Missouri Makes Dead Beat Dads our of Innocent Men

Again, Missouri Judges have declared that a man who is not a childs father must pay child support anyway. This time the mother has declared in court repeatedly that the man is not the father of her child. Yet a state agency says he is. An appeals court sustained the states desire to lock this man in jail. this man and others are caught in a national issue that pits fairness against the power of the state to avoid the expense of finding the real fathers of children.

On any given weekday, millions of people are tuned in to watch sensational shows where  a dysfunctional adult and the pawns of their dysfunction are used in a ratings race by the shows. When it comes down to it, it’s the children who will suffer from never knowing their true father. Nothing beneficial can come out of the display of a mother testing 5 or more men to determine who fathered her baby, this is something that will forever follow the child.

Many men nationwide are trapped into paying child support because they either are declared such administratively, or do not contest paternity. Unlike the Missouri Legislature a growing number of states have changed laws so they now allow innocent men to use DNA evidence to clear their names. Various bills in the House and Senate of Missouri would allow that here, but have been ignored by the governing bodies.

In most states a very short time to contest is further compounded with the ability to declare paternity administratively. In Missouri and Kansas, that period is one year. Child support must be paid until children either turn 18, or graduate college. Judges have a clear legal process designed to disregard true paternity as long as there is anybody that they can force to provide for the child.  This is tantamount to state sponsored paternity fraud.

If there is a requirement of paternity testing before any requirement of child support a great deal of expense, pain, and family disruption can be avoided.  Also, this gives some women the chance take more responsibility for their actions. Lies that hurt so many lives in the long run will no longer be possible.

And by long run we mean a very long run.  In one of these cases a Missouri Court found “…is now held to be the father of (the child) for all purposes and all time,” , “despite both mother and father’s statements to the contrary and without any determination of that relationship by a court of law.”

It is unfair that a man has to pay for a child that is not his, regardless of true paternity a husband is still required by law to support the children even if he did not father them.  It is obvious that in Missouri paternity fraud is rampant.

So frequently we hear about womens rights and dead beat dads.But what about men who are both responsible and want to do the right thing? Where are the rights for these men? Along with mandatory paternity testing their should be a mandatory law stating that the woman should pay back the child support received over how ever long period the time due to the fact that the child/children are not his.