Article 69 of the RF IC. Deprivation of parental rights
The Family Code considers the most serious punishment for parents for their unworthy behavior to be deprivation of parental rights.
The Family Code classifies parental rights and responsibilities as inalienable. If these rights and responsibilities are not used for their intended purpose, they may be lost as a result of deprivation of parental rights. Deprivation of parental rights is a family law measure of responsibility in relation to parents, i.e. persons recorded as parents in the child's birth certificate. If the record of the father was made as a result of establishing paternity, the person who acquired parental rights and responsibilities may be deprived of them on a general basis.
Parental rights apply to each child individually. It is impossible to deprive parental rights in general without singling out a child whose rights and interests are grossly violated by the parents. Deprivation of parental rights in relation to a child who does not yet exist is also not allowed.
An exceptional measure - deprivation of parental rights - is a decision that entails serious legal consequences for both the parent and his child. This means that deprivation of parental rights is allowed: firstly, when it is no longer possible to change the behavior of the parents (one of them) for the better; secondly, only by court; thirdly, if the parent is at fault.
Deprivation of parental rights may be preceded by preventive measures of influence on parents: restriction of parental rights or a claim for deprivation of parental rights must be filed immediately with the implementation of measures to protect the rights and interests of the child, up to and including his immediate removal from his parents.
As a rule, deprivation of parental rights can be the result of the conscious behavior of the parents (one of them). If they are unable to intelligently manage their actions and actions for reasons beyond their control (severe mental illness, profound dementia, disability, etc.), then, as a general rule, they cannot be deprived of parental rights. Thus, the presence of parental guilt is a mandatory condition for deprivation of parental rights. In the absence of guilt, restriction of parental rights by court or placement of the child as having lost parental care is applied.
Saving the life or health of a child leads to the exceptional nature of deprivation of parental rights and explains why only a court can carry it out. For the same reason, a list of grounds for deprivation of parental rights is established. This list is exhaustive. It covers all possible ways parents violate the rights and interests of their child. To satisfy the claim, it is enough to verify the existence of one of them. True, in practice, most often there is a combination of several reasons. But in any case, you have to deal with a situation where a child, his life, health, and upbringing are in danger. Moreover, this is a danger that is of a socially significant nature.
Less dangerous, but harmful for the child, is avoidance of parental responsibilities. It presupposes systematic, i.e. repeated failure to fulfill parental duty, lack of care for their children, no matter how it is expressed (they do not feed, do not provide the necessary clothing, medical care, in a word, they do nothing to satisfy the vital needs of the child).
Most often, the indifferent attitude of parents towards children suffering from hunger, cold, illness is combined with indifference to the conditions of their upbringing or with their own pernicious behavior that destroys the child’s personality (drunkenness in front of the child, turning him into a direct witness of his own immoral acts, etc.) . Depending on the age of the children, certain actions (inaction) of the parent become destructive for them in each specific case. For example, a small child dies because he is not fed, a teenager suffers from constant communication with his parent’s degraded, dehumanized drinking companions.
A type of evasion of parental responsibilities would be malicious evasion of child support. However, it is not necessary that this fact be confirmed by a court verdict. It is enough to be convinced of the constant desire to evade paying alimony and material support for your children. But if a parent cannot pay child support for objective reasons, there is no reason to deprive him of parental rights on this basis.
Another basis for deprivation of parental rights is refusal to take a child from a maternity hospital (ward) or other medical institution, educational institution, social welfare institution or other similar institutions. It is understood that such a refusal is not caused by reasons recognized by the court as valid (serious illness, disability, lack of any housing, etc.). The very fact that parents (one of them) have difficult living conditions is subject to critical assessment in each specific situation.
In addition, each time it is necessary to take into account whether the parents (one of them) have any benefits established by law.
Therefore, the refusal to take the child home cannot be clearly considered unlawful. The refusal of an unmarried woman-mother is subject to the same assessment, since her unconditional right to place the child in a child care institution for full state care has legal grounds.
This rule applies to placing a child of a single mother only in foster care. Therefore, she has no right to refuse to take her child, for example, from the hospital where he was undergoing treatment. As for the maternity hospital, if a single mother abandons her newborn here without expressing her intention to place him in another family or a child care institution under state care (when, moreover, her action is not dictated by serious objective reasons), her behavior should be assessed as unlawful, indicating the existence of grounds for deprivation of parental rights.
