Nevada family-law case summaries

Hope Backman and Daniel Gelbman share a child, D.G., born in 2013. They originally agreed to joint legal and physical custody. In 2018, after a hearing that showed substantial conflict between the parents, the district court kept joint legal custody but changed the physical-custody schedule. In 2023, Backman (then representing herself) asked to modify custody so she could move with D.G. to San Antonio, Texas, citing financial hardship, reduced income after the COVID-19 pandemic, and family support and job opportunities there. Gelbman opposed the move and filed his own request asking for primary physical custody, arguing circumstances had changed since 2018. Gelbman also asked the court to declare Backman a "vexatious litigant" (a person the court restricts from filing new matters freely), and Backman, through her lawyer, agreed to that designation in exchange for cancelling a scheduled hearing. That agreement required her future filings to go through a screening process before being accepted. The court appointed a custody evaluator, Dr. Herbert F. Coard III, who wrote reports about the parents' mental health and the child's situation. During the evaluation, the court temporarily gave Gelbman primary physical custody and limited Backman's contact with D.G., and by the time of the main hearing, Backman had gone many months without contact with the child. After a multi-day hearing, the court in March 2024 denied Backman's request to relocate and gave Gelbman primary physical custody. It kept "joint legal custody" on paper but gave Gelbman the final say over D.G.'s education and medical and mental-health care, while Backman kept information rights, emergency-care decision-making during her time with D.G., and joint authority over religion and extracurricular activities. Backman received alternating-weekend, holiday, and extended-summer time. The court declined to appoint a "parenting coordinator" (a neutral person who helps parents resolve disputes), reasoning that Backman could not afford to share the cost. The conflict continued. In early 2025, Backman filed an emergency motion claiming Gelbman's fiancée had physically injured D.G. The court screened the motion under the vexatious-litigant procedure, found it had arguable merit, and held a hearing. It then denied the motion, finding the injury was an accidental result of roughhousing rather than abuse. Gelbman asked for his attorney fees, and the court found Backman lacked a reasonable basis to keep pursuing the motion once the evidence was in. The court found more than $9,900 in fees reasonable but reduced the award to $2,000, payable at $100 per month, because of the parties' financial circumstances. Backman appealed both orders. The Court of Appeals rejected all of her arguments and affirmed. On the custody change, the court agreed the district court should have more clearly stated a separate finding that circumstances had "substantially changed" since 2018, but concluded the detailed factual findings already showed such a change, so any error was harmless. The court found the district court was not required to appoint a parenting coordinator, that giving Gelbman final say in certain areas was still a valid form of joint legal custody rather than a hidden grant of sole custody, and that the alleged bias of the evaluator went to how much weight his testimony deserved—not to whether it had to be thrown out. The court also concluded the vexatious-litigant designation was mentioned only in passing and did not drive the custody outcome, and that the attorney fees were properly awarded and reasonably calculated.