What to do after a negative outcome in a child custody evaluation; a rebuttal witness may be your answer

In Child Custody Proceedings, Family Court Judges often place a substantial amount of trust in the evaluating Psychologist, and many times they do follow the recommended parenting plan that is provided in the body of the report. It is because of this exact reason that the Court is often very open to hearing from a qualified rebuttal witness, which is a psychologist who performs a review of the initial evaluator’s work product, may testify in court about what they learned, in order to assist the judge in making a fully informed, appropriate decision that is honestly in the best interest of the children involved.

Overall, in my experience, judges have shown that they genuinely care about making recommendations that are actually in the best interest of the child. Because of this, they want to know whether or not there is evidence to suggest that they have placed trust in a psychologist who didn’t deserve it. Although hiring a rebuttal witness can be expensive, it allows the opportunity to reveal if the initial psychological evaluator is performing halfhearted evaluations, producing biased reports, or using antiquated, disproven techniques.

In order to be effective, the rebuttal witness must spend a great deal of time deconstructing the initial child custody evaluator’s methods, and the report that followed. Then, we provide the unfavored parent’s attorney an adequate amount of feedback, in order to prepare them for our direct examination and the cross examination of the court appointed child custody evaluator.

Regardless of where you’re located, if you strongly feel that the results of your child custody evaluation were either bias, blatantly wrong, or poorly performed, please do not hesitate to call our forensically trained licensed psychologist, Dr. Kristin Tolbert, to discuss your case. You will not be charged for the initial review of the report, and Dr. Tolbert will consult with your attorney and give them feedback on if it appears that a complete work product review is warranted. Call us today at 561-429-2140 or email drktolbert@gmail.com.