On March 19 the NC Court of Appeals issued a ruling in Green v Carter that addressed all of these issues, and more. The opinion is 54 pages, so I'll just briefly touch the highlights here but I encourage you to read it in its entirety.

Mother and Partner were in a long term, same sex, committed relationship. The parties were never married and Mother had given birth to a child as a result of IVF during her committed relationship to Partner.  The parties separated and Partner sued for Custody and Visitation and Mother countersued for Child Support.  Mother was represented by Settlyd member Collins Family Law Group who was making an admirable effort to get Partner to do the right thing and financially support a child to which she was claiming a close, familial, personal relationship.

At trial, the court issued a co-parenting order and an order requiring Partner to pay child support.  Partner then appealed the child support order, saying she was not legally required to pay child support as she was not a "parent" as defined by the NC Code, but she was entitled to visitation in accord with NC rule regarding In Loco Parentis.

In Loco Parentis in NC appears similar to SC's Psychological Parent Doctrine.  Under both rules, a party that qualifies as In Loco Parentis or as a Psychological parent is entitled to visitation with a minor child, but is not required to pay child support.  In Green, the trial court tried to extend the rule to require child support along with rights of visitation, but a plain reading of the law required that the trial judge's ruling be reversed on the issue of child support, in spite of it's noble intent.

But the rules are clear: A non parent can not be required to financially support a child, even if they claim to have a strong, loving relationship with a child (akin to parent/child!) to warrant granting them court ordered visitation.

Thank you Collins Family Law Group for taking the high road and trying to do the right thing for a single mom and her child!

Guy Vitetta

Charleston