Nevada family-law case summaries

Vick and Anjena Gill married in 2020 and had a son, K.G., who was born in Las Vegas in April 2023. About a month after K.G.'s birth, Anjena and the baby traveled to Canada for a funeral. They ended up staying longer than planned, in part because the family's Nevada home had a major water leak and Anjena found temporary work in Canada. Vick remained in regular contact, visited, and the couple even discussed having more children. At some point the marriage broke down. In November 2023, Anjena filed for custody of K.G. in a Canadian court. Vick responded by filing a Hague Convention petition in Canada seeking the child's return to Nevada; the Canadian court denied that petition, finding that K.G.'s "habitual residence" was Canada. Vick lost his appeal of that ruling. In May 2024, Vick filed for divorce in Nevada and asked the Nevada court for custody and child support. The Nevada district court refused, saying it did not have "home state" jurisdiction over the child and that a lot of litigation had already happened in Canada. Vick appealed to the Nevada Supreme Court. The Nevada Supreme Court reversed. Under the UCCJEA (Nevada's version is in NRS Chapter 125A), a state is a child's "home state" if the child lived there with a parent for at least six consecutive months before the case was filed, and that period includes any "temporary absence" from the state. The Court concluded that K.G.'s time in Canada from May to November 2023 was a temporary absence: Anjena originally went for a funeral intending to return, communicated frequently with Vick, discussed expanding the family, and the prolonged stay was due to a home repair and short-term work. The Hague proceeding itself found that Anjena did not form an intent to remain in Canada until November 2023. So for jurisdictional purposes, K.G. is treated as having lived in Nevada until November 6, 2023 - less than six months before Vick's May 3, 2024 filing. That makes Nevada the home state. However, the Court did not order Nevada to keep the case. It explained that the earlier Hague ruling - finding Canada to be K.G.'s habitual residence - is entitled to "considerable weight" and that international practice generally directs custody decisions to the country of habitual residence. Under NRS 125A.365(1), a Nevada court may decline jurisdiction if another forum is more appropriate. The Court said deferring to Canada "may ultimately be appropriate," but it would be premature to do so now because: (1) the Canadian court has not yet decided whether it has jurisdiction; and (2) the parties have not had a chance to brief the issue in Nevada. The Court instructed the district court on remand to try to hold a UCCJEA-style conference with the Canadian court, take briefing, and apply NRS 125A.365 to decide whether Nevada or Canada is the more appropriate forum. On the child support claim, the Court noted that custody and support typically travel together, and instructed the district court to exercise jurisdiction over both pending its decision on whether to defer to Canada. The Court did not consider Vick's separate complaint about attorney fees because the record showed no fee award had actually been entered.

Shinichi and Yoko Ogawa married in Japan in 1997 and moved several times between Japan and the United States, buying a home in Henderson, Nevada. Their three children were all born in Japan. In June 2004, the children traveled from Nevada to Japan. The parents told very different stories about that trip: Yoko said it was only a summer vacation and that Shinichi refused to send the children back in August 2004; Shinichi said the whole family had planned to live in Japan permanently. Either way, the children stayed in Japan with Shinichi. About eight months after the children left, in February 2005, Yoko filed for divorce in Nevada and asked the Nevada court to order the children's immediate return, calling their retention in Japan an international abduction. The Nevada court agreed with Yoko, ordered the children returned, later held Shinichi in contempt when they were not returned, and ultimately - after a hearing at which Shinichi's lawyer appeared but Shinichi personally did not - entered a "default" divorce decree. That decree gave Yoko sole legal and physical custody with "no contact" for Shinichi, all of the community property (including a share of a house in Japan), spousal and child support, and attorney fees and costs. On appeal, the Nevada Supreme Court decided three questions. First, did the Nevada court have power to decide custody at all, given that the children had been out of Nevada for eight months when the case was filed? Under the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act (UCCJEA) - a law that generally gives custody-deciding authority to a child's "home state" - a child's temporary absences from a state do not break the required six-month residency period. Because the evidence supported the district court's finding that the children left Nevada in June 2004 for a temporary three-month vacation, Nevada remained their home state, and the Nevada court properly had jurisdiction. Second, was the order sending the children back to the U.S. proper? The district court had relied on the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, an international treaty designed to ensure the prompt return of children wrongfully taken from their home country. But Japan has not signed that treaty, so the Convention and its U.S. implementing statute provide no remedy here. Even so, the Supreme Court held that the district court did not need the treaty: because it had custody jurisdiction under the UCCJEA, it had authority to order the children's return as part of the custody case. So the return order stood, even though the Hague Convention did not apply. Third, was the default divorce decree proper? A "default" is what happens when a party fails to respond to a lawsuit. Here, Shinichi had filed an answer and a countercomplaint for divorce, and his lawyer appeared at the divorce hearing - only Shinichi himself was absent. The Supreme Court held that under those circumstances a default was inappropriate, and that the district court erred by treating the hearing as a one-sided "prove-up," awarding Yoko everything she asked for, cutting off meaningful cross-examination, and never deciding the case on its merits. The court reversed the decree's awards of custody, property, support, and fees, and sent the case back for a hearing on the merits. It denied Shinichi's request that the case be reassigned to a different judge on remand, because he cited no record support or legal authority showing reassignment was necessary.