With so many other pandemic-related anxieties and concerns currently filling New Yorkers' days, it is understandable that even the most diligent of family law practitioners may have only glanced at the V.G. v. Hanley decision, 2020 NY Slip Op 20277 (Richmond County Sup. Ct. 2020), rendered by the Richmond County Supreme Court last week. In that case, the court dismissed an Article 78 petition filed against the clerk of the New York Family Court, the governor, and the state, in which the petitioner, an aggrieved father, sought to compel the Richmond County Family Court to immediately accept new petitions from parents requesting court-ordered parenting time.

The father was permitted to file a writ of habeas corpus, but after the court received an ACS report indicating that the mother posed no risk to the children's safety and the mother produced the children, via videoconference, for the court, the court marked that writ satisfied, thereby providing the father with no further virtual court appearances and no remedy for his continued separation from his children.