Nevada family-law case summaries

Two grandmothers in Las Vegas asked a Nevada district court to make them the legal guardians of their four grandchildren, saying the children had been living with them since March 2023 and were not safe with their mother and her new partner. The court initially denied the grandmothers' petition for procedural reasons (a service issue), and a new hearing was scheduled for April 2024 - several months away. While waiting for that hearing, the two oldest grandchildren, represented by appointed counsel, asked the court for a temporary guardianship - a short-term arrangement that would put their grandmothers in charge of them until the full hearing could happen. They said they were afraid to go back to their mother because of her new partner's history, that they might be unenrolled from school, and that they had been living with their grandmothers for nearly a year. Two days after they filed, the district court denied the request without holding a hearing, saying there was no emergency. The two children then asked the Nevada Supreme Court for an emergency order forcing the district court to reconsider. The Supreme Court agreed that the district court had not properly considered the request. Under Nevada law, when a parent has not had care, custody, and control of a child for the previous six months, there is a legal presumption that temporary guardianship is in the child's best interest and that the parent is unsuitable. The children had been out of their parents' care for well over six months, so those presumptions applied. The Supreme Court also pointed out that the district court appeared to have confused who was asking for the temporary guardianship - it was the two oldest children, not the grandmothers, so the fact that no one sought temporary guardianship over the two younger children was not a reason to deny the request. The Supreme Court ordered the district court to reconsider the petition on an expedited basis. It also noted that the district court could, if it preferred, require notice and hold a quick hearing rather than rule ex parte (without the other side present), so the mother and other interested parties would have a chance to respond.