Kyra’s Law is a New York statute that requires family courts to treat child safety as the central issue when deciding custody and visitation. It amends Domestic Relations Law § 240 and the Family Court Act to require registry checks before any custody order, broaden the evidence judges must weigh, shield parents who report abuse in good faith, and set training standards for judges and forensic evaluators. If you are in a New York custody case where safety is at stake, the rules a judge must now follow are meaningfully different from what they were before.
Why the Law Exists
The law is named for Kyra Franchetti, a young girl from Manhasset, Long Island, who was killed in 2016 while sleeping during a court-sanctioned visit with her father. Investigators determined the father shot Kyra and then killed himself. Kyra’s mother had raised concerns about the father’s behavior during custody proceedings, but unsupervised visits continued. The case exposed a gap in New York’s custody framework: judges were not required to investigate safety allegations through any structured process before issuing orders. Jacqueline Franchetti and other advocates spent years pushing for the change, and the legislation eventually passed as Assembly Bill A6194C.
Registry Checks Before Any Custody Order
Before issuing any custody or visitation order, whether permanent or temporary, the court must now review several databases: related decisions from child abuse and neglect proceedings, outstanding warrants under the Family Court Act, the statewide registry of orders of protection, and the sex offender registry.1New York State Senate. New York Family Court Act 651 – Jurisdiction Over Habeas Corpus Proceedings and Petitions for Custody and Visitation of Minors
For successive temporary orders, the review must be repeated unless one was already done in the prior ninety days. When a court issues a temporary emergency order, the registry review has to happen within twenty-four hours, or the next business day if court is not in session.1New York State Senate. New York Family Court Act 651 – Jurisdiction Over Habeas Corpus Proceedings and Petitions for Custody and Visitation of Minors
The point is to close an information gap. Under the earlier system, a parent could have an active order of protection from a different county or a sex offense conviction that never surfaced in the custody proceeding. Now the check happens before a child is placed, not after something goes wrong.
What Courts Must Consider and Put on the Record
When either parent alleges domestic violence in a sworn filing and proves it by a preponderance of the evidence, the court must consider how that violence affects the child’s best interests and explain on the record how those findings shaped the custody order. Where evidence of child abuse meets the same standard, the court cannot place the child with a parent who presents a substantial risk of harm, and again must state on the record how those findings factored into the arrangement.2New York State Senate. New York Domestic Relations Law 240 – Custody and Visitation
That on-the-record requirement is where much of the law’s practical force lives. A judge can no longer weigh safety concerns and issue an order without written explanation. The paper trail is reviewable, which matters both on appeal and if a placement later goes wrong.
The law also broadens what evidence counts. Courts must consider a party’s history of domestic violence or child abuse, police reports including domestic incident reports, and prior judicial findings related to violence or abuse. It names specific forms of harm that judges must evaluate: coercive control, stalking, violence during pregnancy, substance abuse that threatens child safety, and the nonconsensual sharing of intimate images.3New York State Assembly. Bill A6194C – Kyra’s Law
Coercive control matters because it often leaves no physical evidence. Patterns of isolation, financial manipulation, and surveillance can be invisible to outsiders but serious for the child living in the household. Listing coercive control by name prevents courts from dismissing these behaviors as ordinary relationship conflict. The written-findings requirement applies to temporary orders as well: the judge must explain what evidence was reviewed and how it shaped the conditions.2New York State Senate. New York Domestic Relations Law 240 – Custody and Visitation
Protection for Parents Who Report Abuse in Good Faith
One provision speaks directly to a problem that kept many protective parents quiet: the fear that raising safety concerns would be labeled parental alienation and used to strip custody. Under Kyra’s Law, if a parent makes a good-faith allegation, supported by a reasonable belief based on facts, that the child is a victim of abuse, neglect, or the effects of domestic violence, and acts lawfully to protect or seek treatment for the child, the court cannot take away or restrict that parent’s custody or visitation based solely on the allegation or the protective actions taken.2New York State Senate. New York Domestic Relations Law 240 – Custody and Visitation
The shield is not unlimited. The allegation has to be grounded in facts and made in good faith; fabrication is not covered. But calling child protective services or taking a child to the emergency room after seeing signs of abuse cannot, by itself, be turned into a reason to lose custody.
Training for Judges and Standards for Evaluators
Judges, referees, and hearing officers who preside over custody cases involving safety allegations must complete training developed by the Office of Court Administration, with supplemental training every two years.3New York State Assembly. Bill A6194C – Kyra’s Law
The training is meant to help judges recognize patterns that do not involve physical violence but still put children at risk. It also addresses a recurring courtroom problem: misreading a protective parent. A parent living under abuse may appear anxious, inconsistent, or uncooperative on the stand, and without training those behaviors can look like instability rather than what they often are.
Forensic custody evaluators carry heavy influence, because their reports frequently become the foundation for a judge’s decision about where a child lives. Only New York-licensed psychologists, psychiatrists, or social workers may conduct court-ordered forensic evaluations in custody and visitation cases. Each must complete a training program administered by the Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence and the New York State Coalition Against Domestic Violence, with continuing education every two years focused on the dynamics of domestic violence and child abuse.4Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence. Forensic Custody Evaluator (FCE) Certification
Reports from evaluators who fail to meet these standards can be given reduced weight or excluded from evidence. Methodology matters too: findings should be verified through multiple sources such as school records, medical documentation, and therapeutic notes, rather than resting on a single interview or unsupported impressions.
What Kyra’s Law Does Not Do
The law strengthens protections, but it does not create an automatic bar against custody for an abusive parent. New York still has no rebuttable presumption against awarding custody to a parent who has committed domestic violence. Some states use that approach, which shifts the burden onto the abusive parent to prove they should have custody. New York’s structure remains a case-by-case analysis, with domestic violence as a required factor and a prohibition on placing a child with a parent who presents a substantial risk of harm.2New York State Senate. New York Domestic Relations Law 240 – Custody and Visitation
The law also does not lower the cost of safety-focused custody litigation. Forensic evaluations, supervised visitation, and extended court proceedings remain expensive, and a parent raising legitimate concerns can still face a longer and costlier case if the other side contests them.
What This Means if You Are in a Custody Case
If you are involved in a New York custody case where safety is a concern, several things are different from what they would have been before. Judges must check protection order registries and the sex offender registry before signing any custody order, so history from other proceedings is far less likely to be missed. If you raise abuse allegations in a sworn filing and back them with evidence, the court has to address those allegations on the record and explain how the final order accounts for them.
You have a statutory shield when you report abuse in good faith. Taking your child to a doctor or contacting authorities because you genuinely believe the child has been harmed cannot, on its own, be used against you in the custody decision.2New York State Senate. New York Domestic Relations Law 240 – Custody and Visitation
Any court-ordered forensic evaluation must now be performed by a licensed and certified professional with specialized domestic violence training. If an evaluator lacks the required credentials or training, you and your attorney have grounds to challenge the weight of that report. Those are the specific levers Kyra’s Law gives you to hold the process to the safety-first standard the statute requires.