FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF REVENUE BY AND ON BEHALF OF CIARA GAIL CORBITT, PETITIONER,
v.
KYLE PATRICK ALLETAG, RESPONDENT

Fla. 1st DCA | 2015-02-09
No. 1D14-3011
BENTON and SWANSON, JJ„ concur.
156 So. 3d 1110 Florida District Court of Appeal, First District (2015) Positive Treatment
Cited by 15 cases

AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.

Synopsis

The Florida Department of Revenue sought certiorari review of an order requiring paternity testing in a child support proceeding where the alleged father had previously signed the child's birth certificate and executed an affidavit of paternity. The court held that paternity testing cannot be ordered unless the father places paternity in controversy and establishes good cause, neither of which occurred here.


Holding

The court held that the order departs from established law because the father neither placed paternity in controversy nor established good cause for testing. Paternity is not placed in controversy by merely requesting a DNA test to be 'sure,' and good cause requires proof of fraud, duress, material mistake of fact, or newly discovered evidence—none of which the father alleged or proved.


Headnotes

[1] An order erroneously requiring paternity testing constitutes irreparable harm for purposes of certiorari review.

[2] A party is not entitled to an order requiring another party to submit to genetic testing unless paternity is placed in controversy and good cause exists for the testing.

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Key Quotes

“no party to any family law proceeding is entitled to an order requiring another party to submit to genetic testing unless (1) the proceedings place paternity 'in controversy' and (2) 'good cause' exists for the testing”

Establishes the controlling legal standard for paternity testing orders

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Facts & Procedural History

The DOR filed a petition for child support on behalf of the mother for a child whose father had previously signed the birth certificate and executed a…

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Opinion of the Court
WETHERELL, J.

WETHERELL, J.

The Florida Department of Revenue (DOR) petitions for a writ of certiorari to review an order directing the parties to submit to paternity testing in a proceeding to establish Respondent’s child support obligation. As we have done in a number of prior cases involving similar circumstances,1 we grant the petition and quash the challenged order.

Factual and Procedural Background

DOR filed a petition on behalf of Ciara Gail Corbitt (the mother) for an order *1112requiring Respondent (the father) to pay child support for K.M.A. (the child). The petition alleged that Respondent previously acknowledged that he was the father of the child by executing an affidavit of paternity. The father filed an answer to the petition in which he summarily “disagreed” with the allegations in the petition and requested “DNA testing” because he “must know [K.M.A.] is 100% [his] child.”

The petition was referred to a child support hearing officer, Leartice W. Walton. At the hearing on the petition, the father acknowledged that he signed the child’s birth certificate, but he asserted that he only did so because he “was the only male present” at hospital when the child was born. The father requested a “DNA report” and, over DOR’s objection, the hearing officer treated the father’s answer as a “petition to disestablish paternity”2 and entered a report recommending that paternity testing be ordered. The report did not include any factual findings; it merely stated that “[t]here is a factual basis for the entry of the proposed order” that was submitted by the hearing officer with her report.

The trial court entered the proposed “Order Granting Paternity Test” submitted by the hearing officer. The order directs the mother, the father, and the child to “appear at a laboratory convenient to the parties ... for the purpose of taking from them a blood or tissue sample or buccal swab for paternity testing.” DOR timely appealed the order to this court, but because the order was not a final order or a non-final order appealable under Florida Rule of Appellate Procedure 9.130, we treated the notice of appeal filed by DOR as having invoked our certiorari jurisdiction. See Fla. R. App. P. 9.040(c) (“If a party seeks an improper remedy the cause shall be treated as if the proper remedy had been sought....”).

Analysis

“To be entitled to certiorari relief, the petitioner must demonstrate [1] that the order under review departs from the essential requirements of the law and [2] that the order will cause irreparable harm that cannot be remedied via plenary appeal.” Lynch, 53 So.3d at 1156. We have repeatedly held that an order erroneously requiring paternity testing constitutes irreparable harm. Id. at 1155 n. 1 (citing cases). Accordingly, DOR’s entitlement to relief in this case turns on whether the trial court’s order departs from the essential requirements of law.

