USA – INDIANA Law and Practice Contributed by: Drew Soshnick, Faegre Drinker Biddle & Reath, LLP
The Indiana Supreme Court has established the Indiana Parenting Time Guidelines, which – in the absence of extreme circumstances – serve as a guide for the minimum amount of time a non-custodial parent will have with children. There are age gradations suggesting different frequency and duration for a parent’s contact with children depending on the children’s ages. There is also a detailed suggested schedule for holidays and extended parenting time, as well as consideration of distance between parents as a factor. Child Support The Indiana Supreme Court has adopted the Indiana Child Support Rules and Guidelines that presumptively govern child support, which were dramatically modified effective 1 January 2024, to account for cost-of-living changes and eliminate the complex method of allocating unin - sured healthcare expenses. There is an underly - ing formula that adopts an income shares model, uses gross income, and applies a 21.88% tax factor. There are additional references as to how to address other expenses, such as health - care, extracurricular activities, and educational expenses. If courts deviate from the presump - tive child support amount, they must explain and offer reasons for the deviation. Indiana Code Section 31-16-6-1 provides a non-exhaustive list of factors to be considered for child support payments, but the guidelines calculation usu - ally controls the amount. The duty to support children ends at age 19 unless a child is ear - lier emancipated or is incapacitated (see Indi - ana Code Section 31-16-6-6). College expense orders can continue past age 19 for the dura - tion of an undergraduate degree. Child support orders are modifiable upon showing:
• changed circumstances so substantial and continuing as to make the terms of the exist - ing child support order unreasonable; or • that a party has been ordered to pay an amount in child support that differs by more than 20% from the Indiana Child Support Guidelines’ calculation. Parties may make agreements outside of court for child support and to cover certain children’s expenses, but they are informal arrangements and not enforceable in the event of disputes. The most common approach is for courts to make formal child support orders. Any person entitled to receive child support pay - ments may commence a child support action (see Indiana Code Section 31-16-2-1 et seq). 3.3 Other Matters Courts have the power to make an order that dictates the upbringing of children when par - ents have opposing views on specific issues (eg, schooling, medical treatment, religion and holidays), by naming one parent the sole legal custodian, or when there is a dispute between joint legal custodians. See Indiana Code Section 31-17-2-17. However, that does not mean the other parent must, for example, take the children to the sole legal custodian’s preferred house of worship on their parenting time. It means that the specification of how a child will be raised is in the sole province of the custodian. If joint legal custodians have a voluminous number of disputes, courts will eventually modify legal cus - tody so one parent makes the decisions after consulting with the other parent. Parental alienation is considered not indepen - dently or as a syndrome but, rather, as part of the assessment of a parent when courts con - duct the statutory analysis of a custody situa -
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