When there are no documents confirming the relationship, the interested person can use an application to establish the fact of the relationship to the court. Going to court will help when documents are lost, not preserved, or erroneous entries are made in them. In most cases, it is necessary to establish family relationships with the deceased in order to formalize an inheritance. However, in some cases it is possible to establish this fact between living people.
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Grounds for establishing family relationships
Kinship refers to a connection between people based on descent from a common ancestor. Relationships can be established between brothers, with parents, children, uncles and aunts, grandparents and other relatives in the ascending and descending line. There are no restrictions in this case - everything depends only on the search for evidence of such a relationship.
It should be noted that it is impossible to establish family relationships with a wife (husband), stepsons and stepdaughters, stepmother and stepfather. Although relationships with these people can be very close, they are still not related. Because there is no fact of common descent from one ancestor.
To establish the fact of family relations through the court, it is necessary to determine the legally significant purpose of this legal fact. That is, what legal consequences will this circumstance have? For example, family relationships are established in order to receive an inheritance after the death of a relative. Or apply for a pension on the death of the breadwinner. It will not be possible to simply establish (for yourself) the fact of a family relationship through the court. A legally significant purpose is the main requirement for a statement to establish a fact of legal significance. And special production.
Another important condition for going to court is the inability to obtain the appropriate documents in another way, for example, through the registry office.
In some cases, there is no need to establish the fact of a family relationship through the court. It is enough to correct the typo in the documents issued by the civil registry office. Or establish paternity.
Note! |
Application for making corrections to a civil status record Application to establish the fact of recognition of paternity |
Out-of-court method of resolving the issue
Most often, the establishment of facts occurs in court. However, the law provides for one exception. If there are several applicants for assets and one of them cannot provide evidence of the relationships that are required to call for inheritance, then he can be included in the list of heirs with the consent of other participants (Article 72 of the Law on Notaries). But in practice, this happens infrequently - rarely does anyone want to give the inheritance share to a newly announced candidate.
How to draw up an application to establish the fact of a family relationship
Before drawing up an application to establish the fact of a relationship, it is necessary to obtain documents confirming the impossibility of establishing the fact of relationship in any other way.
To do this, appropriate applications are submitted to the registry office, archives and other bodies where the relevant documents can be stored. Only after receiving official written refusals is an application to the court drawn up.
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Applications to the registry office |
In the application to establish the fact of a family relationship, it is necessary to indicate the person with whom it is necessary to establish a relationship, who these people are related to each other. If the degree of relationship is distant, then you need to describe in detail the entire chain of family ties. The statement indicates the purpose of going to court and what consequences the establishment of a legal fact will have.
As attachments, it is necessary to submit documents directly or indirectly confirming the relationship. You can also present correspondence, greeting cards and telegrams, joint photographs, from the content of which it will be clear that there is a family connection between people. It is allowed to call witnesses who can confirm the existence of family relationships and the degree of relationship. In this case, witnesses will have to indicate the source of their knowledge.
Note! |
Application to call witnesses |
Submitting an application
An application to establish a legal fact is submitted to the district or city court at the place of registration of the interested person (Article 266 of the Code of Civil Procedure of the Russian Federation). An application regarding a property is considered solely at its location. The relevant papers and a tax payment receipt are attached to the claim.
Procedure:
- Determine the basis for filing the application.
- Prepare an evidence base (see above).
- Draw up a statement to establish a legal fact.
- Wait for the final verdict of the court.
- Provide a writ of execution to a government agency or notary office.
- Receive the missing document on the relationship.
Based on the results of the hearing, the court makes a decision whether to reject or satisfy the stated requirements. Parties who disagree with the court decision may appeal it in the prescribed manner within 10 days (Article 321 of the Code of Civil Procedure of the Russian Federation). If no complaints are received, then the judicial act comes into force after 30 days .
Simultaneously with the start of the trial, the notary must suspend actions related to the registration of inheritance (Article 41 of the Law on Notaries). The issuance of any documents is suspended until the end of the court hearing. The period for consideration of such cases is 2 months (Article 154 of the Code of Civil Procedure of the Russian Federation).
Sample application for establishing family relations
We offer a sample application to establish the fact of family relations, taking into account the latest changes in current legislation.
In ______________________________ (name of the court) Applicant: _______________________ (full name, address, telephone, e-mail) Interested person: ___________ (full name or name, address, for the organization - INN and OGRN,
For an individual, indicate if known:
date and place of birth, place of work,
identifier (passport, SNILS, INN, etc.),
telephone, e-mail)
Application for establishing family relations
I, _________ (full name) and _________ (full name) are relatives of _________ (indicate the degree of relationship). However, documents confirming our relationship have not been preserved due to _________ (specify the reason). It is not possible to independently restore documents confirming our relationship due to _________ (specify the reason).
