Photoessay #2496 - Court

I spent all morning helping support a family in an emotionally charged civil court matter.in a rural county an hour or so from here.  The county seat had an imposing courthouse.  This very cool picture is actually the OLD courthouse now used as a downtown building.

I won't comment on the case or the family.  But I did sit through the whole morning docket as their case was the last one.  Mostly disputes about child support payments.  What struck me was the low wage part time jobs the fathers had, which they struggled to keep.  And play child support.  The judge kept repeating "You have to pay child support."

The last case consumed 45 minutes of valuable court time and was about nothing.  Seemed designed to hit the mother up for more court appearances and attorney fees.  But the 'child' here was over 17, apparently an honor student, in Honor Society, and captain of her school's basketball team.  The father's contention through his attorney was that when he came to visit, the daughter always had things planned.  He didn't think that was fair; the child should not make her own schedule and he blamed this all on mom.

What?  What were they talking about?  Why was this taking up valuable court time and running up attorney fees.  Over nothing!

So, that put the judge in a fine mood for my family's case.  No excuse really, the right, if painful, outcome came down in this case.