After the biological father's parental rights are terminated, do his parents have any grandparent rights? My feeling is that once the father's rights are terminated, there are no grandparents on that side of the family. Others have told me that thinking is wrong.

The answer is: it depends. Grandparents in NC do have legal standing to seek visitation with their grandchildren, but unless they can show the court that they have had a SUBSTANTIAL relationship with the grandchild, AND that maintaining that relationship is in the CHILD'S best interest, they're not likely to have the court rule to grant visitation against the wishes of one or more parents. Grandparents who raised or lived with the grandkids for a substantial time, or who spent frequent and extensive time with the grandchildren have a decent shot. Those who saw the grandkids a few times a year won't be successful.

Grandparents wanted to secure visitation rights in NC need to petition the court for those rights as PART OF the divorce proceedings, or in the case of an involuntary termination of parental rights, during or soon after that process, and will need to attend mediation, and the "normal" steps related to visitation issues.

If the reason for termination of the parent's rights was due to some danger to the child, the court may not grant grandparent visitation if the court feels that the grandparents would allow that parent access to the child.

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Thank you for the information. Not only does the grandparent in question not have a substantial relationship with the child, but has never even laid eyes on her and she is now just over a year old. As a matter of fact, that until we started this process of terminating the father's parental rights, they had refused all contact! So I think we're good.

Yep...I'd have to agree. Given that the child is so young, there would be a question of that "strong bond" even if they had ever met the child. I suspect they have almost no shot at getting a court to grant visitation against the wishes of the remaining parent.

__________________
While pointers can be helpful, ultimately the number one lesson in any legal action is: don't take legal advice from books, family, friends, co-workers, police officers, grocery clerks, web sites, or people on legal message boards. The only person who can give YOU legal advice is YOUR attorney.

http://www.aardvarc.org

I have to agree. Have you browsed through the information in LawInfo's Free Legal Resource Center to learn more about your issue yet? See: http://www.lawinfo.com/consumer.html and http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/index.html. You can certainly try to speak to a lawyer to determine what legal options may be available. In the meantime, you may be able to learn more on your own. Search the "Free Legal Resources" tab, or browse the Consumer Resources. Good luck.