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Brine v. Shipp

The superior court lacked subject matter jurisdiction to terminate the husband/legal father's rights in the legitimation proceeding that the biological father/intervenor brought as part of this divorce action.

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This divorce action involves the termination of the parental rights of the husband, who was the child’s legal father for 13 years. The husband is appealing the superior court’s order severing his rights as legal father and granting the biological father’s petition to legitimate. Because we conclude that the superior court did not have subject matter jurisdiction to terminate the legal father’s parental rights, we reverse.

Gwendolyn Brine and William Robert Brine were married in August 1997, just weeks after a relationship between Gwendolyn and Brian Shipp ended. When Shipp found out in the spring of 1998 that Gwendolyn was pregnant, he asked her whether he was the father and she said no. The child was born in May 1998, and Brine was listed on the birth certificate as the father. Approximately 18 months later, Shipp again saw Gwendolyn and asked whether he could be the father. She said that she was married and the child was not his. For the next ten years, Shipp made no more inquiries and took no further action concerning the child’s paternity. He saw the child occasionally as a family friend, but did not attempt to develop a father-son relationship or provide any substantial financial or emotional support. In August 2010, a year after William filed for divorce, Gwendolyn informed Shipp that she thought he was the child’s biological father; subsequent DNA testing confirmed that fact.

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