Lawyers representing survivors of intimate partner violence or protecting parents of abused children must know and understand child custody interstate jurisdiction issues.1  Scenarios that lawyers may need to address include: 1) the survivor wishes to relocate with the child either before or after an initial custody determination; 2) the survivor has fled with the child to Louisiana; and 3) the survivor has fled from Louisiana to a state of refuge and the abusive former partner files to force the child’s return to Louisiana.

The Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act (UCCJEA)2  applies to all “child custody proceedings” in which legal custody, physical custody, or visitation is at issue.3  A “child custody proceeding “includes a proceeding for divorce, separation, neglect, abuse, dependency, guardianship, paternity, termination of parental rights, and protection from family violence, in which the custody or visitation issue may appear.”4  In domestic violence cases, interstate jurisdiction issues typically arise when a victim moves out of state to get away from an abusive former partner. If a victim relocates to a new state but is made to litigate contentious custody issues in the first state, her safety and stability may be compromised. In these cases, lawyers may be called upon to represent survivors who need help asking Louisiana courts to either accept or decline jurisdiction under the UCCJEA’s domestic violence provisions. The UCCJEA includes important protections for domestic violence victims and their children that can help lawyers advocate for them in these circumstances.

The UCCJEA’s inconvenient forum and emergency jurisdiction rules include protections for victims who flee the child’s “home state” to escape violence.5  Under the UCCJEA, a child’s “home state” has jurisdiction to decide custody. Home state is defined in La. R.S. 13:1813 as “the state in which a child lived with a parent or a person acting as a parent for at least six consecutive months immediately before the commencement of a child custody proceeding.” Once Louisiana makes an initial child custody determination as the “home state,” it has exclusive, continuing jurisdiction until it determines that neither the child, nor the child and one parent, have a significant connection with this state and that substantial evidence is no longer available in this state concerning the child’s care, protection, training, and personal relationships.6  In some cases, Louisiana will be the home state and the victim may need to establish or protect its status as such. In other cases, Louisiana may be the home state, but the victim instead needs help asking Louisiana to decline to exercise its continuing jurisdiction in favor of a refuge state. Alternatively, Louisiana may be the refuge state, not the home state, and a victim needs help establishing temporary emergency jurisdiction for protection here.

• 1For additional discussion of interstate child custody issues, see Section 4.10 and Section 4.11 of this manual’s chapter on family law.
• 2La. R.S. 13:1801–1842.
• 3La. R.S. 13:1802(4).
• 4Id.
• 5See Stoneman v. Drollinger, 64 P.3d 997, 1001–02 (Mont. 2003); Kovach v. McKenna, 2011-C-0228 (La. App. 4 Cir. 4/1/11) (unpublished writ opinion). In Kovach, the appellate court reversed a trial court’s denial of a motion to decline its home state jurisdiction in favor of the family violence victim’s refuge state. In its opinion, the Kovach Court found that the “domestic violence and residence of the child in another state for more than six months predominates over all other considerations in La. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 13:1819.”
• 6La. R.S. 13:1814(A)(1). Continuing jurisdiction also ends when neither the child, the child’s parents nor any person acting as a parent reside in Louisiana. La. R.S. 13:1814(A)(2).

When a victim flees domestic violence, litigation of custody in the refuge state can enhance the victim’s safety and economic welfare. Under La. R.S. 13:1819, a Louisiana court with UCCJEA jurisdiction may decline home state jurisdiction in favor of a domestic violence victim’s refuge state by conducting an “inconvenient forum” analysis. Although the inconvenient forum analysis includes a list of factors for consideration, the two factors that are most often determinative on the issue of whether a Louisiana court should decline jurisdiction are domestic violence and the length of time that the child has resided outside of Louisiana. When representing a survivor who has left Louisiana for a refuge state, lawyers should consider whether to file a motion under La. R.S. 13:1819 requesting that Louisiana decline jurisdiction.1  

