Ex Parte Perkins

Joseph and Debi Perkins were divorced in 1987, when their daughter was four years old. The court adopted the Perkinses' divorce agreement, which granted custody of the child to the mother, as part of its judgment of divorce. In 1991, the father filed a petition to modify the custody agreement. The mother maintained that the child was perfectly happy and well-adjusted. The father, who had since remarried and had had another child by this second marriage, testified that the child was behaving oddly and was not properly cared for by the mother. The facts of the case were vigorously disputed, and…