Private agencies will assess custody issues

Saturday, Sept. 6, 1997 | 1 a.m.

These evaluations, now done by court personnel, have been a main source of criticism aimed at the 4-year-old court.

Judges still will make final custody decisions, which won't necessarily have to follow the recommendations of those doing the assessments.

Family Mediation and Assessment Center, the court branch that performs assessments, now will concentrate on mediation - attempting to resolve issues before submitting them to the expense and stress of the courtroom.

Judge Terrance Marren said the new plan will allow the Family Court to rely more heavily on mediation, formerly one of its more successful techniques.

"We somehow lost focus on mediation as our prime resolution technique and came to rely on evaluation. I think everybody agrees it is time to change that."

Judge Fran Fine said mediation "will help the families start the healing process faster."

The new plan will allow couples who are getting divorced to pay private experts - from a court-approved list of licensed marriage and family counselors and social workers - to evaluate their relationships with children and their ability to function as custodial parents.

Many lawyers have said the assessment center did this task poorly, producing misleading reports and sometimes failing to research disputed facts.

In 1996, Marshal Willick, then chairman of State Bar of Nevada Family Law Section, circulated a letter charging, "The evaluations now being performed have broken down so completely that many of them are a farce."

The court's decision Friday was propelled not only by criticism, but by the 1997 Legislature, which decided that all contested child custody matters must be submitted to mediation before trial, and gave Nevada's district courts an Oct. 1 deadline to start doing it. Because Family Court is a part of Clark County District Court, the plan approved Friday must still be voted upon by the larger body on Sept. 15.