Comino v. Kelley

In Comino v. Kelley (1994) 25 Cal.App.4th 678, mother Stephanie appealed from a judgment of paternity in favor of Comino, who was found to be the presumed father of her child. The Court of Appeal concluded that the trial court properly refused to apply the conclusive presumption of former Evidence Code section 621 to establish the paternity of Stephanie's husband Jeffrey. The marriage was a business relationship which allowed Jeffrey to receive a married man's military privileges, while Stephanie received medical insurance as a dependent and could share rent with Jeffrey. They did not have a sexual relationship, and each dated other people. During the marriage, Stephanie became sexually involved with Comino, and became pregnant. She told Comino he was the father of her child. She moved in with Comino a few weeks before the birth of the child. She named Comino as father on the child's birth certificate. (Id. at pp. 681-682.) Stephanie and Comino took the child into a home they shared and held him out as Comino's natural son for two and one-half years. But Stephanie later left Comino, moved in with Jeffrey, and told Comino for the first time that he might not be the biological father of the child. Comino brought an action to establish his parental relationship. In her answer, Stephanie argued that Jeffrey was the father of the child as a matter of law based on their marriage and cohabitation under former Evidence Code section 621, subdivision (a), which created a conclusive presumption that the issue of a wife cohabiting with her husband is a child of the marriage. The trial court adjudged Comino to be the father. The Court of Appeal found that none of the policies underlying the presumption of paternity were served by its application in Comino because there was no marriage or family unit to preserve. This was because the case involved a marriage of convenience, and the child had never lived in a family unit with Stephanie and Jeffrey. The trial court therefore was correct in declining to apply the presumption. (Comino, supra, 25 Cal.App.4th at pp. 684-685.) The Court refused to apply the conclusive presumption of former Evidence Code section 621 where the marriage at issue was merely a "business relationship" that did not involve sexual relations and the husband had not lived with the mother and child in a family unit. (Comino v. Kelley, supra, at p. 681.) Instead, as the court noted, the child had lived since birth with his biological father, whose name was listed on his birth certificate. (Id. at p. 682.) The court concluded that none of the policy considerations underlying the presumption would be served by its application since there was no marital union or family unit to preserve, the interest in providing a father for the minor would not be furthered by severing the child's relationship with the only father he had ever known, and the state's interest in support would be furthered by allowing the biological father to assume the responsibility he sought. (Id. at pp. 684-685.)