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Picture this scenario. Single mom needs someone to pay for a new child. Single mom doesn’t know who the father is, but chooses someone either because of the money they made or some other reason. Man knows he’s not the father– what should the man do?
In the case of Anthony L. Parker, he decided not to do anything.
In the case, the state Office of Child Support Enforcement filed a paternity complaint against Parker on April 18, 2002, but Parker did not respond. McGowan entered a judgment of paternity June 20, 2002, and ordered Parker to pay $24 a week in child support and $4,446 in past-due support.
Parker did not pay the money, and the state agency filed a contempt motion against him March 7, 2003. But Parker did not appear for a court hearing on the motion, and the judge issued a pick-up order for him.
Before Parker was arrested in March 2005, the state garnished his wages from June 2004 through February 2005. Parker asked for a paternity test and was found not to be the father.
Things seemed to be done in an ethical manner– until it got to the state supreme court. You see, the lower court freed the man of the support funds since the child was not his child, but the supreme court ruled that he has to pay the support up until the time that he was cleared.
What we have here should serve as both a warning and a reminder. A reminder that we live in a fallen world and that when people in marriages do not keep their vows, or marital activities are down outside of marriage, the consequences are litigation and rules that, even if you don’t respond because you’re not responsible, you could be held financially responsible. Over at Prison Breakdown, Brian posts about delaying parenthood being done by men because they know that they could get hit with child support should something happen.
A warning– If you are summoned to court (even if you’ve done nothing) GO! Especially in the case of these people trying to go after “deadbeat dads” sometimes you only get a warning in the mail or some kind of statement that if you don’t respond to it they assume that the child is yours. I heard the same thing from other things that you get in the mail claiming you have a debt– you need to follow through and make sure people get the right information. Mr. Parker could have saved himself a lot of headache had he gotten the paternity test sooner.
Sigh…
Well, we live in a society and must comply to its rules and laws. It is not enough just to “be right”, as the example shows.
Shame on the woman, though. And pity for the child…
Great post. It’s awful the child usually suffers the most.
Thankful there are such things as paternity tests! That poor man…great post~!
I know nothing about this case (which seems most odd), but presumably there was a reason the man was picked upon – i.e. that there was a possibility that he had fathered the child. There are good reasons why God reserves sex for the marriage relationship.
Well, it’s certainly possible there was some link, or some degree of probability, but the fact that the man didn’t even acknowledge the possibility that it was his child leaves me with a lot of questions.
I totally agree with you, Stephen– children inside marriage.
I am going to give my opinion, I think it is absolutely ridiculous for that man to have to pay child support to a child he did not even father! I could see if he had adopted the child then, yes, he should be forced to pay, other than that, no. This is not his responsibility, why aren’t they trying to locate the biological father and make him pay for child support?
MIn, I don’t mean to be a devil’s advocate, but even having children inside marriage still does not mean anything in this present day and time. Affairs occur on a daily basis and many children are born out of these unions.
I am done.
Sadly, in today’s society, many young men are reduced to, in biblical terms, “a loaf of bread”. Apparently women have all the rights: they can kill a child or force a man to pay for the rest of his life. And they continue to be the aim of most abstinence messages.
Christian families can save themselves alot of heartache by teaching their young men the principles found in the Proverbs.
Just call me “grandma” … and don’t ask for too many details.
Leticia, what I actually said, and Min agreed with is that sex is reserved for the marriage relationship – a union which is designed for the procreation of children.
Adultery, of course, is sex outside of the marriage relationship, and children from such a union are born outside of the marriage union.
People get themselves into a terrible mess if they don’t follow this command of God.
Now I may be maligning the man in the story above because I don’t knkw the details, but reading between the lines: it seems to me that the paternity claim must have been based on an extra-marital relationship. There must have been a reason why this woman *thought* that the man might be the father. This decision to extra marital relations was the man’s to make. He made it, and it was presumably just chance that he was *not* the father.
Now if he *could* have been the father, and in not contesting the case, he legally accepted the principle that he *was* the father, and if in so doing, he prevented the real father from being identified, then he bears some culpability for the predicament he found himself in. It seems that the court took the view that in the light of a failure to contest paternity, and acceptance of the principle that he was the father, he did become legally responsible for the maintenance.
On one level it is unfair, but on another you could say he has got of lightly. If the paternity test had come backl positive, he might be heading for jail right now – and as I say, presumably there was a possibility that the paternity test might be positive.
This is just one of the many ugly scenarios that can generate from extra-marital sexual relations.