As family law attorneys, we’ve been paying close attention to the Clarksville case involving a young girl who was taken from her adoptive parents’ home and sent to Nebraska to live with her birth father. The story centers on Sonya Hodgins, age nine, and her father John McCaul.
For those of you who don’t follow family law cases, here are the basics: in 2006, John McCaul was sentenced to 15 years in prison for transporting firearms, which is a felony. Because Tennessee does not allow parents who spend more than 10 years in prison to retain their parental rights of children under the age of eight, his daughter, Sonya, was removed from the home and placed into the care of the Hodgins family, Kim and Dave. She was adopted in 2008.
But John McCaul made a deal that allowed him out of prison in seven and a half years, which means that he could petition to get his daughter back. He did, and the court overturned the adoption. He then took young Sonya to Nebraska, where he now lives. She remains in custody of the DCS, but she’s completing a trial home visit with her father.
The battle continues
John McCaul hasn’t spoken to the media since January, but in mid-May he made a statement to a local news station that Sonya is happy. He’s also begun a lawsuit against the Hodgins and 15 other people for defamation of character. His attorneys claim that the Hodgins and others have defamed him viciously, and that he has received death threats – all of which the Hodgins family vehemently denies. McCaul’s attorneys claim they have pages upon pages of defamatory content from online sources in evidence. The Hodgins claim that Sonya cries to come home to Tennessee whenever they speak with her.
As lawyers, we find the case fascinating; as people, we’re heartbroken for poor Sonya, whose life has been uprooted so many times. Legally, McCaul is in the right, though removing a child from the only home she’s ever known to place her into the custody of a man whose only tie is blood, and whose record involves felony arms trafficking, seems cruel and unjust. But we readily admit that we only know the details of the case from what’s available publicly, so we can’t speak to the case with any authority. We do wonder, however, what kind of precedent this may set for the future.
Karla C. Miller has devoted her entire career to the practice of family law in Tennessee. She attended Auburn University and Nashville School of Law, and upon graduation in 1996, she opened her own law firm and has been assisting families throughout Tennessee since then. Learn more about Karla C. Miller here.
