The Top 5 Things to Do Right Now to Help Your Lawyer Win Your Custody Case

Here's a reality check most people don't hear until it's too late: by the time you're sitting in front of the judge in your custody trial, the most important work is either already done—or it isn't. The parent who laid the groundwork ahead of time walks in far ahead of the one who didn't. Today I'm going to show you exactly how to be that parent.

I'm Scott Milner. I'm board certified in family law, and I've spent the last twenty years trying family law cases to judges and juries. I teach people how to work effectively with their lawyers, maximize their chances of success, and keep their costs down. If you find yourself in the unfortunate position of facing a custody case, here are the five things you should be doing right now—and a few you should not.

1. Give your lawyer the information they need to tell your side of the story.

Help your lawyer help you. My best clients do this by building a timeline of the events relevant to their case. You can do this in a Word document or an Excel sheet, but the best approach is an online timeline tool that you can add your lawyer to. That way you keep adding to the timeline as events happen—with your lawyer linked right to it—and you can attach proof directly to each event. Some tools even let you do this from your phone. Even if you haven't hired a lawyer yet, if you know a custody case is on the horizon, start now.

2. Don't make your lawyer's job harder.

Communicate with the other parent in a polite, respectful way. Follow the BIFF method: every communication should be Brief, Informative, Friendly, and Firm. Do not send long, blistering emails or texts. Do not bait the other parent into ugly exchanges—judges see through this instantly, and it backfires. And don't fire off long messages "documenting" the other parent's behavior. Yes, you should document it—document it on your timeline, not in a text thread. Judges like parents who send brief, informative, friendly, and firm messages. Be the parent the judge likes.

3. Assume everything you say or do will become a trial exhibit.

This one goes hand in hand with the last. Every text you send, every post you make, every voicemail you leave—assume it will be displayed on a large screen in the courtroom or played over the speakers for everyone to hear. Even your in-person interactions have a real chance of being recorded. Conduct yourself the way you know a judge would approve of.

4. Do not involve your children in the fight.

Don't vent to them. Don't use them as messengers. Don't quiz them about the other parent. First, this harms your children—and if you're the kind of parent who does things despite the harm they cause your kids, you should reconsider whether you should be asking for custody at all. Second, beyond the harm, judges hate it, and they are trained to spot the parent who does it if the evidence doesn't make it obvious already. Judges want a calm, disciplined, child-focused parent in the custody driver's seat. That parent does not put their children in the middle.

5. Provide your evidence in an organized fashion.

Handing your lawyer stacks of paper or folders full of files that aren't tied to any specific event or issue is not a good way to provide evidence. Organize it so your lawyer can see how each piece fits into the case—label folders by issue and use year/month/day format for dates. Better yet, use an online timeline that lets you attach documents directly to the events they prove. You can then add your lawyer and their staff to the timeline, or export it with links to every document baked right in. There is nothing like receiving evidence this way. It makes my job dramatically easier, and it saves you money, because I'm not spending hours figuring out how your documents fit into your story.

Those are the top five things you can do right now to help your lawyer win your case. The common thread runs through all of them: the work that wins custody cases happens long before trial day. Start it now.

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