Scarberry Indiana Child Custody Appeal Transcript Due Today

The case currently before the Indiana Court of Appeals involves an Anderson, Indiana father who lost his parental rights because he "is agnostic".

On 08 November 2010 Master Commissioner George Pancol and Judge Thomas Newman of the Madison County Superior Court ruled that Craig Scarberry was unfit to parent his three young children because he had changed his religious preference from Christian to agnostic while the children's mother maintained that she is a "Christian"

I previously wrote about the Notice of Appeal filed in Scarberry custody ruling when the Notice of Appeal was filed on 01 December 2010.

The two issues that Scarberry will argue upon appeal are;
1) Whether the trial court's order modifying father's joint legal custody of the parties three (3) minor children to awarding mother full legal custody of the children based upon father's change in religious preference from Christian to agnostic and his religious practices, or lack thereof, which did not in any way actually harm or pose a substantial threat of harm to the children creates an establishment of religion or impinges upon father's freedom of religion inviolate of the establishment of religion clause or free exercise of religion clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution made applicable to the individual states by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

2) Whether there existed evidence to support the facts and whether the facts supported the findings that there had been a substantial change in one or more of the factors provided for by IC 31-17-2-8 and that a modification of custody reducing father's parenting time was in the best interest of the children.

The ruling by Madision County's two top judicial religious bigots came after hearing 20 hours of testimony over a three day period. The transcript was estimated to be over 800 pages in length at a cost of over $3200. But because of the extreme likelihood that Scarberry would win his appeal and that he lacked the funds to pay for the transcript the taxpayers of Madison County will instead pay the cost of the transcript and $250 filing fee.

A check with the Clerk of the Courts today revealed that the transcript of the proceedings was going to substantially exceed the estimate and that the Court Reporter was going to need about an additional week to prepare it. After completion Scarberry will have 30 days in which to file his Brief.

Scarberry will need to make multiple copies of the transcript for lawyers assisting with the appeal. Additionally there will be costs of printing the nine copies of each filing with the Court of Appeals. Scarberry has a Legal Fund page on Facebook where he is seeking donations to help cover these costs as well as proceedings at the trial court level.

Donations may be made on the site using a PayPal account. If you do not have a PayPal account and would like to make a donation you may make a direct deposit or send a check or M.O. Contact me for details.

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