The recent Supreme Court decision in Franklin v. Franklin, No. 602, 2014 (June 22, 2015), demonstrates the importance of providing the Court with the transcript of the proceeding below.

After a hearing in the Family Court, in which both parties testified, that Court entered an order modifying Mr. Franklin's visitation.  Under the modified order, the terms of Mr. Franklin's visitation changed slightly to alter exchange arrangements, but the total amount of his visitation time remained unchanged from the prior order.  The Family Court also noted that the testimony of both parties reflected their daughter's confusion about Mr. Franklin's gender transition and concluded it was their daughter's best interest that the parties' obtain counseling for her.  The Court also ordered the parties to participate in the counseling, but ordered that Mr. Franklin should bear the cost of the counseling.

Mr. Franklin appealed the Family Court's decision alleging, among other things, that the Family Court's decision was unlawfully discriminatory against him because he is a transgender individual.  He also asserted that the Family Court erred in denying him additional time with his daughter and in accepting certain testimony from Ms. Franklin. The Supreme Court noted, however, that:

[Mr. Franklin] challenges [Ms. Franklin's] credibility and faults the Family Court for accepting [her] testimony on certain issues.  Father also contends that the Family Court exhibited bias because of [Mr. Franklin's] gender transition. [Mr. Franklin] failed to provide this Court with a copy of the transcript of the Family Court in order to support those claims.  Without an adequate record, the Court has no sufficient basis to review [Mr. Franklin's] challenge to any of the Family Court's factual findings or credibility determinations. (emphasis added)

The Supreme Court found no error in the trial court's application of the law and found that "under the circumstances, we find no basis to disturb the Family Court's factual findings . . . Moreover, the allegations that the Family Court's decision reflects discrimination against [Mr. Franklin] as a transgender person is completely unsupported by the record." Id. at 7.

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