DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF FLORIDA FOURTH DISTRICT CONNOR PERKINS, Appellant, v. TRENEKA SIMMONDS, Appellee. No. 4D16-3502 [October 4, 2017] Appeal from the Circuit Court for the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit, Broward County; Arthur M. Birken, Judge; L.T. Case No. 15-10975 (35). Nancy A. Hass of Nancy A. Hass, P.A., Hollywood, for appellant. Victor H. Waite of Law Office of Victor H. Waite, P.A., Hollywood, for appellee. BUCHANAN, LAURIE E., Associate Judge. Appellant, Connor Perkins, the biological father of C.P. (“the Child”), appeals the trial court’s order dismissing his Petition to Establish Paternity with prejudice on the grounds that the Child was born into an intact marriage of the mother to another man. Appellant argues that the court erred in finding that he lacked standing to bring the petition based on the facts of the case. Alternatively, he asserts that section 742.011 of the Florida Statutes (2015) violates the constitutional guarantee to equal protection. We decline to address Appellant’s equal protection argument at this juncture, but find merit to his standing argument. Therefore, we reverse and remand for further proceedings as outlined below. In February of 2013, Appellee, Treneka Simmonds (“the Mother”), gave birth to the Child. The Mother declined to provide paternal information on the Child’s birth certificate, but the Child was given Appellant’s last name. DNA tests confirm that Appellant is the Child’s biological father. In September of 2015, Appellant filed a Petition to Establish Paternity, Child Support and for Other Relief. The Mother moved to dismiss Appellant’s petition, alleging that Appellant did not have standing to pursue paternity because the Mother was married to Appellee, Shaquan Ferguson (“Husband”), before she gave birth to the Child and the marriage remained intact. Appellant responded that he was not aware that the Mother was married. The court conducted an evidentiary hearing on the Mother’s motion to dismiss wherein the Mother, Husband, and Appellant testified. Briefly stated, Appellant testified that he was a fixture in the Child’s life from birth on. The Mother, in turn, testified that Appellant was an absentee father and her Husband testified that he raised the Child as his own. Considering the evidence presented at the hearing, the court issued an order wherein it found the Mother’s testimony “generally not credible.” The court also rejected the testimony of Husband, noting that the Mother and Husband lived in different states. The court gave credence to Appellant’s testimony, finding that Appellant was at the hospital when the Child was born and raised the Child with the Mother. Specifically, the court found that Appellant took the Child to doctor’s appointments, enrolled the Child in daycare, voluntarily paid child support, and that the Child calls Appellant “daddy.” The court also found that Appellant had no idea that there was an intact marriage when the Child was born as the Mother told Appellant she married for immigration purposes and was getting a divorce. Despite the foregoing findings, the Court concluded: The facts strongly favor the [Appellant] having some involvement in ...
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