Several families have reached out to the Hays Free Press/ News-Dispatch in regards to what they believe are concerning experiences in Judge Karl Hays’ family law court. The following is part two of a four part series discussing assertions against Judge Hays and the alleged failure to consider the best interest of the child(ren) involved in cases in his courtroom.
Note: The name of the mother has been changed at her request for privacy reasons.
SAN MARCOS — After surviving 19 years of domestic abuse, Destiny thought the hard part was over, but her fight continued in the courtroom of Hays County Family Law Court Judge Karl Hays, following her filing for divorce in December 2020.
Judge Hays was appointed in May 2019 by unanimous approval of several district judges, as Texas Family Code Section 201.001 (d) states that “if an associate judge serves more than one court, the associate judge’s appointment must be made with the unanimous approval of all the judges under whom the associate judge serves.”
Prior to his appointment, Judge Hays was a practicing attorney and completed his law degree at St. Mary’s University School of Law.
Though Destiny was aware of emotional and mental abuse toward her children — an 8-year-old boy and an 11-year-old girl at the time — she stated that until Child Protective Services (CPS) interviewed them, she was unaware that they were also being physically abused for at least a year.
In the first months following the divorce filing, she noted that her ex-husband went almost no-contact with the children; though CPS allowed contact through phone calls, he chose not to. It was after this that Destiny recalls her ex-husband breaking into their hotel room, violating a restraining order that was granted in January 2021.
“Judge Hays was like, ‘[Sir], that’s a felony offense and I can put you in jail. So, if this happens again, I’m going to put you in jail.’ No, you don’t give somebody a second chance on that, right? If there’s a restraining order, you act on that,” emphasized Destiny.
Then, according to an electronic docket entry, on March 5, 2021, the father was given supervised visitation from 4:15-7 p.m. on Wednesdays and from noon to 6 p.m. on either Saturday or Sunday, but this schedule was quickly amended, she said.
Despite the mother stating that CPS testified in March or April 2021 that her children have “100%” witnessed domestic violence and experienced child abuse from their father, “Judge Hays flat out says that ‘Kids need to have dads.’ So, he just overlooks all that. Kids need to have safe dads. They don’t need to have abusive dads,” said Destiny.
Thus began the 50/50 custody split that would carry on for another three-and-a-half years for her son and approximately two days, according to Destiny, for her daughter.
This was against the recommendation, she continued, of the guardian ad litem (GAL) — an individual appointed by the court to advocate in the best interest of a child — that was assigned at court.
Because of her experience, Destiny alleged that “This is how women and children end up dead — I’m going to be very honest — because of people like him … This keeps going and going and going. [He] goes against what CPS says; [he goes] against what the guardian ad litem says.”
At the beginning of the new custody arrangement, the father lived with a roommate, the mother said, who attempted to get into bed with her 12-year-old daughter. Her daughter testified that nothing sexual happened, but she did tell the man that she felt extremely uncomfortable, resulting in the man yelling expletives at the child, recalled the mother.
“Her messages to me on Snapchat, which I screenshotted and sent to her pediatrician, said that if she has to keep going back to [her father’s house], she will kill herself. Prior to that, I didn’t know that she ever felt like that,” Destiny explained.
Since then, her daughter has been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, which has been attributed to her past experiences, and sees a therapist weekly.
One of these instances, according to court documents, was waking up to see her father holding a gun to Destiny’s head.
In a motion to compel filed Feb. 10, 2023, it was revealed that in February 2019, Destiny’s ex-husband “imagined that I was sleeping with the building supervisor who built our house. I was done arguing with him about it — he was completely irrational — so I went into our daughter’s room to sleep. I woke up a couple hours later with a gun pointed to my head. My daughter woke up, as well, and she started crying. [He] and I argued for a while until he told me that he had [the man’s] address and was going to go there to kill him.”
