Opinion
No. 64
Filed 5 May 1981
ON discretionary review to review the decision of the Court of Appeals, reported pursuant to Rule 30 (e) and filed 4 August 1980, affirming the denial by Lyon, J., of defendant-wife's motion to change custody at the 3 December 1979 Civil Session of HARNETT County District Court.
L. Randolph Doffermyre, III, for plaintiff.
Bryan, Jones Johnson by James M. Johnson for defendant.
On 23 July 1979 plaintiff-husband was awarded custody of the couple's two children. This action was brought three months later, on 23 October 1979, when defendant-wife filed a motion in the cause seeking a change of custody. At the 12 December 1979 hearing on the motion, defendant testified that she had overcome the physical and emotional problems which she suffered at the time of the 23 July order. She testified that she could make a good home for the children in Corpus Christi, Texas, where she lived with her husband of four months. The only showing of change of circumstances in plaintiff's care for the children was that his fiancee had begun to live with the family. Plaintiff admitted they were not married, but he said they were engaged. He explained he wanted to be more certain of his second marriage than he had been of his first. After finding facts, Judge Lyon concluded that defendant had failed to make a sufficient showing of changed circumstances to warrant change of custody, and he denied defendant's motion. Upon defendant's appeal, the Court of Appeals in an opinion by Judge Wells, Judges Parker and Hedrick concurring, affirmed the denial of defendant's motion. We allowed defendant's petition for discretionary review pursuant to G.S. 7A-31 on 7 October 1980.
Upon review of the record, the briefs and oral arguments of counsel and the authorities there cited, we conclude that the petition for discretionary review was improvidently granted.
The order granting discretionary review is vacated; the order denying defendant's motion for change of custody remains undisturbed.