The latest round of the longstanding legal battle between Jeff Younger and his ex-wife Anne Georgulas over custody and the right to make medical decisions for their two young children played out before the Texas Supreme Court in late December.
As reported previously by The Dallas Express, the divorced couple has been engaged in a years-long custody battle over their children. While custody battles regularly play out in the Texas court system, central to this case was the fate of one of the children in particular.
Georgulas claims that their child is a transgender girl, referring to the child by the name “Luna” and providing the child with girls’ clothing.
Younger is adamant that the child is not transgender and has refused to participate in what he has referred to as “abuse.” He uses the child’s birth name, James, and dresses the child in boys’ clothing.
In late September 2022, Judge Mary Brown of the 301st Dallas Court ruled that Georgulas could move with the children anywhere in the United States without informing Younger of the location.
The judge also gave the woman the freedom to change her and the children’s legal names and travel internationally without Younger’s consent.
Even though an earlier ruling by Brown expressly prohibited Georgulas from treating the children with “hormonal suppression therapy, puberty blockers, and/or transgender reassignment surgery” without Younger’s consent, the father feared what may happen in another state’s jurisdiction if they moved.
After the ruling was handed down, Younger told The Dallas Express that now his ex-wife “will finally be able to legally castrate my son.”
Georgulas has since moved the children to California. In that state, a new law, SB 107, went into effect on January 1, 2023, that expressly allows for the transitioning of children leaving states such as Texas, where there are more legal obstacles to such medical procedures.
California State Senator Scott Wiener (D), the law’s primary author, touted the legislation in a press release as providing “refuge for trans kids and their families.”
“SB 107 will protect trans kids and their families if they flee to California from Alabama, Texas, Idaho, or any other state criminalizing the parents of trans kids for allowing them to receive gender-affirming care,” Wiener wrote.
“If these parents and their kids come to California, the legislation will help protect them from having their kids taken away from them or from being criminally prosecuted for supporting their trans kids’ access to healthcare,” he concluded.
In light of this new law coming into effect at the beginning of the new year, Younger petitioned the Texas Supreme Court to force the return of Georgulas and their children to Texas.
However, on December 30, the highest civil court in Texas rejected the petition, effectively ending the legal battle.
After his petition was rejected, Younger tweeted, “The Supreme Court of Texas denied my mandamus, effectively terminating my parental rights. My children are now subject to being chemically castrated in California. Texas is an empire of child abuse, led by Texas judges.”
The content of the ruling paints a more complicated picture.
In a concurring opinion, Justice Blacklock, who was joined by Justice Young, admonished Younger for the late filing on the eve of the California law taking effect.
“Three months after the district court authorized the move to California, Father belatedly seeks an emergency order from this Court requiring their return,” Blacklock wrote.
Blacklock went on to say that he concurred with the high court’s denial of Younger’s petition because of the earlier court order prohibiting Georgulas from transitioning their child without Younger’s consent.
“This agreed order is binding on both parents and enforceable by contempt, no matter where they reside,” Blacklock wrote.
The justice went on to say that Georgulas “freely acknowledges that she is bound by this order in both Texas and California,” and she “has flatly denied to this Court that she will seek to evade the district court’s order while she is in California.”
Blacklock then addressed SB 107 and its implications directly, alleging that Younger “misreads California’s new law.”
Blacklock argued that, while the new law is designed to undermine another state’s legislative and regulatory law, the justice sees “no provision in the bill that would alter the enforceability, in California, of a Texas court order.”