Charlene Edwards Law Office

Juvenile Law is governed by North Carolina General Statutes Chapter 7B which includes both juvenile delinquency and child abuse/neglect/dependancy cases. Charlene Edwards only handles matters involving child abuse/neglect/dependancy cases and termination of parental rights. She does so as either a Parent’s Attorney or as the Guardian Ad Litem Attorney Advocate representing the children who have been alleged to have been abused, neglected or dependant.

The ideal goal of most juvenile cases involving a county’s Child Protective Services Division of the local Department of Social Services is the reunification of a family. As a parent’s attorney, the CELO team may be working to help parents fix the situations that led to the children being placed into foster care or some other out of home placement. As the Attorney Advocate, she is the voice of the child. Regardless of the role, the best interests of the child or children is the paramount concern

Termination of Parental Rights is a drastic area of the law that is seen in two separate scenarios. The first usually involve the CPS cases in which the parents have not been successful in being reunified with their children and the court has determined that a different avenue such as an adoption must be pursued to give a child permanence. In these cases the Department of Social Services files to terminate a parents rights to their children in order to free the child up for adoption.

There are also private termination of parental rights cases that are filed. Usually these are filed by one parent or family member against the other parent or parents. These cases can come from the custody or CPS arenas. Charlene Edwards and her team are well versed in prosecution and defense of these cases.