Background
After the parties divorced in 2013, their child lived primarily with John Richard Stevens, while Bethany Kay Stevens had limited parenting time. A 2020 amended plan provided a step-up schedule for mother. In 2024, a magistrate found that father had improperly regressed mother under that schedule, awarded her makeup time, and expanded her regular parenting time; the Court of Appeals later affirmed that order.
Mother then sought further modification, proposing a week-on/week-off schedule. A court-appointed child and family investigator reviewed records, conducted home visits and interviews, and recommended increasing mother’s time and providing mental-health support for both parents. The district court adopted the investigator’s analysis and entered a schedule giving mother five overnights every two weeks during the school year and alternating weeks during the summer.
The Court’s Holding
The Court of Appeals affirmed. It held it lacked jurisdiction to review father’s complaint that the magistrate made no findings after a June 2024 hearing about mother’s therapy because no written, signed final order resulted from that hearing. The issue was also moot because the later parenting-time order replaced the prior therapy requirements.
The court also upheld the denial of father’s motion to set aside the CFI report. Father cited no legal authority requiring replacement of the investigator, and his objections to the scope of the investigation and asserted factual errors concerned the report’s weight rather than its admissibility. The court found no reversible error in the district court’s consideration of the child’s stated wishes or in the CFI’s recommendations for mental-health support, which did not involve psychological testing. Father’s unpreserved judicial-bias claim likewise failed to show actual bias.
Key Takeaways
- An unwritten ruling is not a final, appealable order.
- Challenges to a CFI’s investigation and conclusions generally go to evidentiary weight and may be addressed through cross-examination.
- A CFI may recommend mental-health support while assessing best interests without acting as a psychologist or conducting psychological testing.
Why It Matters
The decision underscores the broad discretion Colorado trial courts hold in parenting-time modifications and the deference appellate courts give to supported best-interest findings. It also illustrates the importance of preserving procedural objections, supporting motions with legal authority, and obtaining a final written order before seeking appellate review.