the mother’s child support obligation should have been suspended due to the father’s deliberate actions in alienating the parties’ children from her.