Obstruction of Contact with a Child

QUESTION:
How should I proceed if the mother is preventing me, as the father, from having contact with my child despite a court order granting such contact?

ANSWER:
A court decision on the dissolution of marriage of parents of a minor child necessarily includes the regulation of parental rights and responsibilities toward that child (Section 24(1) of Act No. 36/2005 Coll., the Family Act, hereinafter “FA”). This includes the right of a parent to have personal contact with his or her minor child. The conditions and rules for such contact are determined in the operative part of the court’s decision on custody.

Pursuant to Section 25(4) FA, “If one parent repeatedly, without justification and deliberately, prevents the other parent from having contact with the minor child (…), the court may, upon the application of either parent, modify the decision on custody.”

It is essential that the parent whose contact rights are being obstructed can objectively prove both:

The court decision regulating contact after divorce serves as the primary evidence. As noted by Bános & Košútová (Family Act – EPI Commentary), “A mere court order that ‘leaves the arrangement of contact to the agreement of the parents’ or that ‘grants contact with the minor without limitation’ is insufficient.” Such orders are unenforceable; in such cases, the entitled parent must initiate separate proceedings to have contact specifically regulated.

Similarly, in Regional Court Bratislava, Case No. 20CoP/57/2021, the court held that Section 25(4) FA requires the existence of a final and binding decision on custody “in relation to the minor, i.e., a decision on the merits.” If no such decision exists, the aggrieved parent has “the right and procedural opportunity to justify the need to have the minor placed in his or her custody” within divorce proceedings or separate custody proceedings. The court also clarified that claims under Section 25(4) FA cannot be resolved via interim (urgent) measures.

QUESTION:
Can the child of a divorced couple meet the former husband’s new partner?

ANSWER:
If divorcing spouses cannot agree on contact arrangements with their minor child, the court will determine such arrangements in the divorce decree (Section 25(2) FA). However, these arrangements apply only to the parties specified in the decision and cannot be interpreted as restricting or prohibiting the child’s contact with other persons with whom the divorced parents have regular contact.

Although the court may, in the interest of the minor and if family circumstances require, regulate the child’s contact with other persons close to the child (Section 25(5) FA), it is highly unlikely that a father’s new partner would be considered among such “close persons” within the statutory meaning.

According to established case law, “In proceedings concerning the care of minors, the central focus and paramount consideration is the best interests of the minor in terms of healthy physical and psychological development; this concept—the best interests of the child—cannot be confused with the individual interests of the parents or their personal ideas about the child’s care” (Supreme Court of the Slovak Republic, Case No. 3 Cdo 81/2014).