An order departs from the essential requirements of law when it violates a clearly established principle of law (including controlling case law) resulting in a miscarriage of justice. Id. at 1156. Here, the challenged order violates controlling case law holding that “no party to any family law proceeding is entitled to an order requiring another party to submit to genetic testing unless (1) the proceedings place paternity ‘in controversy’ and (2) ‘good cause’ exists for the testing,” id. at 1156-57 (quoting Travis, 971 So.2d at 162), because the record establishes that the *1113father did not place the child’s paternity in controversy or establish good cause for paternity testing.

The issue of paternity was not placed in controversy by the father because he did not assert in his answer or his testimony at the hearing that he was not the child’s biological father; indeed, he admitted at the hearing that he signed the child’s birth certificate as the child’s father. See Lynch, 53 So.3d at 1157 (explaining that paternity can be placed in controversy if the purported father “files documentation alleging that he is not the biological father or by asserting that he has not acknowledged his fatherhood in an affidavit”). The ground asserted by the father to support his request for paternity testing — to be 100% sure that he is the child’s biological father — was insufficient as a matter of law to place paternity in controversy. See Brown, 980 So.2d at 591-92 (finding that the father’s “preference” for a DNA test “[t]o be really sure” that he was the father did not place paternity in controversy).

Moreover, even if paternity had been placed in controversy, the father did not establish good cause for paternity testing. To establish good cause, the father must allege (and ultimately prove) that he signed the paternity affidavit on the birth certificate due to fraud, duress, or a material mistake of fact, § 742.10(4), Fla. Stat. (2014), or that there is newly discovered evidence of the paternity of the child, § 742.18(1). See Travis, 971 So.2d at 162 (“Absent any allegation or proof of fraud, duress, material mistake of fact, or newly discovered evidence, no good cause was shown to justify the hearing officer’s recommendation to require the mother and child to submit to DNA testing.”). The father’s assertion that he only signed the paternity affidavit because he “was the only male present” when the child was born and that he wanted to be “100% sure” that he was the child’s father is insufficient as a matter of law to establish good cause for paternity testing.

Conclusion

For the reasons stated above, we grant DOR’s petition for a writ of certiorari and quash the trial court’s order requiring the parties to submit to paternity testing.

PETITION GRANTED; ORDER QUASHED.

BENTON and SWANSON, JJ„ concur.


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Citator

Cited By

  • State v. Josiah M. Hartsell, 189 So. 3d 363 (Fla. 1st DCA 2016)
    …must demonstrate [1] [*365] that the order under review departs from the essential requirements of the law and [2] that the order will cause irreparable harm that cannot be remedied via plenary appeal.” Fla. Dep’t of Rev. ex rel. Corbitt v. Alletag, 156 So. 3d 1110, 1112 (Fla. 1st DCA 2015) (quoting Dep’t of Rev. ex rel. Carnley v. Lynch, 53 So. 3d 1154, 1156 (Fla. 1st DCA 2011)). “An order departs from the essential requirements of law when it violates a clearly established principle of law (including control…
  • Dep't OF Revenue v. Silva, 214 So. 3d 766 (Fla. 5th DCA 2017)
    …mily law proceeding is entitled to an order requiring another party to submit to genetic testing unless (1) the proceedings place paternity ‘in controversy" and (2) ‘good cause’ exists for the testing.” Fla. Dep’t of Rev. ex rel. Corbitt v. Alletag, 156 So. 3d 1110, 1112 (Fla. 1st DCA 2015) (quoting Lynch, 53 So. 3d at 1156-57). Here, the trial court made no finding of “good cause” in the challenged order nor was there any testimony or evidence presented that could have supported such a finding. Thus, if const…
  • Dep't OF Revenue v. M.J.M. and A.M.R., 217 So. 3d 1148 (Fla. 2d DCA 2017)
    …II C of the opinion. As the majority recognizes, M.J.M. had the burden of proving his entitlement to relief on his petition. See Dep’t of Revenue v. Hartsell, 189 So. 3d 363, 367 (Fla. 1st DCA 2016); Fla. Dep’t of Revenue ex rel. Corbitt v. Alletag, 156 So. 3d 1110, 1113 (Fla. 1st DCA 2015). In order to be entitled to relief on his petition, M.J.M. was required to establish, among other things, that he is current on all child support payments for the applicable child or that [he] has substantially complied wi…

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