Michelle A. Lawless
The Law Office of Michelle A. Lawless LLC
161 N. Clark St. Suite 1700 Chicago, Illinois
Telephone: (312) 741-1092
www.malfamilylaw.com; michelle@malfamilylaw.com.
Illinois had proper jurisdiction over an interstate parentage action where the minor child divided time between Illinois and Iowa for the six months leading up to the filing of the petition to establish parentage. Father filed a petition to establish parentage in Illinois and mother filed a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction arguing the minor child, who was 4 ½ at the time of filing, was a resident of Iowa for the six months immediately preceding the filing of the petition. Mother subsequently filed a competing petition in Iowa. The trial court conducted a lengthy evidentiary hearing with multiple witnesses concerning the child’s connections to both Iowa and Illinois and denied mother’s motion. Mother appealed and the Firth District affirmed. The child was properly found to have no home state because he did not consecutively reside in either state for six months preceding the filing of the petition and the evidence supported such a finding where both parties testified the child split time between both households and had never spent the entirety of a month in either Iowa or Illinois. Therefore, pursuant to Section 201(a)(2) of the UCCJEA, the trial court properly considered whether Illinois had significant connections to the matter and where the evidence was available and concluded that both the child and father had significant connections to Illinois and significant evidence concerning the matter was located in Illinois, including witnesses, medical records, family connections and personal relationships with non-family. The Court further held that the trial court could consider evidence outside the six-month home-state period when evaluating significant connections, and that the Illinois court, as the first-filed court, was not required to initiate communication with the Iowa court. Accordingly, the denial of the mother’s motion to dismiss was affirmed. Justice Vaughn issued a dissenting opinion contending that it was error for the trial court to have never determined whether father was a parent or “person acting as a parent” under the UCCJEA, that the father had failed to meet the definition of “person acting as a parent”; and even notwithstanding, Iowa was the home state of the child and father’s parenting time period were simply temporary absences from Iowa since the child was living with mother in Iowa, attending preschool in Iowa, and father was provided parenting time based on the time the child was not in school. Preston C. v. Zakariya S., 2026 IL App (5th) 251049.
In re Parentage of W.C.
Child support payment may not be offset by personal debt owed from one party to the other. It was error for the trial court to have ordered an $800 per month child support award to be “offset” by $500 per month in attorneys’ fees owed from wife to husband until the attorney fee debt was paid in full. A court may not offset child support payments to satisfy a personal debt owed by one parent to the other, including an attorney-fee judgment. Child support belongs to the child and takes precedence over financial obligations between the parents. In re Marriage of Vanduyne, 2026 IL App (3d) 250249.
In re Marriage Vanduyne
Trial court reversed as an upward deviation from guideline child support was warranted. In a case where the parties’ premarital agreement and resulting property distribution created an extreme disparity in financial resources, the trial court declining to award an upward deviation from the guideline child support was an abuse of discretion. It is well-settled that a child’s right to support cannot be adversely affected by a premarital agreement and that child support must be sufficient to allow the children to experience a lifestyle reasonably comparable to that which they would have enjoyed had the marriage remained intact. Because the husband received essentially the entire marital estate and significant income-producing assets while the wife was left with substantial debt and limited resources, the guideline support calculation did not adequately serve the children’s best interests. The Court reversed and remanded with direction to consider husband’s overall wealth, not just his income, in evaluating an appropriate upward deviation. In re Marriage of Vanduyne, 2026 IL App (3d) 250249.
In re Marriage Vanduyne