Nevada family-law case summaries

Erin and Joseph Cornwall divorced in June 2022 and share four children. Under their divorce, they were given joint legal and joint physical custody of all four. In December 2024, Erin asked the court to change the custody arrangement, to interview the children about their preferences, to reset child support, and to award her attorney fees. She argued that Joseph's behavior had changed circumstances enough to justify revisiting custody. Erin raised several concerns. She alleged that in 2023 Joseph berated one of the twins, Sa.C., over chores, pushed him against an oven, held him there, and threatened him. She said the children began recording Joseph's outbursts after that incident and submitted a video showing part of it. She also alleged that Joseph reacted poorly to their daughter Sh.C. identifying as LGBTQ, installed surveillance equipment to monitor the children's communications with her, refused to use a parenting coordinator, did not properly treat a toe injury to F.C., failed to follow the summer schedule, and frustrated the children's access to mental health services. Joseph denied being violent, said Erin took his words out of context, and submitted texts and emails showing affection toward the children and efforts to arrange counseling. The district court held a hearing where lawyers argued, but it did not take live testimony. The court then denied Erin's motion. It reasoned that two of the children, Sa.C. and E.C., would turn 18 within about 90 days, so the court would soon lose authority over their custody. For the two younger children, Sh.C. and F.C., the court found Erin had not made a strong enough preliminary showing to justify a full hearing. The court noted that the video did not actually show Joseph throwing Sa.C. against the oven or threatening him, found the toe-injury complaint too thin, found the denigration allegations too vague, and concluded that Joseph being less open-minded about Sh.C.'s sexual orientation was not, by itself, a basis to reopen custody. The Court of Appeals agreed with the district court on most points. It held the court did not abuse its discretion in declining a hearing on the allegations about Joseph's reaction to Sh.C.'s sexual orientation, his refusal to use the parenting coordinator, the summer timeshare, the mental health provider dispute, and the security equipment, because those allegations either did not amount to a substantial change in circumstances or were too vague. But the appeals court disagreed about the domestic violence allegation. The rule is that, when deciding whether a parent has made enough of a preliminary showing to earn a hearing, the trial court must accept the moving parent's specific factual allegations as true. Erin had alleged a specific act of violence against Sa.C. that occurred after the divorce decree. The district court should have treated that allegation as true. Importantly, Erin had never claimed the video captured the violence itself; she said the children only started recording afterward. So the court could not properly rely on the video's failure to show the violence as a reason to reject the allegation. The appeals court also said the fact that Sa.C. was about to turn 18 did not make the domestic violence evidence irrelevant, because the younger children Sh.C. and F.C. still lived in the home. Because of this, the Court of Appeals reversed the part of the decision denying a hearing on the domestic violence allegations and sent the case back so the district court can hold an evidentiary hearing on that issue. On remand, the court may decide whether to interview the children and may consider all relevant facts in determining what is in the children's best interest.

Mary Snyder and Matthew Walker were never married but had a child together (referred to as T.W., age eight at trial). While living with Matthew, Mary became pregnant with a second child (T.W.2, age five at trial), and Matthew was listed as the father on that child's birth certificate. The couple lived together until October 2019, when Mary moved in with her current husband, Hal, a member of the United States Air Force. Mary and Matthew informally shared custody without going to court. After Hal was transferred to an Air Force base in Maryland, and after Mary and Hal married in July 2021, Matthew filed a court complaint seeking joint legal and joint physical custody of both children. Mary responded by asking for primary physical custody so she could move the children to Maryland. She also claimed another man was T.W.2's biological father and asked for DNA testing. Testing showed Matthew was not T.W.2's biological father, but Mary agreed at the start of trial that the court could treat Matthew as T.W.2's legal father, because the man she believed was the actual father never took a test or appeared in the case. After a four-day trial, the district court ruled against Mary. It found she had not met the legal requirements to move the children out of state, and it gave Matthew primary physical custody of both children. The court also issued a preliminary ruling that Matthew "shall be awarded reasonable attorney fees," but it had not yet set an amount. On appeal, the Court of Appeals of Nevada affirmed. On the relocation issue, the court explained that a parent who wants to move with a child must clear a "threshold test" with three parts, and only if all three are met does the court weigh six additional relocation factors. Mary argued the district court got two of the three threshold parts wrong, but she did not meaningfully challenge the finding that relocation was not in the children's best interests, and she did not challenge the district court's separate findings on the six relocation factors at all. Because those unchallenged findings independently supported the decision, the appeals court affirmed the denial of relocation. On custody, Mary argued that the district court ignored her evidence and effectively forced her to choose between her husband and her children. She disputed the court's findings on several "best interest" factors. The appeals court repeatedly explained that credibility of witnesses is decided by the trial court, not re-decided on appeal, and that the district court had not found Mary's or Hal's testimony credible. Much of Mary's argument amounted to asking the appeals court to reweigh the evidence, which it declined to do. The court found the district court's findings were supported by substantial evidence and affirmed the custody award. On the attorney fees issue, the appeals court held that because the district court had not yet actually awarded any fees, that part of the appeal was premature.