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Paternity & Legitimation

A Closer Look at Paternity & Legitimation

Parenting can be the best experience of your life. However, even in the best circumstances, every parent will tell you it’s not an easy job. The complexities of parenthood are even more challenging when a child’s parents were never married.

In Georgia, a child is considered “legitimate” if the parties were married at the time of the child’s birth or subsequently marry afterwards. If a child is not “legitimate”, then the only legal parent of the child is the mother. The father in this situation basically has no rights and has very few responsibilities.

Legitimation is the process of establishing a father’s legal rights to the child. Without this process, the father typically has no custodial or visitation rights. To establish these rights, there is a specific legal process required by the Courts. If you need to establish your legal rights to your child, the law offices of Spooner & Associates can help.

Paternity is the process of establishing the responsibilities of a father regarding a child. In a paternity action, the Court will typically enter an order of child support, designate how medical bills are to be paid and who is to carry health insurance.

We have years of experience in handling all types of family law cases in the Atlanta area, including paternity actions. Contact our attorneys at 678-714-1131 for a consultation.

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The law offices of Spooner and Associates, P.C. provides quality family law for North Metro Atlanta Counties (including Gwinnett County, Barrow County, Forsyth County, Jackson County, Walton County, Hall County, Forsyth County, and North Fulton County), which includes the cities of Suwanee, Lawrenceville, Duluth, Alpharetta, Atlanta, Sugar Hill, Buford, John’s Creek, Milton, Cumming, Gainesville, Oakwood, Snellville, Winder, Monroe, Dacula (including Hamilton Mill), Auburn, Braselton, Hoschton, and Jefferson.