Nevada family-law case summaries

Jared and Randell Cleland were married and share three minor children; both initially lived in Nevada. After the marriage broke down, Jared moved to Hurricane, Utah, and took the two youngest children with him. Randell filed for divorce and asked for primary physical custody of the two youngest children, arguing the oldest child was not part of the case because Jared was not that child's biological father. Jared countered that he had adopted the oldest child and asked for primary physical custody of the children so they could live with him in Utah. While the case was pending, a temporary order let Jared keep primary physical custody of the two youngest children, with Randell having weekend parenting time. At an evidentiary hearing, the two parents told very different stories. Randell testified she had agreed only that the children could stay with Jared for most of the summer and always intended for them to live and attend school in Nevada. Jared testified that Randell had orally agreed the two youngest children could live with him and attend school in Utah, and he pointed to Facebook Messenger exchanges as proof. Randell said those messages concerned only the logistics of summer parenting time. She acknowledged deleting some messages but said they were messages she inadvertently sent while her phone was in her pocket or that contained typos. Jared acknowledged that after being served with the divorce complaint, he was upset by Randell's custody request and, out of frustration, did not bring the children to Las Vegas for her previously agreed parenting time. The district court sided with Randell. It found that Jared was the legal father of all three children because he had signed voluntary acknowledgments of paternity, but it denied his relocation request, found the parties' messages were ambiguous and did not show Randell had consented to the move, awarded the parties joint legal custody, and gave Randell primary physical custody. Jared then asked the court to reconsider, arguing the deleted messages should have triggered a legal presumption that they were harmful to Randell's case - in other words, that the court should have assumed the deleted messages showed she consented to the move. The court denied reconsideration, finding that both parties had testified about the messages and that any information in them had little bearing on its relocation decision. The Nevada Court of Appeals affirmed. It explained that when no custody order exists, one parent may not move a child out of state over the other parent's objection without a court order allowing the move. The appellate court held that the district court's detailed findings on the relocation factors and the children's best interests were supported by substantial evidence - among them, that Jared moved without adequate housing for the children, that he used the relocation to frustrate Randell's parenting time, and that separating the youngest children from their older sibling caused them emotional pain. On the deleted messages, the court explained that a parent seeking the adverse-evidence presumption must show the evidence was destroyed with intent to harm, and Jared failed to meet that burden. Because appellate courts do not reweigh evidence or second-guess credibility findings, the Court of Appeals found no abuse of discretion and affirmed.