Particularly dangerous is the abuse of parental rights, which can take different forms of expression, for example, teaching a child to drink alcoholic beverages or drugs; use of a minor in committing a crime or acquiring proceeds from crime. Parental rights are abused by people who force their children to beg, engage in prostitution, etc.
Abuse of parental rights, as a rule, is not one-time in nature, but is expressed in a number of actions and actions of the parent. To bring to justice it is necessary to establish guilt. The inability to rationally evaluate one’s actions and manage them does not allow one to raise the issue of deprivation of parental rights. Protection of the rights and interests of the child in such cases is carried out in accordance with Articles 73, 123 of the RF IC.
Parental rights should also be deprived for cruel treatment of children by parents. It consists, firstly, in physical, and secondly, in mental violence against them. In the first case, we can talk about beatings, causing physical suffering in any way. Mental violence is expressed in threats, instilling a feeling of fear, suppressing any will of the child, etc. An attempt on his sexual integrity poses a particular danger. If it is not the parents themselves who treat children cruelly, but members of their family, which the mother and father of the child do not oppose, then restriction of their parental rights is also possible.
Parental chronic alcoholism or drug addiction are among the serious diseases associated with complete damage to the volitional sphere of a person. These diseases themselves pose a particular danger to the child. In a family of parents who are chronic alcoholics, children most often go hungry, do not have the basic necessities, they do not have proper supervision, they unwittingly absorb an unhealthy family atmosphere, from which they perish morally and physically.
The danger of a parent’s chronic alcoholism is that his condition is, as a rule, the root cause of all other grounds for deprivation of parental rights. Therefore, the absence of parental guilt has no legal significance here. The same can be said about drug addiction, which is always chronic. As for substance abuse, it is not an independent basis for deprivation of parental rights.
Chronic alcoholism must be confirmed by a medical report. Any kind of assumptions in this regard are excluded. To deprive parental rights on these grounds, there is no need to first recognize the chronic alcoholic parent as having limited legal capacity.
A parent suffering from chronic alcoholism cannot intelligently manage his or her actions due to a severe mental illness, aggravated by an irresistible attraction to alcohol. In such cases, the court must inquire from the medical institution regarding the parent's ability to raise their children. If, according to experts, he cannot do this, legal methods should be used as a measure to protect the rights and interests of the child.
It is necessary to distinguish the so-called everyday drunkenness from chronic alcoholism. Then the behavior of the parent, his attitude towards the children is assessed through the prism of other grounds for deprivation of parental rights.
Undoubtedly, a deliberate crime against the life and health of a child committed by his parents is one of the most serious and socially dangerous. We are talking about attempted murder, attempt to commit suicide, grievous bodily harm, beatings, torture, infection with a venereal disease, rape, sexual intercourse with one’s child who has not reached puberty, indecent acts against one’s minor children, leaving them in danger and etc. A person who has committed a crime of this kind cannot be the owner of parental rights and responsibilities, protect the rights of his children, or represent their interests. However, deprivation of parental rights on these grounds can only take place if there is a court verdict.
Harm to a child can be caused not only by criminal actions directly aimed at his life and health. He may also suffer in cases where the life and health of the spouse become the object of the crime, i.e. the child's other parent. In these cases, the danger for a minor is not any intentional crime against the life and health of a person close to him, but only serious bodily injury, murder and rape. To deprive parental rights, it is not necessary that the crime be committed in front of the child. But even here it is necessary to have a verdict against the perpetrator.
Basic Concepts
A person, along with responsibility towards his child, receives a set of civil rights. Moreover, they occur not only in biological parents, but also in adoptive parents. These include:
- Raising a child in accordance with one’s own will (within the framework of the laws of the Russian Federation and taking into account his interests).
- Representation of a minor before third parties.
- Obtaining information about the child, his state of health, education, and so on (subject to separate residence).
- Obtaining support from adult able-bodied children.
Parents who are under eighteen years of age also have some powers over their children, albeit in a somewhat reduced form. They can live with the child in the same territory and take some part in the educational process.
