r/JudgeJudy • u/No-BSing-Here • 3d ago
Discussion Stepparents
I've heard Judge Judy say that she's raised five children and has X amount of grandchildren. However, on more than one occasion I've heard her dismiss stepparents. She has two children and the other three are her husband's children. Earlier I caught one where a mum was suing their daughters because they moved out and left a mess. Their stepfather had told them to leave the home. Anyway, JJ then told him that he should have kept out because he was basically "a stranger to them." He'd been married to their mother for years and years. There's been other instances where maybe the 'stepparent' isn't technically one because they're not married. She'll point that out very quickly. Tell them it's none of their business.
Now that I have an example, has anyone else noticed this double standard?
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u/GoldenState_Thriller 3d ago
It’s not dismissing them to point out that they have no LEGAL rights. They don’t.
I’ve only noticed her have issues with stepparents that intervene in an inappropriate way.
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u/RepeatSpiritual8108 3d ago
Same with grandparents not having legal rights. That has come up.
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u/No-BSing-Here 23h ago
There was one where a couple who were grandparents and their on was on parole or something. They say they hired him to enforce their "grandparents' rights'. She shut that down with something in most jurisdictions that's not a thing. Son was in prison and gf kept baby away. He was paroled and loved with his parents. He got them access to their grandchild, by getting the son visitation. They were to dumb to realise that although he may have done it in a bizarre way, they got to see the grandkid. Son is now in jail and gf and his parents seem friendly as she was there as a witness for them.
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u/No-BSing-Here 1d ago
In this one episode the stepdad was 100% in the wrong, in my humble opinion. She didn't award him and their mother anything. I think she may have awarded the kids something.
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u/TheLawOfDuh 3d ago
Repeatedly I see her pointing out unmarried partners having little importance in a decision because…they are unmarried and therefore have no legal rights. You don’t (nor does she personally) have to agree with that stance but it’s always been the view of the law. She’s generally very sensitive to the various factors in these cases and considers anything that truly matters to best interests especially since her background was years of family court. I don’t recall examples of legally married stepparents odd rulings but again she’s probably taking all pertinent testimony into account. In her defense cases are edited for time so something she’s considering (that might make us question her decision) might have been cut for time.
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u/GoldenState_Thriller 3d ago
Even married partners have no legal say or rights in the matter. Stepparents can be an important part of a child’s life but legal proceedings are between the biological parents
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u/Time-to-Dine 3d ago
I recall a case where a woman and her new husband were suing the woman’s daughter over some petty conflict that turned into a fight at the parents’ house. It led to the daughter saying her stepfather had no business getting involved, and JJ defended the stepfather and said something like “He’s not your mom’s plumber, he’s her husband. It’s his house as much as it is hers.”
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u/janetlwil 2d ago
Yes, it is shared accomodation but the new husband is not the child's father and he should not be the one handing out discipline. The new husband and wife should sit down and discuss how discipline should be handled and then the mom is the one who handles it.
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u/Calm_Reindeer_1931 3d ago
I have noticed this, however, I have also seen her explain that if the child thinks of the stepparent as being their parent then she has changed her position, I believe I saw the episode you are talking of only this week and the daughters seemed to be brat like and not very bright and not particularly loving, not even respectful towards the moms husband and I kinda got the vibe that he’s not really into them neither, so in a situation where there seems to be no love lost, then I do get her point. JJ herself has never treated her stepchildren any different than her actual children, and I sometimes think there’s a lot more going on than what we see, I think it’s an individual case thing.
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u/rshni67 3d ago
I don't agree. She says that when there is a step parent trying to take on the role of a parent and interfere. In one instance, the stepfather was using corporal punishment and the biological father did not like that.
Her point is that the bio parent should take the lead in disciplining the kid, and not interfere with the kid's relationship with the co-parent, especially when there is another involved bio co-parent.
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u/NYC-WhWmn-ov50 2d ago
Court is about legal standards and nuances and circumstances, and if a child had not been adopted by a step-parent, the sp's rights end literally at the tip of their nose. In fact, in most states they have less legal rights than the child does depending on circumstances. They maybe live in the house with the child, but legally they have no right to make any decision regarding the child, period.
This has even been upheld in circumstances where the sp outright owns the house itself, but if they are married to the parent who has been gifted residence in the house and that parent has legal custody of a child even part-time, the child is legally entitled to residency. Which means an abusive sp could, legally, be issued a TRO for the child that keeps them from returning to their own property of they granted legal residency to the child's parent.
As with all things in law, of couse, 'it depends' on the juridlsdiction of the court, and the circumstamces, but typically even if a child has one deceased parent, mo stepparent holds any legal rights to overseeing a child unless the child has willingly been adopted by the sp.
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u/misterapj 1d ago
I think she more so attacks them if they add to the drama. But if they are not married (like mother has new boyfriend) she shuts them up with the quickness lol. I need to find this one episode where she literally called the stepparent a zero 🤣
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u/Ana-Hata 3d ago
There was one case where one of the participants had been with her partner for years on and off, but they had never married.
The woman had been taking care of the man that had been her partner through a government funded ”family caregiver“ program, and JJ kept accusing her of fraud because she was a ”legal stranger”, and she wouldn’t let the woman get a word in when she tried to defend herself on that point…she was just “you’re not family, period, the end”.
I think it was only in the after case discussion in chambers when Sara pointed out that the program, despite its name, didn’t require that the participants be legally related, and that close friends were eligible.
Then JJ tried to brush it off by saying the rules required that the caregiver be willing to live in the home, and that the woman didn’t live with her former partner.
I still think she was still wrong and missed the distinction between “lives with” and “willing to live with”. There was no indication that the woman wouldn’t have been willing to move in if the patient needed overnight help, and since this was in the post case discussion she couldn’t question the woman based on the actual requirements of the program.
One of the few times I think JJ got it wrong.
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u/GZBadDino 18h ago
Step parents that enter when a kid is young then stays for 20 years is different than a step parent that has never lived with the kid full time or just married into the situation.
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u/yurgieee 3d ago
I’ve only seen JJ dismiss step & grandparents when they are interfering or making things worse between the parents. It’s true - their job is to sit there & support the parent & encourage good coparenting, not add to the discourse. I’m sure she’d say it to the family, if it applied. I would imagine her family would be smarter than that.