Kirton McConkie adoption attorneys bring contentious adoption case to a successful close

Kirton McConkie adoption attorneys Larry Jenkins and Lance Rich brought a contentious adoption case to a successful close. The Utah Supreme Court upheld a district court’s denial of a motion by a putative father to intervene in an adoption proceeding. The district court had denied the motion on the ground that the putative father, Jake Strickland, had failed to strictly comply with statutory requirements in the Adoption Act for an unmarried putative father to preserve his parental right to contest an adoption. 

Strickland tried to excuse his failure because of representations made to him by the mother—specifically, that she would not place the child for adoption if Strickland agreed not to file a paternity action. The Supreme Court affirmed Strickland forfeited his parental rights based on a private bargain he struck with the mother (and not because of any unconstitutional or unlawful state action) and upheld the district court’s denial of Strickland’s motion to intervene.