Ford v. Litton
| Decision Date | 10 June 1968 |
| Docket Number | No. 44899,44899 |
| Citation | 211 So.2d 871 |
| Parties | Allen FORD v. Katherine W. LITTON et al. |
| Court | Mississippi Supreme Court |
Alexander, Feduccia & Alexander, Cleveland, for appellant.
John S. Throop, Jr., Water Valley, for appellees.
On February 17, 1967, Katherine W. Litton, maternal grandmother, and Robert L. Litton, step-grandfather, filed a petition for adoption of Katherine Lee Ford, a minor three and one-half years old. The mother, Carol Ford Watson, joined in the petition and consented to the adoption. Allen Ford, the 21-year-old father of the child sought to be adopted, was made a defendant.
Chancellor William H. Anderson of the Eighteenth Chancery Court District heard the matter for Chancellor Kermit R. Cofer of the Second Judicial District of Yalobusha County, Mississippi, who recused himself. The trial judge approved the adoption and change of name of the child to Katherine Lee Litton.
The father, Allen Ford, filed an answer objecting to the adoption and also a cross-petition wherein he prayed for modification of the decree placing custody with the mother and prayed that custody be granted to him. On motion of the appellees, the cross-petition was dismissed because it was improperly brought in the adoption proceeding rather than in the divorce and custody proceeding.
The appellant and Carol Litton (now Carol Ford Watson) were married on December 20, 1962, when he was seventeen years old and in the eleventh grade at Benoit High School, and she was sixteen years old and in the tenth grade a Water Valley High School. They continued to go to school after their marriage, he in Benoit and she in Water Valley. During the summer of 1963, the appellant moved to Water Valley and lived with his wife in the home of her parents until the fall of 1963, when he returned to Benoit and entered the twelfth grade there.
Katherine Lee Ford, the child sought to be adopted, was born to these young parents on October 2, 1963, in Water Valley. A bill of complaint for divorce on the ground of habitual cruel and inhuman treatment was filed by Carol Litton Ford in the Chancery Court of the Second Judicial District of Yalobusha County, Mississippi, and a divorce was granted her on May 1, 1964.
The divorce decree placed custody of Katherine Lee Ford in her mother, Carol Litton Ford, and ordered appellant to pay five dollars per week toward the support of his child. He paid such sum from May 1, 1964, to the hearing of the adoption proceeding, a period of approximately three years. In addition thereto, he paid the attorney's fees of $125 adjudged in the divorce decree and all court costs.
At the time of the divorce, when the appellant was about eighteen years of age and not working and then later when he had a low-paying job, he got behind in his support payments and a citation for contempt was filed against him and continued from month to month until he caught up. He now has a good job in Greenville, Mississippi, and has been current in his support payments since February 26, 1965.
In the petition for adoption the appellees charged the appellant with being morally unfit to rear his child, Katherine Lee Ford, and also charged that he had abandoned and deserted his daughter. The chancellor found that the appellant was not morally unfit as a father but did find that he had abandoned his child and, therefore, decreed the adoption and change of name.
The appellant has remarried and has one child by his second marriage. The mother of the child, Carol Ford Watson, had also remarried and was pregnant at the time of the hearing. Katherine Lee Ford, the child sought to be adopted, has lived all of her life with her mother in the home of her maternal grandparents, the petitioners in this adoption proceeding.
The sole issue is whether the evidence was sufficient to show an abandonment of his minor daughter by the natural father, Allen Ford. We hold that it was not.
For some months after the divorce decree Ford's conduct was considerably less than ideal, and he had several minor skirmishes with the law, but at the time of the hearing of the adoption petition he had held down a good job for two and one-half years, had paid regularly five dollars per week as decreed by the court toward the support of his minor child, and had made numerous telephone calls in an attempt to see his child, and had written six or seven times to...
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In re Adoption of DNT
...and that, ordinarily, it would be for the best interests of the child that he remain in the custody of his parents." Ford v. Litton, 211 So.2d 871, 873 (Miss. 1968). Here, the child was one year and four months (16 months) old when she and her mother came to Mississippi to visit her grandfa......
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Bryant v. Cameron
...1178 (Miss.1982); Yarber v. Dearman, 341 So.2d 108, 109-10 (Miss.1977); Simpson v. Rast, 258 So.2d 233, 236 (Miss.1972); Ford v. Litton, 211 So.2d 871, 873 (Miss.1968); Newman v. Sample, 205 So.2d 650, 652 This foregoing rule works in tandem with Miss.Code Ann. Sec. 93-17-7 (Supp.1984) conc......
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Adoption of a Female Child, In re, 53043
...rear and train it or them, when the contest is between a natural parent and third persons. We reiterated this premise in Ford v. Litton, 211 So.2d 871, 873 (Miss.1968), stating, "Before the best interests of the child are to be considered, the court must find that the parent objecting to th......
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Petit v. Holifield, 54049
...unfit to rear or train the child. Once that has been established, the best interest of the child is to be considered. See Ford v. Litton, 211 So.2d 871 (Miss.1968). The criterion for determination of unfit parent's rights are stated in Mississippi Code Annotated section 93-17-7 (Supp.1983) ......