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A 44 year old man was in the news recently, for failure to pay his court ordered child support for his three children, who reside with their mother. Richard Delancey pleaded guilty earlier this week to four counts of criminal nonsupport of three children, which is in violation of his 1999 child support order. Delancey was ordered to pay $669 per month to help support his three children, yet has failed to make a single payment since April of 2006.
Criminal nonsupport is a Class IV felony, which is punishable by a $10,000 fine, or up to five years in jail…or both. Being almost $26,000 behind in support payments, Delancey may find himself in a heap of hot water on his August 17 sentencing. Delancey readily admits that he is behind in his payments, but is looking for a break.
Many states use prosecution and incarceration for nonsupport as a last resort, using other measures first to grab the non-custodial parents attention, such as suspending driver’s licenses, weekends in jail, as well as adding interest and late fees to the growing amount of back support, and those reasons are exactly why Richard Delancey as well as other non-custodial parents are asking for a break.
With more and more fees accumulating to what is owed, non-custodial parents can soon find themselves in an irreversible financial hole once they fall behind. Parents have a hard time making up payments once their drivers license has been restricted, or revoked altogether, not to mention trying to get the interest and late fees down. They argue that if they were not able to meet the initial payment requirements, how can they possibly make higher payments to rid themselves of the extra fees being tacked on?
Yet custodial parents are wailing as well. If they have to find a way to make ends meet and support the child when the money that they were counting on to help raise that child isn’t coming in, than the non-custodial parent should receive no sympathy when they too find themselves in a financial bind and unable to pay all of their debts.
Delancey is hopeful that the judge will be lenient on him, and grant him probation time, along with a temporarily lowered child support payment, which will allow him to catch up on his financial obligation to his children.
I am still flabbergasted by the fact that if you fail to support your child financially you can end up in jail for years, yet as I wrote about the other day, if you kidnap your child and take him or her on the run as a non-custodial parent, you can end up in jail for a matter of months?
When did the safety and well-being of the child become less important than a monthly support check?
The big consequenses for non payers sound a lot like ‘If a little bit is good, a lot has got to be more better’. Wages can be guaranshied, assets seized, etc. When the system does things that directly limit the deadbeat’s ability to make an income, like tagging him with a felony, or taking his drivers liscense, this becomes opening the goose to get the golden eggs.
If he can’t get a good paying job, all the incentive in the world won’t help get the support payments paid. Zinging the guy may feel really good to the custodial parents, but they and the child pay for such a poorly thought out approach. John
I agree completely John, they are setting these non-custodial parents up for failure with the current system. Tacking on more money while restricting the ways the parent can earn money just doesn’t make any sense.
It also makes me wonder how the non-custodial parent would be able to visit his or her children when they are hit with their license being taken away. As well as all the extra working hours that the non-custodial parent will have to do in order to catch up on back payments. The whole thing seems to be a lose lose situation, except of course for the government agency who is collecting all of those fees…
Have you ever dealth with a non-custodial parent who purposely wuit a well-paying job
to be payed under the table and hide in different states for the last 5 years? Let me tell you, the big punishments sound fine and dandy to me since we (myself and children) have been the ones to pay for his lack of responsibility. NOT losing his license did notihg to him and neither did threats.