Most powers cease when the child reaches adulthood. From this moment on, he independently decides his fate. The parent can only demand child support (in certain cases) and retains the possibility of inheritance.
How to write an application
The application for relinquishment of parental rights is drawn up in free form.
In the header, in addition to the court that will hear the case, you will need to indicate the guardianship and trusteeship authority, as well as the registry office department. The plaintiff also indicates his full name, address and telephone number. Since this is not a claim, there is no need to indicate the details of the second parent.
An example statement text looks like this:
“I hereby, of my own free will and unconditionally, renounce parental rights in relation to my son, Alexey Vitalievich Sidorov, born on February 8, 2013. I agree to the deprivation of my parental rights and the subsequent adoption of my child in accordance with current legislation. I understand that my son may be adopted in the future. I understand that I will not be able to reverse this refusal once a court order has been issued confirming my refusal or in any way terminating my parental rights to my son. Even if the court's decision does not revoke my parental rights, I will not be able to change my refusal once the decision to adopt my child takes effect.
The parental rights of my son's mother, Svetlana Alekseevna Sidorova, are retained in full.
I have read and understood what I have stated above and I sign it freely and meaningfully.
I ask the court to consider the case in my absence."
At the end, the applicant indicates the locality where the document was drawn up, puts the current date and signature.
After this, the application must be certified by a notary. He testifies that the document was signed in his presence by the same person who is listed as the author. The registration number of the application is also indicated here.
Procedure and consequences
Deprivation of parental rights is a lengthy procedure that includes several stages.
- Recording of violations by parents against minors (by law enforcement agencies, public authorities, other federal bodies).
- Warning guardians about the possibility of sanctions.
- Submission of an application by an interested party (a sample can be found on the Internet, but such a complex issue is best resolved with an experienced lawyer, since it requires certification of many factors and the preparation of a whole package of documentation).
- Satisfaction of the requirements (or refusal) by the court, after analyzing the reasons and their compliance with Art. 69 RF IC.
Then all that remains is to take the last step - to make changes to the registry office data and protect the child from communicating with the person against whom the lawsuit was carried out. The most common reasons for initiating such cases are chronic abuse of alcohol, drugs, that is, severe dependence, documented and confirmed by witnesses, as well as evasion (malicious) from fulfilling alimony obligations.
The person subject to the procedure must be aware of the consequences - he can no longer participate in the life of the minor, make choices for him (for example, approve transactions or educational institutions). But the person continues to bear some responsibility towards the child, such as paying child support.
Deprivation of parental rights is a long and complex procedure, implemented only for reasons specified in the current legislation and in court. The consequences are a significant limitation of a person’s ability to participate in the child’s life while maintaining some responsibilities.
Abandonment of a newborn
If a mother abandons her child in the maternity hospital until the registry office has issued a birth certificate, the procedure is simplified. The woman signs an agreement that the newborn will be placed in a government facility. Consent to the further adoption of the child is also indicated there. Usually, in addition to this, they are asked to provide information about themselves and the child’s father - full name, education, nationality, whether they are registered with the IPA. The refusal is certified by the head physician of the maternity hospital. He also submits the application to the guardianship authorities, who initiate the procedure for deprivation of parental rights.
It must be said that if a woman is married, then her mere desire to leave the child in the maternity hospital is not enough. The corresponding application must also be received from the father of the newborn, otherwise he will have to take care of the baby himself. If he does not want to do this, then the procedure will be initiated by the guardianship authorities.
Expert commentary
Kamensky Yuri
Lawyer
If the mother changes her mind, she has six months to take the child back. This can be done not only by her, but also by the biological father and potential guardians - grandmothers, aunts, adult brothers (sisters), etc. After the end of this period, parental rights will have to be restored through the court, and this can only be done if the child We didn’t have time to adopt.
How long does it take to adopt a child from another person?
Until the person listed in the registry office as the natural father of the baby is deprived of his rights, any legal action, including the adoption of the baby, will be unlawful, and no authority will agree to this.
According to the law, a decision to renounce the rights to raise a child by one of his legal parents can be officially made only after six months from the date the court accepted the relevant application. Only after this stage can the registry office employees change the baby’s birth certificate, removing the name of the biological father from there and emptying the column. And after all the above manipulations, the child can be adopted.
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