## Facts

- Lisa and Janet, long-term partners residing in Virginia, entered a Vermont civil union in December 2000.
- During the civil union, Lisa conceived a child via donor insemination with a donor chosen jointly by the couple; the child was born in April 2002.
- In August 2002, the parties and child moved to Vermont, lived there for over a year, and separated in September 2003; Lisa returned to Virginia with the child while Janet remained in Vermont.
- In November 2003, Lisa filed a Vermont civil-union dissolution action seeking dissolution, primary custody, and contact rights for Janet, describing the child as a child of the civil union.
- In June 2004, the Vermont family court issued a temporary order granting Lisa temporary legal and physical responsibility and granting Janet scheduled visitation and daily telephone contact.
- Lisa largely refused to comply with the Vermont visitation and phone-contact provisions; in September 2004, the Vermont court held Lisa in contempt for willful noncompliance.
- In July 2004, Lisa filed a Virginia parentage action seeking a declaration that she was the sole legal parent; the Vermont court reaffirmed its jurisdiction and ordered compliance with its temporary custody order.
- In October 2004, the Virginia court entered an order declaring Lisa the sole parent and stating Janet had no parentage or visitation rights.
- In November and December 2004, the Vermont family court ruled that both Lisa and Janet were parents under Vermont law and refused to give effect to the Virginia parentage order, finding Virginia lacked jurisdiction under the PKPA.
- Lisa pursued an interlocutory appeal challenging the Vermont visitation order, contempt finding, and the rulings recognizing Janet as a parent and rejecting the Virginia judgment.

## Issues

1. Whether the PKPA required Vermont to treat Vermont as having continuing, exclusive custody/visitation jurisdiction, thereby depriving Virginia of authority to enter a conflicting parentage/custody order and permitting Vermont to deny full faith and credit to that order.
2. Whether Vermont law treated a non-biological civil-union partner as a legal parent where the child was intentionally conceived and raised during the civil union.
3. Whether DOMA or state public-policy objections to same-sex unions altered the PKPA analysis or justified disregarding Vermont custody and visitation orders.

## Decision

- The Vermont Supreme Court affirmed the family court’s orders.
- Vermont was the child’s home state when the dissolution and custody matter began, and Vermont’s custody/visitation jurisdiction was continuing and exclusive under the PKPA.
- Virginia lacked PKPA-compliant jurisdiction to issue a conflicting order while the Vermont case was pending; Vermont properly refused to recognize the Virginia parentage order.
- Janet was a legal parent under Vermont law and therefore entitled to seek custody and visitation as a parent.
- DOMA did not displace or create an exception to the PKPA’s jurisdiction and full-faith-and-credit requirements for custody and visitation determinations.
- The contempt finding against Lisa for violating the Vermont visitation and contact order was upheld.

## Legal Principles

- Under the PKPA, once a state properly exercises home-state custody jurisdiction and issues a custody/visitation determination, that state retains exclusive, continuing jurisdiction so long as statutory conditions are met, and other states may not issue conflicting modifications while the first case remains pending.
- A custody-related judgment entered by another state without PKPA-compliant jurisdiction is not entitled to full faith and credit in the forum state.
- The PKPA’s jurisdictional rules apply to custody and visitation determinations without regard to the parties’ relationship form; the statute targets interstate forum shopping and relitigation of custody disputes.
- DOMA does not authorize states to bypass PKPA custody jurisdiction rules or to disregard otherwise controlling custody and visitation determinations because they arise from a same-sex relationship.
- Vermont law may recognize as a legal parent a non-biological civil-union partner where the child was intentionally conceived during the civil union and jointly parented, permitting custody and visitation to be decided under parent-based standards.
- A party may be held in contempt for willful noncompliance with valid custody/visitation orders; a later, conflicting out-of-state order does not excuse disobedience where the issuing court retained PKPA jurisdiction.

## Conclusion

The court held that Vermont, as the child’s home state and the first forum to exercise custody jurisdiction, retained exclusive PKPA authority over custody and visitation, so Vermont could deny effect to a conflicting Virginia parentage order; it also affirmed that the non-biological civil-union partner was a legal parent under Vermont law and upheld contempt sanctions for violating Vermont’s visitation order.


Miller-Jenkins v. Miller-Jenkins, 180 Vt. 441, 912 A.2d 951 (Vt. 2006)