North Carolina Recent Legal Answers from Lawyers

You have a very complex legal situation on your hands and I strongly encourage you to contact an attorney in your local area.  In short, if a parent is shooting up heroin when the children are in the house, my opinion is that the children are at risk of immediate bodily injury which would be grounds to file for emergency custody.   View one of our blogs for more on emergency child custody in North Carolina.  You may also consider contacting DSS.   It is difficult to give additional information here without more facts, but as grandmother, you would also have to establish standing for a custody action if you were the one filing (rather than a parent).  Hope this helps a bit. ... Read More

This certainly sounds unfair.  However, there appears to be no legal claim here.  Employees of cities and towns in North Carolina are employed at-will which means they can be terminated (or disciplined) at any time for good reason, bad reason or no reason at all.  You could only sue the City if you can show there is some unlawful motive behind the termination.  You may want to discuss this with an experienced employment attorney if there are more facts that you believe are relevant.... Read More

The EEOC enfoces federal law which prohibits discrimination (or harassment) on the basis of race, color, sex, national origin, religion, disability or age 40 or older.  You do not mention any of these "protected classes" in your facts.  Did you mean that you are disabled after the on-the-job ingury and are being harassed due to your disability?  If so, that is possible, but I do not see near enough in these facts although there could be more facts that change the analysis. I want to let you know that harassment for file a worker compensation claim in not unlawful.  However, retaliation that leads to job loss for filing for workers compensation is unlawful. ... Read More

There is generally no need for a witness or notary to have a valid contract, but I assume there was more than just hte parties' names.  There would need to be sufficiently definite terms,i.e. A is selling this car to B for this price on February 1.  If these terms are not included, the paper itself may not be enough, but the buyer may be able to incorporate other writings (e.g. the correspondence between you) to flesh out the terms.... Read More

I strongly encourage you to immediately seek legal counsel in your local area.  There are a number of complex laws at play in a scenario like this, and it is important to understand not only North Carolina law, but the local rules within your particular jurisdiction.  View our blog for a brief discussion on denying visitation when involved in a child custody dispute in North Carolina.  Typically, we would file for both permanent child custody and temporary custody in a situation like this.  A court order would help draw lines and clarify the visitation schedules of each parent.  Once an order is in place, a non-abiding party can be held in contempt for not following the order.  Hope this helps.  ... Read More

I encourage you to continue seeking legal advice in your particular area.  Most law offices offer low cost (or sometimes free) initial consultations which should shed some light on your situation and answer many of your questions.  Some law firms also have much lower initial retainer fees than $6k and may offer payment plans.   One of our blogs discusses how the marital home is typically distributed during divorce in north carolina, which may shed some light on scenarios when both parties dig their heels in and refuse to leave the house.  Your situation is a complicated one that would likely need to be attacked from several angles...there are a number of potential avenues you could go down, including divorce from bed and board, postseparation support/alimony, equitable distribution/interim distribution, child custody/child support, temporary restraining order to prevent marital waste, etc...Hope this helps a bit.         ... Read More

Thank you for asking. Please review the current custody order as it will dictate the course of actions that need to be taken for modification. Most of the time parenting orders have a clause that says if both parents can agree to different custody arrangements than, so be it. Otherwise, you might have to go through mediation or litigation (where the child is now court) to get the custody order modified. The way you presented your question, sounded like you and your ex-husband have no problem getting along as far as communication is concerned, therefore it would be safe to just go with the flow and have him bring the child over with a letter asking you to take care of the child from this point on. What will become of her schooling if she moves? You guys should let her finish her current school year and let her start the new school year at your place. If you like, you can email me the current custody order for general review at smsattorney@gmail.com and I will give you my analysis on it. Looking forward to hearing from you. Good Luck. Above answer and comments to questions are for general purposes only and does not constitute legal advice or establishes an attorney-client relationship without a signed retainer. Please reach out to an attorney you are comfortable with working and discussing your case in more details.... Read More

There are no easy wrongful termination claims including claims based on disability.  At base, you must show that you were terminated (or not hired) due to your disability.  That is a difficult task in the best of circumstances.  The best thing for you to do is to get a consultation with an experienced employment attorney to fully discuss.... Read More

Adult age in most states is 18 years old and some states are 21, 23. An adult aged son can travel with a step or biological sibling under the age of 18 with consent from parents. Above answer and comments to questions are for general purposes only and does not constitute legal advice or establishes an attorney-client relationship without a signed retainer. Please reach out to an attorney you are comfortable with working and discussing your case in more details.... Read More

Your facts do not disclose many of the items that would be necessary to give good advice. I assume that your husband has left the country and you want him back. However, you have not disclosed your present immigration status or that of his parents, and that would be relevant in seeing whether he could have a chance of returning if he is under a 10 year bar for unlawful presence in the US for a year or more. I suggest that you make an appointment with an immigration lawyer who can go over all your available options taking into account all of the facts.Due to the limitations of the Lawyers.com Forums, Alan Lee, Esq.'s (the "Firm") participation in responding to questions posted herein does not constitute legal advice, nor legal representation of the person or entity posting a question. No Attorney/Client relationship is or shall be construed to be created hereby. The information provided herein by the Firm is general, and requires that the poster obtain specific legal advice from an attorney. The poster shall not rely upon the information provided herein as legal advice nor as the basis for making any decisions of legal consequence.  ... Read More