The leading case on applying the domestic violence factor in an inconvenient forum analysis is Stoneman v. Drollinger.2  Additionally, in an unpublished writ opinion, Kovach v. McKenna, a Louisiana appellate court ordered declination of Louisiana’s home state jurisdiction under La. R.S. 13:1819 and dismissal of the abusive party’s Louisiana custody suit. In doing so, the Kovach Court concluded that “domestic violence and residence of the child in another state for more than six months predominated over all other considerations in La. R.S. 13:1819.”3  As in Kovach, many trial courts may find an absence from the state of 6 months or more (even if it occurs after the initial filing) weighs heavily in favor of declining jurisdiction under a section 1819 “inconvenient forum” analysis. Louisiana’s courts of appeal have upheld declination as inconvenient forum when the child has been absent for a lengthy time.4  The ruling on a motion to decline as inconvenient forum is reviewable for abuse of discretion by supervisory writs.5

Additionally, if the victim of domestic violence left Louisiana after a Louisiana court issued an order regarding custody, lawyers should determine whether the previous order is an “initial custody consideration” that would give rise to continuing jurisdiction.6  If the prior order was only interim or temporary and was not a considered decree or a final judgment or consent judgment that took best interest factors into account, it may not be the kind of order that gives rise to continuing jurisdiction.7

• 1La. R.S. 13:1819(A).
• 264 P.3d 997 (Mont. 2003); see also Rainbow v. Rainbow, 990 A.2d 535 (Me. 2010) (declination of home state jurisdiction in favor of refuge state was appropriate where there was domestic violence).
• 3Kovach v. McKenna, 2011-C-0228 (La. App. 4 Cir. 4/1/11) (unpublished writ opinion).
• 4Burds v. Skidmore, 2019-0263, p. 1 (La. App. 4 Cir. 3/22/19), 267 So. 3d 192, 193 (where mother and child had been living in Georgia for 6 years, Georgia had the most significant connections and was the forum most convenient); Wootton v. Wootton, 49,00, p. 1 (La. App. 2 Cir. 5/14/14), 138 So. 3d 1253 (affirming trial court order declining to exercise continuing jurisdiction despite Louisiana consent judgment with provision indicating Louisiana would retain jurisdiction, where mother and child had lived in Mississippi for four years); Kovach, 2011-C-0228; see also Addington v. McGehee, 29729-CA (La. App. 2 Cir. 1997), 698 So. 2d 702, 704.
• 5Kovach, 2011-C-0228; see also Addington, 29729-CA, 698 So. 2d at 704.
• 6See La. R.S. 13:1802(3), (8).
• 7See Burds, 2019-0263, 267 So. 3d 192.

La. R.S. 13:1816 addresses a Louisiana court’s authority to issue temporary emergency orders to protect family violence victims who have fled to Louisiana. La. R.S. 13:1816(A) expressly allows temporary emergency jurisdiction to protect a child if the child or a sibling or parent of the child is subjected to or threatened with mistreatment or abuse.

However, La. R.S. 13:1816 emergency orders provide only temporary relief. The custody case must be resolved in the state that has proper jurisdiction under La. R.S. 13:1813–1815 unless that state declines jurisdiction under the inconvenient forum test. If no prior custody order exists and no suit has been commenced in a state with La. R.S. 13:1813 subject matter jurisdiction, a temporary emergency order will remain in effect until an order is obtained from the home state or a state that has proper section 1813 jurisdiction.1  If a prior custody order exists, the judge must confer with the other state’s judge.2  Then, the court with temporary emergency jurisdiction must specify a reasonable time limit for the petitioner to obtain an order from the state with proper jurisdiction under La. R.S. 13:1813­–1815 or to seek declination from that court.3  The temporary emergency order will remain in effect until an order is obtained from the other state or the time limit expires.4

Because Louisiana can assume only temporary jurisdiction under La. R.S. 13:1816, using it can present legal risks for survivors. There is always a danger that the court in the “home state” will view the victim’s request for an emergency order as forum shopping or contumacious. This risk is especially high if the judge in the other state has issued prior orders declining to find domestic violence or minimizing the danger of abuse. In cases like that, the use of this provision can sometimes create more problems for the victim and child when the case eventually returns to the home state.

• 1See La. R.S. 13:1816(B).
• 2La. R.S. 13:1816(D).
• 3La. R.S. 13:1816(C).
• 4Id.