Nilaja Ford: The Voice of the Child in New Jersey Custody

New Jersey judges are now hearing from children directly in custody matters, and parents whose exes have spent years working on those children are alarmed. Nilaja Ford's counter is that the children were already in the middle of it. The revision changes who gets to hear them.

Nilaja Ford co-founded Ford Brown Law with her partner Donnett Brown. Both were prosecutors for the state of New Jersey, and both specialize in domestic violence alongside family law. Nilaja handled domestic violence contempt matters on the prosecution side before moving into an exclusively matrimonial, custody, and domestic violence practice, and she has been conducting child interviews since before the statute was revised to formalize them. She and her partner also run a free legal-services clinic at a women's resource center in Newark. Everything she describes here is New Jersey practice, though she notes much of it tracks other states moving the same way.

The conversation opens on hearsay, because it is where parents lose ground without understanding why. A letter from a therapist, a teacher, or a supportive friend generally cannot stand on its own at a hearing; the person who wrote it has to be available to be questioned. Nilaja walks through the exceptions she leans on, particularly business records like school attendance, and why expert reports come with the expectation that the expert can be asked how they reached their conclusions.

She then explains what the revision, nicknamed children in charge, actually does. New Jersey's best-interest standard and its 14 factors are unchanged. What is clarified is the mechanism: a recorded interview with the judge, under a protective order rather than something a parent can post, with questions submitted by both sides. Age affects how much weight a child's preference carries, not whether they are heard. And the question she puts on her own list is not who do you want to live with, it is what the ideal arrangement would look like, in specifics, because the specifics are what reveal what is really going on.

Nilaja and Lisa then work through the situations BTGO's clients live in. A parent asking for sole custody, and her first question, which is always why. Reporting abuse, and why the investigating body has to be the state agency rather than you. Cayden's Law, and what these changes are trying to prevent. A teenager who has already aligned with one parent, and Nilaja's uncomfortable point that acts and omissions count, that timing counts, and that a case arriving late arrives with a history already built. She also covers legal decision-making, stonewalling, and the 24-hour clause she has had written into orders so one parent cannot run out the clock on the other.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• What hearsay is, and why the letter from your child's therapist may not come in
• Which records do come in, and why school attendance is used so often
• What New Jersey's children-in-charge revision actually changed, and what it did not
• How a child interview is conducted, who submits the questions, and who can hear it
• How age affects the weight of a child's preference rather than their eligibility
• Why "I want sole custody" gets answered with a question, and what she is listening for
• Why the state agency, not you, has to be the one investigating an abuse allegation
• Acts, omissions, and timing: why a case brought late arrives with a history attached

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Nilaja's background: prosecutor, then family and domestic violence law
3:00 Hearsay, and why the therapist's letter will not come in
7:00 What the children-in-charge revision actually changed
9:00 How a child interview works, and who writes the questions
11:00 Age, weight, and New Jersey's fourteen best-interest factors
17:00 "I want sole custody." Her first question is why
19:00 Reporting abuse: the agency that investigates, and why it cannot be you
25:00 Teenagers who have already been turned against a parent
31:00 Getting to the whys behind what a child says
39:00 Legal decisions, stonewalling, and 24-hour clauses

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 Nilaja Ford at Ford Brown Law: https://www.fordbrownlaw.com/

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.