Child custody; Proper cause or change of circumstances; Vodvarka v Grasmeyer; Established custodial environment (ECE); MCL 722.27(1)(c); Pierron v Pierron; Burden of proof; Kessler v Kessler; Best-interest factors; MCL 722.23; Rittershaus v Rittershaus; Child Custody Act (CCA)

The court held that the trial court erred by awarding plaintiff-mother sole legal custody without making the required findings on ECE, burden of proof, and the 12 best-interest factors, so the order was vacated and the matter remanded for a new evidentiary hearing. Plaintiff and defendant-father shared joint legal and physical custody under a consent judgment, but repeated disputes over “parental decision-making” including counseling and medical care, led to multiple motions and hearings, culminating in the trial court granting sole legal custody to plaintiff on the theory that “sole custody should be awarded if parents cannot agree on essential decisions.” On appeal, the court emphasized the CCA’s “specific procedural requirements and factual findings” and that MCL 722.27(1)(c) serves a “gatekeeping function” and “barrier against removal of a child from an” ECE. Although the panel could “adduce from the record” that the counseling dispute supplied “proper cause or change in circumstances” because medical decisions “are clearly important decisions affecting the welfare of the children” and implicated factor (c), it found error in the trial court’s wholesale omission of required custody findings. The trial court “did not rule on whether an [ECE] existed, and if so, with whom,” so it never determined “the appropriate burden of proof,” and despite referencing cooperation, it made “no findings on any of the 12 specific best-interest factors under MCL 722.23,” violating the requirement that courts “explicitly state” findings and conclusions for each factor. The panel held this failure affected the children’s substantial rights and “seriously affected the fairness and integrity of the proceedings,” requiring vacatur and remand for an evidentiary hearing to make explicit findings on custodial environment, apply the resulting burden of proof, and make best-interest findings using “up-to-date information.”