My nephew has arrearage in child support for his 2 children which initially started while he was encarcerated with no means to earn an income. Unfortunately his father, a TX lawyer at the time, never filed to have support reduced and it accrued according to his potential income at min. wage at 40 hrs./wk. Now he has approx. $20,000.00 in back support (almost 1/2 of which is interest at 6%/yr) and has a court date tomorrow on his birthday. He cannot pay this money, and his mother helped him pay over $3,000.00 a couple of years ago and his wages were garnished when he lived with his father in NH, but dad's new wife kicked him out and now he's back in TX. His driver's license was suspended for 4 yrs in NH and now his mom has kicked him out, and is wearing out his welcome at his grandmother's house. He cannot drive and has had odd jobs but not much to amount to anything. He cannot find anyone to take him to work and of course, uses that as an excuse because he's sick and tired and angry and feeling hopeless. He wants to run from this court date tomorrow, but I will try to coax him there. He was sent a letter from the attorney general about voluntarily terminating his parental rights.... but will that get him off the hook for the arrearage or just from having that amount grow larger? Will the courts accept this voluntary relinquishment without an adoptive parent in the background? How will this affect his mother's already establishe grandparents' rights? Please advise.... Where should he go to get help? Is there any hope?

I don'tt know what to say. Maybe his mother is willing to take the kids full-time or the mother is married and her husband is willing to adopt. He needs to ask the state if terminating parental rights will let him off the hook for the arrearage. This is a unique situation, so you need to go talk to someone local, a local attorney. Without knowing the reason that the termination of parental rights offer was made, it is hard to know if the arrearage can be negotiated away.