Currently, there is a need to _________ (indicate the reasons for the need to establish the fact of relationship). Our family relationship is confirmed by _________ (give evidence confirming the existence of a family relationship, full names of witnesses).
Based on the above, guided by Articles 131-132, 264-267 of the Civil Procedure Code of the Russian Federation,
Ask:
- Establish that I, _________ (full name, date of birth), am _________ (indicate the degree of relationship) _________ (full name, date of birth).
List of documents attached to the application:
- Notification of sending (delivery) a copy of the application and documents to interested parties
- Receipt for payment of state duty
- Evidence confirming the existence of this legal fact (documents, acts, letters of a business and personal nature containing information about family relationships)
- Evidence confirming the impossibility of the applicant obtaining the appropriate documents or the impossibility of restoring lost documents (certificate from the civil registry office, etc.)
Date of application “___”_________ ____ Signature _______
statements:
Application to establish the fact of family relations
Registration facts
By way of special proceedings, the following facts characterizing the legal status may be established:
- fact of birth registration;
- fact of registration of adoption;
- fact of marriage registration;
- fact of registration of divorce;
- fact of death registration.
The above legally significant events, as a general rule, are registered by civil registry offices, which issue a certificate of state registration of a civil status act.
However, it may happen that documents confirming the fact of registration are not preserved either by the citizen or by the civil registry office.
Establishing the origin of children during surrogacy
In 2021, the use of artificial reproduction methods is widespread. Surrogacy refers to the introduction of germ cells from other citizens into a surrogate mother to carry and give birth to a child. The procedure is regulated by Federal Law No. 323 of 2011 and is carried out on the basis of an agreement concluded between the parties.
The contract secures the woman’s consent to the bearing and birth of a child, as well as to its subsequent transfer to the other party to the contract. A woman aged 20 to 35 years can act as a surrogate mother. A prerequisite is that she has at least 1 child.
Before concluding the contract, the surrogate mother signs consent to medical intervention. If a woman is officially married, then the consent of her husband must be obtained for the procedure.
Important! The law prohibits the use of a surrogate mother's egg in surrogacy.
To obtain parental rights to a child born by a surrogate mother, it is necessary to obtain her consent. If a woman does not give consent, then maternity can be established by a court decision.
The court must study the case materials: the surrogacy agreement, the reasons for the woman’s refusal to give consent to enter information about the customers as the child’s parents. If there is a properly executed contract, it is possible to satisfy the applicants’ requirements, regardless of the genetic relationship with the child.
Drawing up an application to the court
When making an application, you must provide the following information:
- Full name and address of the applicant, name and address of the interested party. The registry office is most often indicated as the interested party.
- name of the document - Application to establish the fact of birth registration or Application to establish the fact of birth
- circumstances indicating the need to go to court and the loss (impossibility of obtaining) the necessary documents
- pre-trial appeal to the registry office and grounds for refusal to issue documents
- requirement to establish the fact of birth
- list of attached documents
The application is signed by the applicant and indicates the date of filing with the court.
A case from judicial practice
It is also necessary to confirm the fact of birth in cases where the birth certificate is lost. This is where the following precedent may come in handy.
The Foothill Court of the Stavropol Territory considered in 2014 a case (No. 2-694/2014) to establish the fact of birth of citizen Ivanova, born in 1943 (surname changed). She had a Russian national passport, but the archives have lost the birth record.
When considering the case, marriage registration data and witness statements were taken into account. As a result, the applicant's demands were satisfied.
If a woman gave birth to a child in neighboring countries, the lawyer can additionally make inquiries to the medical authorities of the relevant state. This will help in restoring the truth.
What documents confirm the fact of relationship with close and distant relatives?
Documents to confirm relationship include:
- birth and marriage certificates, as well as name change certificates;
- passport records confirming marriage or presence of children;
- court decisions on adoption, adoption or other recognition of family ties;
- certificates issued by the MFC, registry office or other institution with access to the relevant archival data.
If any of the documents was lost or missing for other reasons, you need to contact the following organizations:
- At the MFC or Civil Registry Office: based on the available records, they will provide a certificate or a duplicate of the certificate.
- To the city archive: if the requested documents were issued a long time ago, then they could be transferred from the responsible institution to the archive.
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There are situations when the available evidence is not enough to establish a relationship, and it is not possible to find the lost evidence. In this case, you should go to court with the available evidence.
How additional evidence of family relationships is also considered in court:
- testimony of witnesses, common relatives;
- general family photographs;
- official family tree;
- other indirect evidence of family ties.
Documents confirming the relationship between several people are of great practical importance.
They are of great value, since they are mandatory in some cases and are used as evidence in the event of disputes about property and rights. If they are lost, you can try to restore them.