Court of Appeals rules on case manager hearings

TOPEKA—The Kansas Court of Appeals today filed its decision in the following child custody proceeding, which generated much attention during the past legislative session:

Appeal No. 106,292: In The Matter of the Marriage of Jeffrey E. Hutchison and Karen L. Wray, f/k/a Karen L. Hutchison

The state Court of Appeals today ruled that due process, "one of the most sacred and essential constitutional guarantees" requires district courts to conduct an evidentiary hearing in making child custody decisions if the assigned case manager's recommendations "materially affects a parent's right" to the care and custody of his or her child and the facts are disputed by the parent.

The Court pointed to recommendations that change legal custody, residential custody, or significantly change parenting time as circumstances that warrant a hearing.

The decision came in an appeal from a Douglas County decision in a post-divorce order granting a change of residential custody of a child from the mother to the father that was based on the case manager's recommendation without granting a hearing to the mother, who strongly contested facts contained in the case manager's report.

Writing for the Court of Appeals three-member hearing panel, Judge Karen Arnold-Burger, said that "when the case manager's recommendations materially affect a parent's right to the care, custody, and control of a child and the case manager's report relies upon material facts that are either not supported by specific factual references or are specifically disputed by a parent, due process requires that the district court conduct an evidentiary hearing prior to ruling on the recommendations."

Judge Arnold-Burger noted that although today's decision "may result in having busier dockets, the information received at such a hearing will aid the courts in deciding whether the case manager's recommendations are in the best interest of the child and insure that due process, one of the most sacred and essential constitutional guarantees, is provided to the parties."

Also participating in the decision and opinion drafting in the case were Chief Judge Richard Greene, and Judge Melissa Standridge.