Oklahoma City Child Custody Lawyer

Oklahoma Custody Determination

Mazaheri Law Firm is committed to helping our family law clients protect the relationship they have with their children. Whether you are divorcing or separating, the decisions you make have a long-lasting effect on you and your children. Our Oklahoma City family law attorneys can provide compassionate, skilled representation throughout your custody case while offering realistic and level-headed solutions to you.

Types of Child Custody

Types of custody in Oklahoma include:

• Physical Custody - The time that each parent spends physically with each child. This is where the child will live and can have an impact on the decision of who will likely receive child support payments.
• Legal Custody - The responsibility a parent has in making important decisions for the child, including but not limited to, education, healthcare, religion, discipline, lifestyle, etc.

Custody can be awarded as sole, joint, or joint legal custody with or without a primary custodial parent.

When are Child Custody Arrangements Decided in Oklahoma?

During divorce, there will be both an initial and final custody determination. Child Custody can also be established for a child born out of wedlock once the paternity has been established. Frequently in divorce, we hear of one spouse prohibiting the other from seeing the children once separation has occurred. This is a very difficult time for both parents and children.

How to Enforce Child Custody in Oklahoma

In Oklahoma, the only way to enforce parental rights and access to your child once this has occurred will be to get a temporary order in place and establish the temporary custody and visitation for each parent. Until this has happened, both parents generally have equal rights to the children but there is no mechanism of enforcing those rights in absence of a court order dictating one parent to allow the other to see the children other than an emergency.

Section 110.1 of Oklahoma Title 43 encourages the trial court to provide substantially equally access to the children if the parent requests it. This is not a mandate. Once the temporary orders are in place, if one parents demonstrates a continued unwillingness to follow the court’s temporary orders, thus precluding another parent from having access to the children, Oklahoma courts have used this behavior as grounds for awarding custody to the parent who was denied access to the child.