Marriage of Danks: PRE Fees Explained. As we have emphasized at various points in the past on our blog, the principle which underlies all custody-related determinations in the State of Colorado is the “best interests” of the children. This is also the case for other jurisdictions throughout this nation. Of course, courts look at all sorts of specific information along the way to create a well grounded opinion, and there are other principles which guide court analyses; but, in the end, custody is ultimately based on what is truly the best for the children themselves.
In some instances, courts will take account of reports written by parental responsibility evaluators (PREs) when making these custody determinations. PREs are used to conduct independent investigations of parent-child relationships; the results of these investigations are then turned into a report, and then that report is submitted to the court and used as a valuable resource to aid the court’s decision making process. Unsurprisingly, fees for PREs can rapidly become quite high, and so there is always an issue as to who bears the financial costs for producing these reports.
In the case of Marriage of Danks (2025), the court ultimately determined that these costs should be divided equally between both parents. Let’s go over this case in detail.
Facts of the Case
In 2018, the mother and father obtained a formal dissolution of their marriage, and the court developed an order which divided parental responsibilities between the two parents. After this order in 2018, the mother relocated to the State of Oregon. This relocation clearly had an impact on the parental responsibilities of both parents. Later, in 2022, both parties filed competing motions to formally modify parental responsibilities. The court set an evidentiary hearing in August, 2022.
Prior to this evidentiary hearing in August, the father filed another motion; this motion requested the appointment of a parental responsibility evaluator. The father claimed that such an appointment was necessary, as a PRE had the ability to take an objective view of the situation and better serve the best interests of the children. The court concurred, and ultimately a PRE was appointed. Initially, the court held that only the father was liable for the PRE’s fee, but also stated that such liability could be reassessed at a later time.
The PRE’s appointment was marked by several issues. For one, at one point prior to the completion of the PRE report, the appointed PRE faced disciplinary actions and was temporarily suspended from the statewide PRE eligibility roster. Furthermore, the mother also objected to the particular PRE who was appointed and attempted to have his appointment blocked. There were other issues as well, and the PRE report wasn’t completed by the evidentiary hearing held in August. Still, the court overruled the mother’s objections and ordered the PRE to finish the report. Eventually, the PRE completed his report and submitted a 51 page document to the court for review.
The total fee for the PRE report was $18,450. The court ordered that half of this fee, or $9,225, should be paid by the mother. The mother then appealed.
Ruling & Discussion
When the court divided the PRE’s fee equally between the mother and father, the court essentially stated that this equal division was fair because the PRE report was in the best interests of the children. Even though the mother tried to quarrel with the PRE’s appointment on various grounds, and gave conflicting testimony on the usefulness of the report, the court determined that the report benefitted both parties, and therefore equal division of the fees was reasonable. The mother faced an uphill struggle in overturning this determination on appeal.
The mother tried to argue that the fee division should be overturned because the trial court abused its discretion, and because the division was barred by the doctrine of res judicata (or “claim preclusion”). The mother failed on both of these arguments.
Readers should, at a minimum, takeaway the following lessons from this case: when necessary, Colorado courts may appoint a parental responsibility evaluator to help identify the children’s best interests. And, when this happens, these fees can quickly become steep, and ordinarily these fees will be shared between the parties, unless there is a really compelling reason to rule otherwise.
Contact the Drake Law Firm for Additional Resources
If readers want to know more about about parental responsibility evaluators (PREs), custody issues in general, or any other aspect of family law in Colorado, contact one of the family law attorneys at the Drake Law Firm today by calling 720-797-6790.