## Facts

- Darryl Thurgood and Shauna Thurgood divorced in 1994 and were the biological parents of S.T.T.
- Shauna, the custodial parent, died on April 28, 2000.
- Maternal grandmother Darlene Uzelac took charge of S.T.T. and petitioned to be appointed guardian and conservator; Thurgood filed a competing petition after learning of Shauna’s death.
- The trial court first issued a temporary restraining order giving Uzelac immediate custody, then awarded temporary custody to Thurgood.
- The trial court later found the rebuttable presumption favoring a biological parent had not been rebutted and appointed Thurgood, as sole surviving parent, the custodian and legal guardian.
- The court also contemplated future grandparent contact, initially indicating visitation would occur at Thurgood’s approval.
- After conflict between the parties, the trial court entered a specific, court-ordered visitation schedule for Uzelac.
- When Thurgood allegedly failed to comply, the court held him in contempt, sentenced him to 60 days in jail, and allowed him to purge the contempt by delivering S.T.T. to Uzelac for visitation every other weekend.
- Thurgood moved under Utah Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b) to vacate the contempt order; the trial court denied the motion.
- Thurgood pursued an interlocutory appeal from the denial of Rule 60(b) relief.

## Issues

1. Whether the contempt sanction could stand where it enforced a grandparent-visitation regime that failed to give constitutionally required special weight to the decisions of a fit, surviving parent.
2. Whether the trial court erred (abused its discretion) in denying Rule 60(b) relief from the contempt order and its purge condition.

## Decision

- The Utah Court of Appeals reversed the order denying Thurgood’s Rule 60(b) motion to vacate the contempt order.
- The court concluded the contempt order was invalid because it coerced compliance with a visitation requirement that did not properly respect the fit-parent presumption and the parent’s constitutionally protected authority over visitation.
- The purge condition requiring every-other-weekend visitation was improper where earlier orders framed grandparent visitation as subject to the father’s approval and where the parent’s rights had not been found unfit or otherwise rebutted.

## Legal Principles

- A fit parent has a constitutionally protected liberty interest in the care, custody, and control of the child, and the parent’s visitation decisions are presumed to be in the child’s best interests.
- When ordering third-party (including grandparent) visitation over a fit parent’s position, a court must give special weight to the parent’s decision-making and may not simply substitute its judgment without adequate justification consistent with constitutional limits.
- Contempt sanctions, including incarceration and coercive purge conditions, cannot be used to enforce visitation obligations that exceed what may lawfully be imposed consistent with the fit parent’s rights.
- Denial of Rule 60(b) relief from a contempt order is reversible when the contempt rests on an enforcement scheme inconsistent with governing constitutional protections for a fit parent.

## Conclusion

The court reversed the denial of Rule 60(b) relief because the contempt order’s jail sentence and purge condition impermissibly coerced a fit, surviving parent into a grandparent-visitation schedule that failed to give required deference to the parent’s decisions and authority over visitation.


Matter of S.T.T., 83 P.3d 398 (Utah Ct. App. 2003)