Might Be Surprised to Hear from that Lawyer
6. “Custody evaluations can be dangerously bad ideas—
as bad as trials.”
There are exceptional cases where so-called custody evaluations are necessary. But these are the exception—and far from the rule.
Beth Kerns, the director of our county’s Domestic Relations Counseling Bureau, has estimated that 80-90 percent of families sent to her offices for custody evaluations should not be there. In that 80-90 percent of cases, no benefit from the evaluation comes close to justifying the evaluation’s (1) promotion of the accusatorial interaction between the parents or (2) placement of children in the middle of the dispute.
Consider saving your money and skipping this potentially destructive process. If you wish to use counselors, ask them to provide confidential counseling actually intended to improve your co-parenting.
It’s noteworthy that more and more psychologists refuse to do these evaluations, precisely because they can hurt children, parents, and parent interaction as badly as trials themselves do. When experts begin turning away work that is profitable to them, we should definitely listen.