There have been other occurrences of abuse that her daughter saw and experienced, as well, said Destiny, and because she was older at the time, the memories are clear in her mind: “She saw what has happened and so, she was very vocal to [him] … He tries to brainwash people into thinking things, [but my daughter] is like, ‘No. That’s not what happened. This is what happened.’ He started getting real pissy about it and treating her like [trash].”
After her daughter’s experience with her father’s roommate and insistence that her recollections are accurate, Destiny noted that the then-12-year-old child has not visited her father again.
The experience was opposite for her son, explained the mother, as he was spoiled, doing essentially whatever he wanted at his father’s house.
“[My son] returns out of sorts, defiant and he usually echoes demands from his father — e.g., ‘You need to buy me XYZ because dad pays you child support.’ It usually takes several days for him to regain equilibrium.”
She stated that he previously requested to live with his father because when he is there, he doesn’t have to brush his teeth, he stays up as late as he wants, eats fast food everyday and doesn’t have to go to school.
The latter became a bigger issue when the child had 63 absences in his sixth grade year, recalled the mother.
When Destiny was notified of the absences, she stated that she requested an emergency hearing for a modification of custody in April 2024 from Judge Hays, which was delayed to June 2024, as the father had no attorney, but alleged he intended to retain one. This same day, according to an electronic docket entry, Judge Hays stated that the court “would not entertain a continuance of this case.” Despite this, a motion for continuance was granted and the father was issued an amended temporary restraining order and order to appear, which prevented him from withdrawing the child from school, arriving late or keeping him out of school.
“[I told Judge Hays], ‘I don’t understand why there would be a continuance when you specifically said there would be no continuance’ and he literally just went pale as a ghost,” said Destiny.
After this restraining order, she stated that her son was no longer late to school, which she said proves that the father could successfully bring him to school, but just chose not to previously: “That’s not the way Judge Hays [thinks]. He doesn’t enforce child support. He doesn’t enforce anything. He says a bunch of bullshit and then, he does whatever he wants.”
She stated that she and her family have put more than $70,000 into the court case, due to the judge’s constant delays, which not only include resetting court appearances, but also “reciting pieces of law and then, he brings up his own personal divorce almost each time in court.”
Destiny recounted one example when her son was required to take medicine and when his father couldn’t remember to pack it, Hays would state, “When my kids go with my ex-wife, she packs the meds.”
She stood firm that “You should never bring in your own [experience]. You have no idea what I went through and I don’t know what you went through. Maybe you and your ex-wife are amicable, that’s different.”
Due to experiences like this, she has attempted to move to other courts, but each time, she is told that Hays is her only option. More than a year later, the emergency hearing has still not been heard.
At the beginning of the 2024-25 school year, she and the children’s father made the decision for her to keep the boy during the week, while the father had him on the weekend — her daughter no longer visits — but this, again, changed, as the father later requested only the first, third and fifth weekends.
The change in her son has been unrivaled, explained Destiny: “It’s a huge 180 in [him] and even his grades, his personality, like, he’s a completely different kid now that he’s in a stable environment.”
Although the two have agreed on the current custody situation, it is not official in the court documents, she explained, but she is not pushing to go back to court as she “wouldn’t be shocked [if Judge Hays enforced the 50/50 agenda] because nothing shocks me that Judge Hays does.” Destiny said that despite teachers and family acknowledging that her son is doing better, she feels that the judge would go against what is best for her son and instead insist that he go back to week on and week off with his father.
“Nobody cares about these kids; they don’t. At the end of the day, they go home to their families and they don’t think twice about it. These are people’s real lives and real families and charging people this much money and dragging things out like that is ridiculous,” Destiny stressed.
“My perfect solution would be that Judge Hays, first of all, is not a judge there anymore, but if he was, my perfect solution would be that he would enforce the things that he sets in place; he follows through with his word … and he [determines what’s right] case by case,” Destiny concluded.
Neither Judge Hays, nor the court administrator, responded to requests for comment.
To read part one, visit bit.ly/4mZfx1U.
