Pregnant female in foster care wants to give temporary custody of child to relative in another state?

Question

I do not need to be told rudely to go seek legal advice,obviously for a situation like this,that is inevitable.Input is appreciated:BEFORE I CONSULT WITH LAWYERS, SOCIAL WORKERS & LEGAL AID. I just wanted to know if anyone happened to have any information about this complicated situation:

R.E. is a 16 year old girl in foster care, living between group homes and foster families. She resides in New York City. R.E. is pregnant and will be giving birth to her newborn son in December/January. J.R. is 23 year old, living in Virginia. R.E. wants to give J.R. temporary custody of the newborn child. What is the procedure to do this? R.E is 16 years old (a minor), she is in foster care, she lives in a completely different state.

If temporary custody is not the best alternative, then what should be done so that J.R. is able to bring the baby to doctors appointments, get WIC, etc.

(We are trying to avoid any permanent legal adoption&putting the infant in foster care is NOT an option.)

Answer 1

seems like J.R. needs to "adopt" R.E..... give the expectant mother a safe place to be and help her mother her baby.

Answer 2

I am not sure, but I believe in NY, if you have the baby while "in the system", they take the baby from you.

Answer 3

I think because mom is 16 and in foster care already that the social services that handles her case would be involved with the newborn. The Mom should talk to her case worker about this and also have the person who wants temp custody contact the case worker. Generally they prefer the child go to a relative before strangers.  But the other point is, if the Mom has all intentions of getting this child back, then living in another state, how does she bond with or develop a relationship with the child.?

Answer 4

Maybe you should ask this question in the law section.

Answer 5

Is there a reason the 16 year old AND her baby can't go live with the relative

Just be careful when mentioning pregnant teenagers on the internet.  There are lots of potential adopters just gagging to get their hands on pregnant teenagers and attempt to help themselves to their babies

Best of luck to mother and baby and I hope it all works out so Mom and Babe can stay together if possible.  

Apologies for not being much help with the question, I just want to wish you all the best with this

Answer 6

I was a foster parent for many years.  Unless the laws have changed she can not be forced to surrender her child unless she is an unfit mother.  Some foster homes do take in girls that have babies.  If she wants to put the baby with a relative DHS will probably investigate the relative to make sure they are fit.

Answer 7

Have RE look into "kinship care" through her foster program.  Our son was actually placed with his bio grandparents after birth due to special needs that he had that his bio-parents could not handle physically & emotionally.  Kinship care allowed the bio-grandparents to take "custody" for doctor appointments, applications for assistance, etc.  

Hope that helps.

Answer 8

My family supports a residential program for pregnant teenagers in the Wash DC area.  They provide a residence, parenting education, day-care, GED support, and job training.  The program is firmly against adoption and foster care and strives in every way to prevent separation of the mother (and some fathers) and child.  Surely, New York City has a similar program.

If J.R. is a relative, kinship care is a possibility, however, if R.E. wants to parent her child, I think it would be very traumatic for the baby to be removed from his/her mother.  Puppies are treated more respectfully than human babies!

Answer 9

because it is across state lines the social service will not allow her baby that is born in foster care to cross state lines. The best thing to do is move to the state until the baby is born show permanent residence and then move back with the child, after birth.

Answer 10

Just have temp. custody papers drawed up and have both the mother and the temp. parent sign them and have them notarized