Public-domain · open source
OpenJurist

511 So. 2d 628

511 So.2d 628

12 Fla.L.Weekly 1744

Docket No. 86-2579.

Hicks v. Hicks

Duane Anthony HICKS, Appellant, v. Pamela Wright HICKS, Appellee.

District Court of Appeal of Florida

Decided July 17, 1987.

Rehearing Denied August 25, 1987.

This page is marked noindex.

District Court of Appeal of Florida · decided 1987-07-17

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

“shared parental responsibility would be detrimental to”

quoted by 5 later decisions, including Grimaldi v. Grimaldi, Griffin v. Griffin

“their animosity toward each other, their inability to communicate, and, most damaging, their use of the children to hurt each other created a negative effect on the children. Consequently, the trial court ruled that sole parental responsibility, obviating the need for joint decision-making, served the best interests of the children. We find no basis for overturning the substance of the court's ruling; however, we note that the trial court erred in awarding sole parental responsibility to the mother absent a specific finding that”

quoted by 1 later decision, including 540 So. 2d 235 - Hunter v. Hunter

Relies on 458 So. 2d 81 - Holland v. Holland · 432 So. 2d 648 - Nichols v. Nichols

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1987-07-17

How this case has been cited

Cited by 10 later decisions — most recently May 2010

10 state decisions

501987199020002010decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

¶1Marshall G. Slaughter, Bartow, for appellant.

¶2Arthur C. Fulmer, Lakeland, for appellee.

¶3SCHOONOVER, Judge.

¶4The appellant, Duane Anthony Hicks (husband), appeals a final judgment dissolving his marriage to the appellee, Pamela Wright Hicks (wife).

¶5We find merit only in the husband's contention that the trial court erred in awarding sole parental responsibility of the parties' minor child to the wife without finding that shared parental responsibility would be detrimental to the child. We affirm in all other respects.

¶6The final judgment in this case reflects that the court, in addition to awarding the sole care, custody, and control of the parties' minor child to the wife, found that the best interest and well being of the child required that the wife have sole parental responsibility of the child. The court did not, however, make a finding that shared parental responsibility would be detrimental to the child before awarding sole parental responsibility to the wife as required by section 61.13(2)(b)2, Florida Statutes (1985).

¶7In Nichols v. Nichols,432 So.2d 648 (Fla. 1st DCA 1983), our sister court held that the best interest of the child standard, as used by the trial court in this case, does not obviate the necessity of a specified finding *629 that shared parental responsibility would be detrimental to the child before awarding sole parental responsibility to one parent. See also, Holland v. Holland,458 So.2d 81 (Fla. 5th DCA 1984). We agree with the holding of Nichols and, accordingly, remand for further proceedings. Upon remand, the trial court should, with or without receiving additional evidence, enter an appropriate order indicating its determination as to whether shared parental responsibility would be detrimental to the parties' child. Nichols.

¶8Affirmed in part and remanded.

¶9SCHEB, A.C.J., and CAMPBELL, J., concur.

/511/so2d/628 · .json · Public domain