Paternity has to do with the legal determination of who a child’s father is.  Obviously, it should be clear who a child’s mother is, unless, of course, there is a surrogate mother situation.

In Utah, paternity of a child is presumed to be the husband of the mother if the mother is married. Usually there must be a showing that it is in the child’s best interest for someone to challenge a husband’s paternity of a child.

Paternity cases normally come about when an unmarried couple have a child together, they have split up, and either the mother is attempting to collect child support, the father is attempting to exercise visitation, or the mother is attempting to inhibit the father from exercising visitation. Normally, once a Petition for Paternity is filed in a court, if the paternity is disputed, a paternity test must be administered. Usually, the party asserting paternity will pay the initial costs for the paternity test.

Please reply with any questions or comments you have with regards to this information.