ARTICLES

Parental Sexual Misconduct and Visitation

When making or modifying custody awards, Illinois courts sometimes consider a parent’s “sexual misconduct” (homosexuality, living with a lover, adultery, etc.). The standard used by Illinois courts in making or modifying custody determinations is the “best interest of the child”¹ and, in particular, whether the complained-of conduct has, or may, negatively affect the child.²

When making or modifying visitation awards, however, Illinois courts are held to a much higher standard.³ Allegations that a father had “sexual propensities” with “younger females” were insufficient to warrant a restriction of visitation where there was no evidence of contemporaneous endangerment of the daughter.⁴ Likewise, where a nine-year-old boy told the judge that when he visited his mother (the father had custody) he slept in one bedroom and his mother and her live-in lesbian partner slept in another bedroom, the father’s request to restrict visitation was denied.⁵ The court noted “it is irrelevant that that the [the mother] lives with her lesbian lover. What is relevant is whether [the boy] is adversely affected by that cohabitation.”⁶

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