Ask a lawyer on the topic of Family law

Order to remain in accordance with §§ 1682, 1685 of the Civil Code

February 12, 2011 | 25,00 EUR | answered by Bernhard Müller

How can we make our grandson come back to us? Our grandson, who is almost 11 years old, lived with us for over 10 years. Our daughter had her parental rights revoked, and our grandson was taken out of school by the child protection services. This was justified by the chaotic state of an apartment that my daughter had rented. Furthermore, the revocation of parental rights was justified by the intention to transfer custody to the child's father. However, the child protection services were aware that the grandchildren (2) and my daughter were living in our house, as she could only work while we took care of our two grandchildren.

1. Child from a divorced marriage with no issues with our ex-son-in-law. 2. Child from a very problematic relationship that my daughter ended a few days after the birth of her second child, but has since been suffering greatly from the child's father, who has been harassing her.

Since the pregnancy of my daughter, this child's father had announced that she would have to suffer for what his ex-girlfriends had done to him. These were not empty threats.

I will spare the details at this point. Just to mention that in 2009, a court-appointed expert recommended suspending contact. Besides the sexual incident that my grandson told him about, there are also other fears regarding his father according to the expert. My grandson apparently cannot talk about this openly - instead, he expresses it in his behavior, such as mistreating the cat.

Since the end of September 2009, our grandson has not been forced to go to his father. (He had resisted with all his might, ran away, clung to the stair railing. Our daughter was forced to make her son go to visit, otherwise she would lose custody. Just for your information, the child's father is on familiar terms with the head of the child protection services and unfortunately has a very good personal relationship with the family court.

The expert opinion is being ignored by the family court. Instead, another expert opinion was obtained, and my grandson did not mention this to her. Coercive measures were taken against my daughter regarding visitation rights. Custody was taken away from her by interim order (without her presence). Then our grandson was taken away by the child protection services. (Our grandson from the first marriage still lives with us)

Since then, my daughter has been unsuccessfully trying to get her son back. Any contact is denied to her and us with our grandson. Currently, the child protection services claim that she is crazy. But we and our other grandchild are also not allowed to see our grandson. It has been 8 months. We only have a small pension, and my daughter has become unemployed and has debts because of this situation.

She sees no chance of getting custody back, as the child's father has incredible connections. We hope that our grandson can come back to us through a decision on where he should stay.

Since the attached decision on

Bernhard Müller

Dear questioner,

It can be seen from your attachment that the proceedings before the district court have not yet been completed but are still pending. There, the child's mother can request that the decision to withdraw custody from her be reversed. She should plausibly demonstrate that she did not refuse the child contact with the father, but rather the child refuses to have contact with the father.

Once the proceedings before the district court are completed, the child's mother can appeal to the district court in accordance with §§ 58; 64 FamFG. This appeal will then be forwarded by the district court to the appellate court under § 68 FamFG, where the case will be reconsidered.

As grandparents, you actually have no right to have the child returned to your household. § 1685 I BGB only grants the right to visitation, that is, to see your grandchild occasionally if it is in the child's best interests.
Therefore, at the family court, you can only successfully request to see the child for a few hours on weekends and would have to justify how this benefits the child's well-being.

A constitutional complaint would have no chance of success in your case.

Sincerely,

Bernhard Müller, Attorney